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It is impossible to overstate the central importance of William Clayton to everything we think we know about Joseph’s polygamy. We will be dedicating two complete episodes to this interesting and troubling man and his highly problematic journals and claims.
Sincere thanks to Jeremy Hoop and his diligent research in preparing these presentation.
Pull up some oranges, raisins, or ginger lozenges and join us a for a deep dive into the journals and the mind of William Clayton — the linchpin of Joseph’s polygamy.
Links
William Clayton Journal
William Clayton 1874 Affidavit
James Allen Biography of William Clayton
Transcript
[00:00] Michelle: Welcome to 132 problems revisiting Mormon polygamy. I am so excited to be finally bringing you this episode. This is the long awaited first part of my conversation with Jeremy Hoop about William Clayton. For anyone who doesn’t understand. William Clayton is such a critical figure in the entire discussion of Mormon polygamy because everything hangs on him the entire veracity of section 132 almost everything that we think we know about Emma and Emma and Joseph and their relationship and so many other things. And so it is really important to get to the bottom of who this very complicated and problematic man was and to understand much more about him. So I am so excited to dig into this information. I hope that you will all share it far and wide. I hope you will find it extremely informative and helpful as we parse out all of these complicated parts of Joseph’s polygamy. I also want to say, I know that there are other topics that we still need to get to some of the responses that I haven’t been able to finish yet. I only have so much time. I promise you that I will get to them. There are answers to every single thing. It just takes time to dig in and prepare and outline an episode and be able to present it. So it is all coming, but I wanted to bring these episodes first. So thank you so much for joining us as we take this deep dive into the very murky waters of William Clayton. Ok, Jeremy. Here we are fair warning to everyone. This is going to be a lot. Am I right? How many slides do you have to share with us in this one presentation? I think
[01:55] Jeremy Hoop: it’s 100 and 60 something.
[01:57] Michelle: Ok. So do you need to give any preliminaries about? I’ve said a little bit about who William Clayton is and what hangs on him? Is that going to be in your presentation? Or should we just start by letting people know why this matters so much?
[02:09] Jeremy Hoop: Maybe the why? Yeah, we’ll give the bio in a second.
[02:13] Michelle: OK. So you, so you do want to, I didn’t understand. Do you want to give a little preliminary of why this matters so much? Why William is so important? Why? It’s
[02:23] Jeremy Hoop: probably good? Yes.
[02:25] Michelle: OK. So, so I’ll start, I already said the only witness to 132 100% of the veracity of 132 coming in the way that we are told is hangs on William Clayton. He’s the only one living to tell the tale. William Clayton’s journals that they claim are contemporary are the only source for most of the information we have about polygamy about Emma’s behavior. Joseph’s behavior. Many of the things happening. Tell me what else hangs on him or those are the two main things I’m aware of.
[02:58] Jeremy Hoop: Um, a lot of what we understand or we think we understand, like you said Joseph’s behavior, but it also indicates elements of his character, but also Emma’s mental state. Um People believe that Emma has a mental disorder only because really of William Clayton and, and what other people will say later. But what they say is based in what uh what is in the pages of what’s called his journal. And we’re going to explore elements of that, not all of it. Today. Today, we’re going to focus on a part which we’ll talk about, but, but we’re going to, we’re going to cover the whole thing. We’re going to cover all of the salient elements of uh William Clayton’s impact on this narrative.
[03:46] Michelle: OK. So this is, I don’t think I’m overstating it. You can tell me if you think I am to say if William Clayton is trustworthy, then Joseph was the author of 132. Joseph was the author of polygamy. Emma was insane and unstable. Joseph was cheating on Emma, right? All all of that. If, if that is not true. If, if, if Joseph wasn’t the author of 132 that wasn’t the author of polygamy, right? Like it all, it all hangs on the trustworthiness of this one man, right? If he’s trustworthy, that is true. If he’s not trustworthy, none of that is true because there is no other source for it, other than the later claims that build on it, which we have already proven false. For example, the story of Emma pushing Eliza down the stairs that grew into her, having a miscarriage and grew into her becoming infertile. We know that that is false. We know that there are so many falsehoods that we’re told later. So William Clayton is the lynchpin and on, on which all of this hangs. So I want everyone to really understand why we are doing, going to dedicate so much time to this one guy.
[04:56] Jeremy Hoop: Uh Other than what James Allen has written, I, I’ve not, I’ve never heard anyone discuss William Clayton. Um I actually, I’ve never heard anyone discuss William Clayton in the way that we’re gonna do it today and, and in, in a subsequent episode, um but in terms of uh in depth discussion, um at least in written form, James Allen is the one who’s done the most work on Clayton and others have written on him, George D Smith and, and, and others, he has done some work on Clayton. But um is
[05:26] Michelle: the one that had access to the journalist, right? Isn’t he the one that wrote some transcripts from the journalist about Alan? Ok. I’ll let you go.
