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The Zelph Story
By Kenneth W. Godfrey

When the twenty men who formed the vanguard of Zion's Camp left Kirtland, Ohio, on 1 May 1834, they could not know that one of their most lasting and intriguing contributions to Latter-day Saint history would take place, not on a Missouri battlefield but rather on top of a large mound in Illinois. This elevation, located about one mile south of modern Valley City, has been called Naples-Russell Mound Number 8, Pike County. According to historian Stanley B. Kimball, this mound is a "typical prehistoric Middle Woodland mortuary complex of the Hopewell culture." There, on 3 June 1834, members of Zion's Camp located a few bones, including a broken femur and an arrowhead, approximately a foot below the earth's surface, and these remains became the catalyst for revelation to Joseph Smith regarding the skeleton's identity. Subsequently, the information recorded by several of the camp's members would be used by historians, geographers, and other scholars as evidence that Book of Mormon events, especially those reported in its closing chapters, took place in the northeastern part of the United States. Because this account is cited so frequently, usually as it is given in the History of the Church, it seems useful to examine closely the primary sources reporting the details of this extraordinary event.

The day after the finding of Zelph, the Prophet Joseph Smith, "on the banks of the Mississippi River," wrote a letter to his wife, Emma. While he does not mention Zelph by name, Joseph describes the setting in general:

The whole of our journey, in the midst of so large a company of social honest and sincere men, wandering over the plains of the Nephites, recounting occasionally the history of the Book of Mormon, roving over the mounds of that once beloved people of the Lord, picking up their skulls & their bones, as a proof of its divine authenticity, and gazing upon a country the fertility, the splendour and the goodness so indescribable, all serves to pass away time unnoticed.

Naples-Russell Mound Number 8, Pike County, Illinois, where Zelph was found.
Photograph, taken March 1989, courtesy of Donald Q. Cannon

Obviously, Joseph and his companions were inspired and elated as they moved closer to their land of promise in Missouri. The territory they were in was vast, rich, and unsettled. The ghostly mounds of former inhabitants, however, reminded Joseph and his camp that the land had once been occupied. As they went, they naturally talked about the Book of Mormon. Joseph called the land "the plains of the Nephites." They believed that the mounds had belonged to "that once beloved people," and they interpreted the mere fact that skulls and bones were readily found as evidence of the divine authenticity of the book. Evidently they were most impressed by the evidence that a prior civilization had been destroyed from off the face of this land, for the Book of Mormon similarly reports the destruction of a large group of people on this continent. Simple confirmation of the fact that destructions had taken place was evidence enough for these adventurers that the Book of Mormon was true.