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Missouri Era: Residue of Wisdom

Elder John K. Carmack

It is hard to find a winner in the tragic events which comprise the Missouri era of Church history. Looking back we seem to see an old movie in which the speeding locomotive pulling dozens of cars behind it is approaching a country intersection towards which an automobile is speeding on the highway, each unaware of the other, with no warning signal to alert either the train conductor or the automobile driver. The spectators see it all unfolding before their eyes with a sense of impending doom. Looking back on the events and assessing negligence, blame, and proximate cause does not lessen the toll in life, property and carnage.

There was enough blame to go around and plenty of losers. The big loser was Governor Lilburn W. Boggs of Missouri, who became known nationally as the author of an order to exterminate a whole segment of his state's population-the Mormons. Repeated attempts to get Governor Boggs to go to the scene to ascertain the true situation reached deaf ears. He preferred, it seems, to act on rumors and dubious accusations. The state of Missouri became tarred with the brushes of prejudice, lawlessness, and brutality for its treatment of the Mormons. The residue of that brutal and lawless era remains a part of Missouri's heritage, although present day Missourians are in no way responsible for the events of the 1830s.

The reputations of Generals John B. Clark and Samuel D. Lucas were tarnished by a combination of pettiness, ego, and prejudice during the Mormon War. Their unseemly management of the roles assigned during the skirmish with the Mormons was noised abroad and thus did little to enhance their places in history.

On the other side of the fence were the Mormons, fighting for their lives and property. Missouri citizens and officials seemed to have believed that they had the right to expel a large group of men and women because they disliked and feared them. Although the Saints were clearly the injured party, some among them hurt their cause. Sampson Avard was perhaps the leading loser for his part in leading a small secretive organization to engage in activities of fanatical zeal. Avard successfully escaped blame and prosecution for his excesses by pointing the finger at Joseph Smith. By making the Prophet responsible for his own complicity, Avard besmirched his own reputation, although it probably saved his life in the short run.

Avard's self-serving and unreliable testimony at the preliminary court hearing involving charges against Joseph Smith and his companions in arms has raised questions of what Joseph Smith and Sidney Rigdon knew. Similar questions are still raised by writers unsympathetic to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in modern-day attempts to discredit both Joseph Smith and the Church. Even today the label "Danites" is recklessly pinned on the Church when attempts are made to discredit it by tying it in with foul play of one kind or another.