[05:34] Jeremy Hoop: Ok. And we’re gonna talk more about Alan next time and, and his assessment of Clayton. Um, but in terms of today’s discussion, uh we wanna, we wanna try to understand a little bit about William, uh his character, his mindset. And if we can determine from the things he left behind, if he’s someone that we should, we should trust and believe
[05:59] Michelle: to this extent, especially if he, if he is trustworthy enough to be the only source for all of this. 100%. So, OK, let’s get into it. We’ve got a lot. I know you’ve got a lot for us. So
[06:12] Jeremy Hoop: first off, this is part of our series of talking about. Um if I can share my screen those that love and make a lie. This is part two in terms of understanding this story. Um First of all, it’s in the broader context of a number of stories that when you pull them apart, they don’t add up in the last episode. We, we visited Brigham and Hebrew in just a small portion of some of the things that they said. And what I want to emphasize that we’re looking at a small portion of some of the things that these people said. If we took, we could take weeks and analyze Brigham Young. And I think that if we did that by the end of it, you’d say the guy said some nice things. But for the most part, wow, when you really look at what he said, it’s not difficult to do anyone who has access to his writings. And um and they’re publicly available, the complete discourses of Brigham Young when you have access to his writings, you realize, wow, this, this guy, um it’s pretty easy to understand actually, I think. Um and he’s not, you know, he, he’s not Genghis Khan, he’s not, he’s not pol pot but, but he’s a, he’s a, a small d dictator, you know, and, and that’s funny, small d dictator, but he’s, he’s
[07:45] Michelle: his own brand. He’s his own breed. They’re all a little bit different, but he definitely loved power and wielded power and used it to benefit himself at the expense of others. And that’s one thing that they have in common. Yes.
[07:59] Jeremy Hoop: And when you look at, when you look at Hebrew Kimball, you get, you get similar kinds of things. Uh You get men who have extraordinary egos who have extraordinary disregard for women who view women and others as their either property or their minions to control. Um That may sound harsh if you’re coming into this for the first time, I’d recommend going and, and listening to that previous episode, just to get a
[08:26] Michelle: sense, I think I do, I do want, I want to just remind everybody that Brigham Young and Hebrew Kimball were writing about this extensively in England on their missions before they ever claimed Joseph Smith taught it either of them, both of them claim to have had the revelation before and, and how you were just describing them and their sort of their egos and their, their relationship with women. It’s so interesting because the um the program that they started this principle that they started trains that it embeds it. Like I was just listening to another woman who has escaped from polygamy talking about how five year old boys are narcissists in the making because they are taught from their earliest childhood that they are, you know, they are the God and the women are there for their, to serve them. So it really is interesting how their personality embedded itself into their principle that they, that they started and that they insisted on and taught.
[09:26] Jeremy Hoop: Absolutely. And so in the last episode, we talked about what we, what we’re calling the godfathers of this whole situation of the, the plural marriage revelation. Um And by the way, I have never once heard anyone of the antagonists to the, to the restoration or the apologists to the institutions ever address, really address what we talked about last time. I think that’s something to consider. Um I think what we did was a me really measured and thoughtful approach to understanding the mindset of those two men, what they did in detail long before Joseph supposedly ever said a word to them. And I think that’s worthy of consideration today, we’re going to talk about um one aspect one aspect of the plural marriage revelation story. Um And you know, the, it, it, the, the the consensus consensus narrative goes something like this that um it was received on July 12th, 1843. Um I’m not going to go through the whole tale, but that Hiram came to Joseph and said, hey, we got to convince Emma that this is right. And so can you write this down and, and Clayton happened to be there and, and a uh uh Hiram says, please, please, please. He says, well, I don’t know. He hemmed and hot. And um finally, he said, OK, Clayton, get some paper, um go write it down. And Hiram said, use the thumb, use the and thumb and, and Joseph said, no, don’t worry. I’ve got it memorized. I know it by heart. And um so they took three hours, wrote it down and um in Clayton’s journal, he says that Joseph and Hiram went to, to um give it to Emma and she was rebellious in his 1874 affidavit. He said, Hiram went alone. Um uh and then uh Emma freaked out that was the beginning of this revelation. OK. There’s all kinds of things about that. The tale. We’re gonna talk about some of that in the next episode. Um There’s all kinds of pieces to this that are important uh hail and um others believe that it’s um a foregone conclusion that this is a true story. Um They believe the provenance of it is firmly established. They believe that there are contemporaneous sources that firmly established the provenance of it sources like Austin Cowell, who signed an affidavit, uh the wi the laws um William and Jane law signed an affidavit saying that one. Austin was in the, the Nuha Council um in August of 1843 when Hiram supposedly read this polygamy or plural marriage or celestial marriage revelation, William and Jane I’m
[12:09] Michelle: planning to do an episode. I have an episode in the works on what Hyrum read what the laws saw and on all of there is a great, there’s so much information there. So anyway, I just wanted to let people know that story.
