Sandwich Islands mission diaries of LDS Prophet Joseph F. Smith charts maturity of teen

In 1855, future LDS Church President Joseph F. Smith, son of the martyr Hyrum Smith, was shipped off from Utah to the Sandwich Islands — now called Hawaii — to serve a three-year church mission. What makes it unique is that Smith was only 15. The mission call may have been an attempt to straighten out Joseph F., who had by many accounts a rough adolescence, particularly after his mother, Mary Smith, died when he was 13.

His missionary service served to mature the teen at an early age and he left his mission three years later a man both in size and spirit, with a dedication to the LDS Church that would never waver and lead him to becoming a prophet. The Smith-Petit Foundation, with editor Nathaniel R. Ricks, has compiled the surviving two years — 1856 and 1857 — of diary entries of his mission compiled by Smith. The first year’s entries were destroyed via a fire. They underscore the seriousness in which the teen took his mission, and the heavy responsibilities he was dealt while on the islands.

In fact, Smith was both a mission leader and ecclesiastical leader. In fact, he excommunicated members in the Sandwich Islands. Here’s an entry from April 18, 1856: “I attended meeting this morning and spoke some time to the Saints. Conference again convened at 10 o’clock, much business was transacted pertaining to the mission, among other things Charles S. Atkins was excommunicated from the church for stealing &c. a good spirit prevailed during the day.”

Just a few weeks earlier, Smith recounted a fight over scissors with another missionary that became violent. While working on garments, which in that era required certain parts to be sewed on, a Brother Gordon Linn accused Smith of stealing his scissors. After Linn called Smith a “Damn Shit ass,” Smith approached Linn, saying he wouldn’t take that, and was struck in the temple by Linn. Later in the diaries, there is correspondence between both missionaries that indicate the dispute was healed amicably.

Readers will also enjoy learning of the differences between missionaries of that era and today’s era. Although there were companions, it’s clear from the diaries that Smith was alone often. Also, he was encouraged at times to spend days away from proselyting. Many of the entries are of days spent reading novels, newspapers, letters or writing letters. He also hunted, sailed from Island to Island, milked cows, slaughtered turkeys and steers, worked as a carpenter, and went from house to house searching for food and provisions when supplies were low.

Smith was not immune from the frustrations that many missionaries — in a different culture — experience with the native people. He spent much of his mission trying to find enough food to eat, and was very harsh with the Sandwich Island people, who he thought hoarded food for themselves. The young missionary, although he expressed deep gratitude for helpful native members, was not immune from the bigotry of that era. No doubt meaning it well, Smith nevertheless promised native members in a March 30, 1856 sermon, saying “I spoke a short time by the spirit and prophysied that they would live (some of them) to see their children a white and delitesome people, if they would only obey the laws of God. ...”

Smith was scornful of missionaries from other faiths, as they no doubt were to him. Seeking salvation for the Sandwich Island dwellers was a competitive job among churches of that era. The teen although seethed in anger at apostate members, as well as apostate missionaries, who made his job much harder.

Despite the frankness of the diaries, it would be a help for today’s LDS missionaries to read Smith’s accounts. Many of his accounts include feelings and thoughts to missionaries of any era. The young Smith craved mail from home, and was disconsolate when it didn’t arrive as scheduled. He dealt with household pests (Nov. 6, 1856 entry reads in part: “… the objects of our Distress ware an innumirable quantity of domestic insects … called by some Fleas ...”), Illness, frequent homesickness, was frustrated with unmotivated church investigators and unhelpful local members. And, like many a missionary today, he romanced a girl from home with long letters that he eagerly awaited responses from.

Prior to Smith’s mission, earlier missionaries had enjoyed success in the area. However, time had eroded members’ enthusiasm and much of Smith’s work was devoted to reactivating branches and memberships. Many of the early members no longer considered themselves LDS and were excommunicated. Baptism totals during Smith’s tenure were low as the elders worked to repair the church’s foundation in that area. It’s clear that Smith was a highly valued missionary, willing to work hard and do tasks assigned to him. Readers of the diaries will enjoy even the most mundane entries, as they capture the stolid but diverse life of an early LDS Utah-based missionary.

Legend has it that Smith, upon returning to Utah after sailing to California from the Sandwich Islands, was accosted by a rough character asking if he was a Mormon. Smith, 18, is alleged to have replied, “Yes sir, dyed-in-the-wool, true-blue, through-and through!” After that response, the ruffian complimented Smith on his convictions. Whether the tale is true or not, there is no doubt that Smith’s teenage mission was instrumental in preparing him for a lifetime commitment to his religion.