[12:21] Jeremy Hoop: That’s a great story that most people don’t understand. And I have never, and I’m challenging you, Brian Hales, I’ve never heard people address adequately what really happened that day. There’s all kinds of pieces that are never addressed in that story in just the, the the Hiram reading it to the High Council. And later on what they say about that in the Nabu City High Council, uh not Nabu City Council minutes in June 8th and 10th of 1844. Right? Previous to the the martyrdom, there is a lot to understand about these stories. They are not as simple or they are not as uh two D as this picture here represents. And so um we are accused of not addressing certain things that they bring up, look, we have to address everything they bring up. We’re kind of on in the, on the defense team. So we have to, we have to answer every single charge. And today we’re going to talk about one aspect of the charge. And that’s this Clayton story um by first examining William Clayton himself. Um in terms of uh this revelation, there are some important considerations that also ought to be factored in that we won’t address today. But at a future date, those things are, are going to be addressed in great detail. Um, understanding, uh, the motivations of two factions. By the way, there are two factions that are primarily opposed to Joseph Smith. People who want him dead. Ok. They want him dead and other people,
[13:59] Michelle: John Bennett and the laws and uh huh.
[14:01] Jeremy Hoop: And people who wanna wanna usurp his quote kingdom. Ok. Um, understanding the culture of the people that live in, in Utah, Mormon. Um, uh, understanding, um, uh, the fact that the, the nature of the evidence you’re looking at these things are really important to understand. We, we don’t have time to address all that stuff today constantly. When, when we give presentations, we are accused of not dealing with all the evidence. We’re taking this piece by piece methodically, there’s just too
[14:38] Michelle: much to deal with it all at once. There’s too much so we do the best we can the chunk of it.
[14:43] Jeremy Hoop: That’s right. I gave a talk four years ago now. Um where I said this is an opening statement, it’s just an opening statement and I gave a summary of what I think the main issues are and it was always my intention and, and now it’s the intention of so many others. Um others before me to do a full exhaustive treatment of this, but it takes a bit because this is not a simple issue. Um They want to make it a simple issue. A whole bunch of people said a whole bunch of stuff. Therefore, you know, therefore he’s guilty. Well, you have to examine the whole bunch of stuff that the whole bunch of people said and you have to understand the nature of those things and see if it holds up. And so today, um the title is Rewriting Revelation. I call it rewriting a revelation because there was a revelation. Um We won’t go into that today, but there was a revelation on marriage. Joseph acknowledged it. Hiram acknowledged it. Many other people talked about it contemporaneously. And after the fact, um a revelation on ceiling on a man and a woman being married for eternity. Joseph taught it on July 16th 1843. He taught it publicly. Hiram taught that revelation to the Nabu High Council imm referenced it in April 8th, 1844 Joseph referenced what he taught in the, in the Nabu City Council minutes on June 10th of 1844 Joseph taught this publicly, he also publicly taught against the things that he was accused of doing. And so the reason why this gets all confused is because frankly, these two guys, William Clayton and Joseph Joseph C Kingsbury, the only two supposed witnesses. Now there is only one witness as you said correctly of the supposed event of the revelation being quote received. It’s a complicated story because the reception of the revelation is, is a little fuzzy. Um Was it 1831? Was it 1829? As Brigham Young said by the way, well,
[16:55] Michelle: and also let me just throw in the fact that it’s, it’s illogical. It’s just a nonstarter from the beginning because Hiram says, please get the urm. And Thummim Joseph says, I don’t need it. I’ve got it memorized. So it was a previous, previous revelation that he has memorized that it speaks to a that’s happening right then. Was God threatening Emma with destruction back in 1831? Right? Or was it in 1843 because she was rebellious according to Clayton? So there are so many things like that that it just doesn’t work anyway.
[17:26] Jeremy Hoop: And we’re going, we’re going to examine all of that stuff in detail either in these episodes or, or in other formats because that whole entire narrative needs to be understood. Um every aspect of the story to see if it holds up. But first off, let’s take a look at Clayton, William Clayton. Ok.
[17:47] Michelle: We’re getting into it. Yes, I’m
[17:49] Jeremy Hoop: calling little Clayton Casanova because the man likes him. Some lady folk.
[17:55] Michelle: The guy had a sex drive. We will say that.
[17:58] Jeremy Hoop: Yeah. Uh, yes, he had 10 wives. Two of them left him but 10 wives and 47 Children. He was actually much more prolific at baby making to Brigham Young or he kimball much more and he had far less wives even though, you know, 10 and then eight is a handful. He was born in 1814 in Penwortham. That’s in the uh the, I don’t know what they call it. A county or province of Lancashire. It’s up in the northern part of England. Um It’s the, it’s, if you can think of the, the Beatles, you know how they talk like this and then, you know, it’s, hey, John, how are you doing? And so it’s that Lilty English working man accent. Ok. And that’s what he would have had. Um son of Thomas Clayton and Critchley. He was the oldest of 14 kids. Um He was educated by his dad who was a school teacher. He apparently was a great musician and we know that he wrote, Come Come Saints, right? Um But he learned, he grew up playing piano. I learned to play the drum, the violin and the French horn. I believe he worked as a textile factory clerk in Penwortham. And in 1836 married his first wife, Ruth. We’ll, we’ll hear a little bit about Ruth, only a little actually, but a little bit about Ruth throughout this narrative. Uh He actually doesn’t talk a lot about her, which is kind of interesting. Um He married her in his hometown. He’s baptized by Hebrew Kimball in 1837. Um He was ordained a priest by Hebrew Kimball in 1837. Um And then um in 1838 after being ordained a high priest by Hebrew Kimball, he quit his factory job um and decided to serve a mission, you know, like so many at that point and he was on fire. I mean, he really was this, this guy put his whole, whole heart and soul into it. Um And he became the second counselor in the mission presidency as a 26 year old man serving, I believe it was um Joseph Fielding, serving with Joseph Fielding. Um and he eventually would immigrate to or emigrate to Nabu um in 1840 middle, middle to the middle to the end, I believe in. Uh he started preparations in July of 1840 he would leave uh shortly thereafter, he was a member of the Nabu Masonic Lodge that will factor in later. He served as a recorder and scribe for Joseph um 1842 to 1842 844. Really? He was a clerk. The bulk of his duties appear to be as a clerk, dealing with um financial transactions, uh recording temple um uh receiving a temple funds, um activities regarding the temple baptisms, et cetera.
[20:49] Michelle: Um Let me, let me just step on that one second. It is important to clarify. William was not. Clayton was not describe of any revelation. The only revelation that he claims to have been described for was section 132 which we don’t have the original because supposedly Emma burned it. So we have literally like that, that’s a real anomaly.
[21:10] Jeremy Hoop: And we will examine what we will examine what James Whitehead says about William Clayton. James Whitehead was also one of the clerks. James Whitehead claims to be, have been the personal secretary of Joseph Smith in charge of his, his um, personal letter books and his personal journals. Hm. That’s interesting. We’ll talk about that later. But, um, because the, the idea of what Clayton was really in charge of what his, his duties responsibilities were, I think is interesting to examine based on what he tells us, um, in his own writings. Yeah.
[21:46] Michelle: And you know what, it’s also good to clarify Clayton’s journal like Joseph’s journal which James Whitehead would have kept, which we don’t have, we have the, the journal that Willard Richards kept for Joseph, but we don’t have um whiteheads. And so it is important, I just want to point out that what the information we have is not from Joseph’s journal. It’s from William Clayton’s own personal journal. He wasn’t a journalist for Joseph Smith and that’s an important distinction. And again, let me clarify when we’re saying journal don’t mix that up to think that means a daily record that was kept at the time. We don’t think that’s what his journal was.
[22:23] Jeremy Hoop: I’m going to give a spoiler here. It wasn’t a daily record for those of you who are watching this who think I’m nuts. I’ll prove it to you. I’ll prove it to you. In fact, I’ll prove that you cannot prove that it was a daily record and I’ll show you why, but that’s something that we will reveal. Um I know that sounds audacious but um I think
[22:48] Michelle: we better pick up the page just a little bit because you’ve got a lot to get through. He was
[22:52] Jeremy Hoop: a member of the council of 50. Um and he went to Utah in 1846. Like I said, he had 10 wives, two divorced and 47 Children. He died at 65 years old in 1879.
[23:02] Michelle: So did you say he went to Utah in 1846? Because that, how did he go before 1847 when Brigham went?
[23:09] Jeremy Hoop: Um that’s the, that’s what I found in the Joe Smith papers. So that’s what they’re saying. So in fact, that doesn’t sound right to
[23:19] Michelle: me. So you might be right. I can look it up while you’re talking. You keep going
[23:24] Jeremy Hoop: little fact checking. So understand Clayton is really critical. Why? Because he’s what they call their smoking gun. Um He is the only, as you mentioned, the only contemporaneous source. Now, I know other people have said here’s all this contemporary evidence. No, it’s not evidence. Accusations are not evidence. Correlation is not causation. I mean, we we need to understand these things um that when you accuse someone unless you can corroborate the accusation, the accusation is not evidence. And during Joseph’s lifetime, there is things, there are things that are basically correlation and really stretchy correlation. And there are accusations. You have to corroborate those. This is where they corroborate everything. It’s with Clayton. And so um we have to understand the nature of this source in order to get to that to a determination. Um And by the way, Clayton is the reason why apologists and antagonists feel so confident in their assertions. Yes, we have all these people later on who said a bunch of stuff in 1869 and onward wrote, wrote affidavits and gave accounts, et cetera and published things in the papers. Um But it’s this journal that gives them the confidence to say those other things are true. And it’s also why so many people absolutely hate Joseph Smith as we will see
[24:54] Michelle: is the reason. OK,
[24:56] Jeremy Hoop: as you’ll see today, partly and in the next episode,
[25:01] Michelle: let me, let me just answer this one question. So if you Google search when Clayton got, went to Utah, it does say February 1846 but that’s actually when he was forced to flee NAVOO. So he left NAVOO February 46 and he arrived in Utah, I think 24th of September 1840 makes sense because he went
[25:18] Jeremy Hoop: to, he went to Whitter quarters and, and uh so thank you, thank you for that clarification. So if we’re going to understand William Clayton, it requires that we understand several things. Number one, we have to understand his English journal. I am so surprised that this has not been an area of inquiry or study or, or um that we haven’t had full treatises and papers written on this subject, James Allen touches on it. But um we’re going to see what James Allen said, says about this period a little bit here in a second. We also have to understand how his behavior in England, which has to do with b by the way, spending all kinds of time as a young man alone, as a missionary, as the second councilor in the mission presidency, alone with women, um all kinds of time. And so his relationships with Willard Brigham and Heber and how his behavior in England and those relationships carry over in the nut. It’s not, he just learns this stuff from Joseph and all of a sudden boom that he’s off to the races. We’re going to see that this begins far uh long before three years before we need to understand his work as a clerk and, or, and, or copyist, which I’ll explain in the next episode, his infamous nau journal is not a contemporaneous record. As we will see um his evolving tales of the July 12th, 1843 revelation will touch on those in the next episode and how his story connects to the story that will be told by Joseph C Kingsbury. That’s fascinating. There’s some incredible things that we learn from Clayton about Kingsbury that we’ll touch on later. So if we go into his journal, in his own words, we we’re gonna see he is