-- Doug Gibson

-- Originally published at StandardBlogs

In anti-Mormon literature’s ‘golden age,’ even phrenology, or the Mormon skull, was examined

Terryl L. Givens’ “The Viper of the Hearth: Mormons, Myths, and the Construction of Heresy” (Oxford University Press) is perhaps the best work detailing how the evolution of an inexpensive press — and a consistent popular yen for scandal — led to a “golden age” in “anti-” books in religion, notably literature that attacked the Catholics and the Mormons. As Givens explains, the public taste was not geared to theological debates, so these literary attacks on Catholicism, and to an extent Mormonism, were political in nature. The faiths were cast as acting contrary to U.S. patriotism or various ideals. Both faiths were also guilty of crimes of the salacious sort, usually against women. “Danites,” the Mormon defense group that assisted Joseph Smith, were also features in many of the books, usually as a paramilitary group that assisted Brigham Young and other Mormons in murder, kidnapping, or activities against the U.S. government.

There is no end to the fascinating library of anti-Mormon literature — from long Victorian-type novels, to action serials, to detective works, to western novellas. Frankly, the output was ubiquitous. Givens provides a list of titles, “The Courage of Captain Plum,” “The Mormoness; or, the Trials of Mary Maverick,” “Elder Northfield’s Home, “The Mormon Prophet and His Harem” … and many, many more. It’s a fascinating genre, and the majority of these books can be accessed and read on the Internet. The term “Harem” is significant. In his book, Givens argues that “Orientalism,” the effort by Western persons to define Middle East or Asian culture — was a prominent feature in anti-Mormonism of the 19th century. For example, the word “harem” to describe Young or other polygamists, and the use of “Danites” to prop up the leader of the “harem.” In one novel, the antagonist is referred to as the “Attila of the Mormon Kingdom.” (While a polygamous lifestyle can be applied to Middle Eastern culture, as Givens notes, the analogy falls apart as life in Utah and within Mormon polygamy is studied. One example — divorce for a Mormon women in Utah was easy to achieve.)

Like the “sinister china-man” of nativist literature, Mormon men were alleged in many of the literature of having the mystic talents to mesmerize or hypnotize their victims, usually female, with an intense glare. Givens relates one piece of literature that allows the dastardly Mormon men to even hypnotize the fathers of the girls cast into polygamy.

The section in Givens’ book on the how the pseudoscience of phrenology factored into anti-Mormonism was fascinating primarily because it required a deliberate disassociation of the U.S. and British roots of most members of the young, 19th century Mormon faith. It’s an extension of “Orientalism,” applying a sinister tinge to the unpopular Utah-based religion.

A paper was presented at the New Orleans Academy of Sciences in 1861 titled, “Effects and Tendencies of Mormon Polygamy in the Territory of Utah.” In Givens’ book, we read the findings of U.S. Army assistant surgeon Roberts Bartholow, who argues that a “new race” is being created in Utah.

Bartholow writes: “… there is, nevertheless, and expression of countenance and style of feature, which may be styled the Mormon expression and style; an expression compounded of sensuality, cunning, suspicion, and a smirking self-conceit. The yellow, sunken, cadaverous visage; the greenish-colored eyes; the thick protuberant lips; the low forehead; the light, yellowish hair, and the lank, angular person, constitute an appearance so characteristic of the new race, the production of the polygamy, as to distinguish them at a glance. …”

Such pseudoscience dissipated somewhat after the railroad linked Utah with the rest of the nation, and visitors to Salt Lake City failed to see the “differences” that Bartholow noted. Depictions of Mormon countenances were left to satires, such as Mark Twain’s riffs on Mormon women in “Roughing It,” or to Oscar Wilde, who as Givens notes, said of Mormons, “They are … very, very ugly.”

Yet, the condescension and bigotry that allowed phrenology a place at the table in anti-Mormonism is not completely gone. Later in “Vipers …,” Givens notes with contempt this claim by acclaimed Harold Bloom, who Givens writes, had “learned to tell the difference between certain Mormons and most Gentiles at first sight.” Bloom, Givens adds, noted “something organized about the expressions on many Mormon faces as they go by in the street.”

Givens’ book is well worth reading for those interested in the cultural perceptions of Mormonism as well as the growth of the press, as well as books and novels, in the 19th century. Even as technological changes moved much of the propaganda and exploitation press to other venues — film, the Internet, cable TV “reality” series and documentaries — what makes these “exposes” of Catholicism, Mormonism, or any other currently unpopular “-isms” is the public’s fascination with that which is considered criminal, anti-social or at odds with American values. The arguments, be they religious or some other topic, are less important than the “sizzle” which sells the steak, which allows the consumer to be properly outraged, titilated or most important, allowed to feel superior to a subject and persons they know virtually nothing about.

In “Viper …,”  Givens quotes Catholic sociologist Thomas F. O’Dea’s wry observation that “‘The Book of Mormon’ has not been universally considered by its critics as one of those books that must be read in order to have an opinion of it.”

-- Doug Gibson

-- Originally published at StandardBlogs.