extremely candid at times and it’s, it’s a, it’s a fascinating read. Um As this 26 year old, he has left his wife and his two daughters, his two young daughters, three and two, Sarah and Margaret. Um He never mentions his wife by name. Uh except to say that he’s written a letter to her but not by name, but he’s written a, wrote a letter to my wife, received a letter from my wife. Even when he returns home, there are no expressions of joy or, or, or, or wonderful reunion with one minor exception. Um It’s really odd. Ruth is quite absent from the narrative other than in a perfunctory way. Um He, as I mentioned, he’s serving the second co uh as a second counsel mission presidency. As expected. He’s doing lots of missionary stuff, preaching, visiting the sick. He, he deals with tons of really interesting drama with the members of the church, the Saints in the area that alone deserves its own paper because it’s a AAA fascinating read to get a sense of the zeitgeist of the times, but also this culture of um uh Manchester. And if you’ll call them that saints and, and kind of how they deal with each other. It’s really fascinating. He meets frequently with the 12, especially with Richards, Kimball Young Taylor and Woodruff. He writes Richards all the time. We can see the beginnings of their collaboration here in England. Um
[28:35] Michelle: OK, so let me, let me just pause on that for a second. Richards, Kimball Taylor and Young and Clayton are all in England together before that. Right. Right. I’m just that, that group right there that you named is really important, right? That they were all there together and we have their journals like kind of showing this pre this existed at that time. So that’s, that’s just, it’s amazing that none of us know this and that no one cares.
[29:07] Jeremy Hoop: Yeah, we, we have stories about the, the, the 12 mission to England and this and all the converts and this glorious harvest that was reaped there. But I think there were other things going on. We’re going to see that especially by an incredible letter that I found that reveals a lot. Um There are also in this journal, there are strange accusations by people towards William and those accusations in varying varying matters continue in de nau. It’s really bizarre. And then even James Whitehead, uh, offers up an accusation that had been, had against Clayton around stuff with money. It’s just odd that he’s constantly being accused of things, which I find interesting. Um, he records tons of gifts from, from members because they went without personal script and they were given things, but he records all the gifts and some of the gifts are really interesting. Um, he has many interesting strange dreams. Um I’ll share a few of those. He spends a great deal deal time alone with women by the way, like I mentioned, but often very late at night or early in the morning, very late at night. Um And a good number of these women that he meets in, in his Manchester mission are later marital interests in nu-
[30:27] Michelle: and, and those journals as I’ve read those late at night, it doesn’t necessarily say went home after like, right, he’s spending time late at night and then we don’t know the rest of the story,
[30:40] Jeremy Hoop: right? He’s boarding with a Mrs Hardman and he’ll often have supper. And when, when we read this, you should, people should know I had to look up English meal times back in the 18 forties and, and supper was had usually starting around nine pm or later, but could go to as late as 2 a.m. It was a basically a midnight snack. It was your, it was your late night snack before bed. And so when it says took s with so and so or took D that’s dinner or took, I can’t even figure out what C is, or took w which is water, took water with. So and so or took B which is breakfast, you can kind of get a sense for the time of day. So oftentimes he’ll take s with a woman and then take B with the same woman. And so it’s really, I don’t, it doesn’t mean necessarily anything. It’s just interesting that he’s,
[31:34] Michelle: although this whole conversation I think should be done with the shadow of if this were Joseph Smith’s writing about a woman and he took dinner with, he took supper with her and then took breakfast with her. I think we should all keep that in mind because we have nothing from Joseph Smith and we have all of these, from these other sources and the instinct to explain one away and accuse the other one is astounding
[32:02] Jeremy Hoop: four of the women. Um in this English period become his wives. Um his first wife, Ruth, he will marry her sister and he will marry Alice Hardman and her sister Jane in Nuvo. Um He’s the first one that I’m aware of to do. Sister, wives, true, sister, wives, sister pairs. Um And in fact, he’s, he, he pulls a number of firsts which we’ll see. So first we want to give special emphasis to a woman named Sarah Crooks. There’s others, there’s Rebecca Alice Mary Aspen’s sister Booth. Um, but Sarah Crooks seems to, um, have the attention of, of William in a special way. He spends nearly every day with her for months. And when I say every day it’s most of the day he travels with her, walks with her bed breakfast with her supper, with her conversing with her, writing to her. Even when he’s away, he’s writing to her. He, uh, there are strange dreams about William marrying multiple women that come from her. Um, they’re often accompanied by her friend Rebecca. Um, and he’s often taking supper with her, staying up till the wee hours of the morning, often till at two or past 2 a.m. Sarah will wash his feet eight times which we’ll, um, we take a look at and then there are these strange redacted journal entries which we’re going to look at as well. Now, first James Allen, who is the principal biographer for William Clayton. Why? Because he basically had the most access to his journals. Um, he was given access, I believe in the late 18 seventies and, um, 19
[33:46] Michelle: seventies, 19 seventies.
[33:48] Jeremy Hoop: And, um, uh, he made a full, he made the only full and complete typescript of the nu’s and some interesting features of the journals that we were able to ascertain. Uh, when I say we’re able to, they’re not publicly available. We have excerpts from them only. Um, today we’ll be quoting from those excerpts. Um, but he says this about the relationship with, with William Sarah. He says, it’s clear that this special relationship was open and Clayton was careful to make it so all the saints in Manchester knew about it. And back in home, back home in Penwortham Ruth was fully aware of it. On occasion, Sarah even gave Clayton various gifts for his wife and family. There is no evidence that their relationship ever went beyond the bounds of propriety. And then he says, being, being convinced of a principle is quite different from putting, putting it into practice and there and lay a great human drama for Clayton. He was delighted with the possibility that Sarah Crooks would become one of his first plural wives. This is talking later in Nabu, which we’ll see um since he had known her back in Manchester and the two had become very, very close Ruth too, was acquainted with her and they all got along very well indeed. So
[35:05] Michelle: I think we also, we also need to point out that James Allen is also a great apologist. He’s very much an apologist looking at it. It’s like, it’s like hearing that from Brian Hales in a way, right? It’s going to be through that
[35:17] Jeremy Hoop: lens from everything I understand about James Allen. He just seems like a fantastic historian and really a lovely person. I couldn’t disagree more with that characterization. However, um that’s what he said now, interestingly enough, William Clayton in 1874. Would tell this about his relationship with Sarah. He said one day in the month of February 1843 date not remembered. The prophet invited me to walk with him during our walk. He said he had learned that there was a sister back in England to whom I was very much attached. That’s Sarah, I replied, there was but nothing further than an attachment such as a brother and sister in the church might rightfully entertain for each other. Ok. Well, let’s take a look and see what we can assess. So first mention of Sarah’s on the 13th of January 1840 he mentions her. Um Sarah c crooks is grieved at S Perkins being hurt at a little at a little thing. Sarah Crooks gave me. I think it’s 20. I don’t know how to read these markings. I don’t know what they mean. I’ll have to find out but it’s like £20 or something like that. Um or 20 pence. Um Sarah was grieved because I objected and said if I did not take it, she, he’s she’s offering him gifts. If I did not take it, I must speak to her no more. She seemed grieved. He talk, he, he mentioned this, this kind of stuff. A lot, a lot of people are vexed and grieved and rebellious and, and they seem very low. He’s often mentioning, mentioning, often mentioning the emotional state of the people that he’s interacting with, which gives us a lot about both him and the the interactions that he’s going to have on the 19th of January, a very interesting dream. There have been several dreams in the church concerning my wife. During the last 10 days. First, I dreamt I was in the middle of a garden full of ripe fruit. And after bringing some home was going again and my wife ran up a hill before me and vanished out of my sight. Another night, I dreamed that I was at Hodgson’s Penwortham amongst ripe gooseberries. As above. I felt like a single or unmarried person. Sister Dewsnup dreamed that she saw me at hard man’s with one child in great trouble and the child was crying for bread. I asked her to get it something to eat while I went somewhere. Sarah Crooks dreamed that one of the American brethren was talking and joking about me having a second wife and Sarah joked, et cetera. So she thought I then had a sec. I, uh I had then a second wife. Sister C Crooks. I think it’s her sister says today she dreamed that I was stripped, uh, in the greatest trouble. My wife was either dead or near to dying and I had one child with me. Sister Jones dreamed same as Sister Dewsnup. What is going on?
[38:18] Michelle: Let’s think of the steps here that not only are people. I mean, how many do you go tell your dreams to the mission president of like that’s, I think when James Allen says nothing like her propriety again, I want to point out, ok, go to go have like midnight snacks and then breakfast and wash the feet of your steak president who’s married, right? And then tell him about your dreams about his dead wife and that he had multiple wives. This is, this is Bizarro. Ok. So sorry, a
[38:53] Jeremy Hoop: little spoiler alert. We decided to ask chat GG BT about washing feet in the 18 forties. We’re gonna see what chat GP T has to say about that. 21st of January 1840 we came back to Hardman. This is the place where he’s boarding the Hardman case. Uh Sister Hardman and sister Hardman and he ends
[39:09] Michelle: up marrying two of the daughters, right? So two of the daughters that he’s living with,
[39:16] Jeremy Hoop: I wrote a letter to, to s Crooks, that’s Sarah and gave it to her. There were several of the sisters present went after taking s to Crook Street to sleep, found them in bed. I don’t, sometimes he mentions stuff, I don’t know, really know what’s going on, but he, I don’t think that anything is going on here. But odd 23rd, January 1840 B at John Hardman. That’s breakfast, received a letter from Bro Richards and answered it. Uh sent one also to my wife. That’s kind of how he mentions the letter exchanged with him and his wife written one for Mary Hardman and to Nottingham sister, Mary Hardman has dreamed about seeing my wife with her hair down upon her back in all disorder. She seemed in distress and was coming to Manchester to seek me. But I was gone to blum no Children with her. Why are people having these dreams about problems with his wife
[40:04] Michelle: and then telling him and then he’s writing them down? It’s like he’s looking for them. It’s like he’s asking, have you dreamed anything about my wife being in
[40:11] Jeremy Hoop: trouble? So, um my wife and I currently we talk about dreams a lot and uh there’s a green Bible and sometimes it’s just our minds working out the problems of the day or going through things or trying to make sense of the world or sometimes trying to tell us stuff I believe God speaks to us in dreams. Is it possible that there’s stuff in the air that’s being talked about or whispered about? I don’t know. Um That’s coming up in dreams 24th January 1840 went to sister William Miller saws Perkins all pretty comfortable. Uh This is just to show he’s, he’s starting to spend quite a bit of time just going to women’s houses.
[40:49] Michelle: Can I make one point? Really? Can I just do I want to steal man? So if anyone is listening to this, that’s more on the faithful polygamy is of God’s side and they’re thinking, oh, this could have been God preparing him and sending these messages, right? I just want to point out if anyone is thinking that all of these dreams are about his first wife being in great distress. So even if you want to claim that this is God preparing him, it’s kind of like he’s hoping his wife will die and he’s
[41:20] Jeremy Hoop: alone and he and he’s going without Children. And
[41:24] Michelle: right, this isn’t some beautiful principle being revealed to him. This is that wife that’s kind of my ball and chain, maybe she’s going to die. And then there’s all of this ripe fruit everywhere for me to take advantage of. That’s you can’t even put it in that context. OK? Keep
[41:44] Jeremy Hoop: going on the 26th of January 1840 Sarah and Becca brought Coco to the room for me. Um Sister decent. It very low. I’m going to skip over some of this stuff. But you, you get the sense he’s, he’s talking about lots of women spending time with lots of women getting gifts from women. 27th January supper with Sister Batters Battersby. She fetched me a pint of porter just for, for those latter day saints or um if they’re watching this, you’re not really aware of the word of wisdom and the development of it in these days, it was no issue to, to drink beer, to drink wine. Um and moderately even hard liquor. Why? Because, and they did because it was not a commandment in those days. So just wanted to bring it
[42:28] Michelle: up. Can I just ask you also? So we’re reading all of this that he records like he records in his mission journal, these two girls who I end up marrying, who I’m living in their house, brought me chocolate. Like how much, I mean, think of your mission journals. Right. And how much of his mission journal is spent on? I taught this lesson to this person. They were like, what’s the, what’s the comparison? Do
[42:51] Jeremy Hoop: you? I’m not reading every entry and that’s why I went through that list of things before there is a lot of went to preach, went to do this, want to anoint s um uh people and, and you have to understand what he’s saying. There’s one writer that said, yeah, he even went, he, he anointed a woman’s breasts and played with them. No, that’s not what it said. It said I anointed her breast because she had some sore and prayed with them. Anyway. You have, you have to understand when you read the whole thing. He’s doing a lot of preaching. He’s doing a lot of ming and that’s for real. There’s a ton of that going on. So just like any missionary effort. It’s just that in and around the whole thing. I’m showing the interactions with the, with the women.
[43:27] Michelle: I’m sorry, you have to give, you can’t just throw that out with letting, letting people laugh at the, the vast importance between an L or an R and
[43:36] Jeremy Hoop: not one word. I had to look it up and it doesn’t say it says parade. So the guy, the guy was playing fast and loose or just wanted to see what he wanted to see on the 29th of January 1840. Took D with S crooks. She is troubled about Susannah, about being, again, being grieved for a little, lots of being troubled. Lots of drama, lots of, um, I don’t know what’s going on with all the women. The 31st January 1840. Um This is interesting and this is just one instance of this uh B at HS that’s breakfast D at Rigby’s SSIs Powell and SIS Booth. Sis sister Booth will be someone he interacts with a lot in Nauvoo and actually want uh considers taking her for a wife and her daughter and her daughter. Um Booths are very ill grieved about reports told of me, Mary Powell acknowledges to having called me and the or the elders abominable liars and said that if she had plenty to give me, I should go and see her often. Uh This was said before H Royal Elizabeth Elizabeth Booth and on and on bad spirits and everything. So he will often mention that people are having some trouble with him. Interesting. 3rd February 1840 um this is interesting, have dreamed that I was going to baptize my father where the water was very muddy and soon as we got into it uh arose almost to our heads and I could not baptize him. I also dreamed that a raging fever was making desolation in the town. I saw carts coming to the fever ward every four or five minutes with afflicted people in 5 February 1840. Um, more stuff with, with, uh, with s crooks. He’s recording tons of gifts here. Sis Perkins gave me a tea cup full of red wine Mary Johnson. Um, oh, appears worse. Let’s see. Sis Pool gave me 1 £1 or 11 farthing or emails too far. So they get their support and their sustenance from, from the people in the area. But oddly enough, he records mostly the gifts from the women, which is interesting. Um, in February 1840 wrote a letter to Sarah Crooks in Manchester. Uh February 12th, having been writing to the whole of the day. My mother came. This am to say that she thought my wife was dissatisfied on account of my being from home and it was hard for moons to keep her and Children. Uh, that’s understandable. Um He’s not been home for a while and Ruth is struggling February 13th Coco with Sis Morgan. February 16th. Sis Brewer gave me a pint of Porter. Um, 17th February 1840. I
[46:10] Michelle: just, I just, I’m sorry, I have to interrupt you again. Just February 12th. My wife is struggling with my Children at home, but it’s ok because February 13th, I get to drink hot cocoa with this, with another woman. I, I just, ok. Uh OK. Continue, sorry, just like one day after the other. And OK,
[46:28] Jeremy Hoop: this is the, this is the pattern that you’ll see. He goes home and he’s out immediately and there’s no mention of his wife or his Children, which is interesting. There’s a little
[46:40] Michelle: bit of desire to be home. He has no desire to be home. He, he,
[46:44] Jeremy Hoop: he is thrilled with this, with, with his missionary experience uh 17th February. Um I waited on the road for Sarah Crooks and Henry Royal. Sarah was waiting near the old church through misunderstanding. So he’s spending lots of time. Sarah came, Sarah went with me. Sarah gave me an orange ginger lozenges got home 12 o’clock um supper at the preaching house. Um 19 February found Sarah Crooks here. Um uh 21st February dinner at sister Booths and water. Sarah Crooks later it gives me um one farthing and some raisins. Um tw 22nd February, Susan yet grieved B. Crooks very low. He, as I mentioned, he, he often will be observant of the emotional states of these women in particular, doesn’t mention the men so much. But the women. 23rd February had three orange oranges given me Sarah and Rebecca came and I came along with them Betsy Crooks and Betsy Dewsnup was shy and behaved. Unkind, got home a little before 1125 February went to S Perkins and S to sleep there. Um 27th February, I went to William Miller’s to meeting and spoke much on the tribulation, which is at hand. So that’s one example. He’ll often be speaking. And then afterwards, uh the saints seem moved and I had great liberty in speaking, prayed with one sister. Sarah and Rebecca brought me home. I told them what Susan was intending to do. R seemed much troubled and Sarah appeared rather tempted to get married. I felt a sorrow on this account. I don’t want Sarah to be married. I was much troubled and tempted on her account and felt to pray that the Lord would preserve me from impure affections. She gave me an orange.
[48:28] Michelle: I’m sorry. And let’s just think back to the BYU days like the college days. But at BYU like when girls are bringing cookies to boys or do you know what I mean? Like like girls take raisins and oranges and ginger lozenges and two boys for reasons, right? Like there’s an interest there. It’s,
[48:55] Jeremy Hoop: it’s just the the interjection of she gave me an order so perfectly placed. I certainly feel my love towards her increase but shall strive against it. I feel too much uh too much to covet her and I feel too much to covet her and afraid lest her troubles should cause her to get married. The Lord keep me pure and preserve me from doing wrong. So he doesn’t want to do wrong. But he doesn’t want her to be married. That’s a really interesting juxtaposition.
[49:25] Michelle: And when you’re being tempted, flee from the face of temptation. Right. Do you keep nursing that? Like he is clearly lusting after this woman, which he actively admits here and he keeps nursing. It. Don’t get married. Keep bringing me more oranges and ginger lozenges like, right. Like this is so, I’m glad to at least read that he knows it’s wrong and wants to strive against it. That’s actually good to read.
[49:51] Jeremy Hoop: And yet the next day, Sarah Crooks gave me one far thing and I objected. She would uh make me have it. Rebecca went on a little way with me on the 29th and the very next day, Sarah Rebecca gave me cocoa, uh uh Rebecca gave me two oranges um et princes. Then we meet
[50:08] Michelle: Rebecca gave me two oranges and Sarah gave me one. Right. Anyway, it’s hilarious. He’s recording how many pieces of fruit each woman gives him.
[50:18] Jeremy Hoop: Absolutely. It’s really, it’s an interesting little tidbit of information that he has to include uh separate princes. Saturday with Alice. This is Alice Hardman who will later become his wife and Hannah till two o’clock. That’s two o’clock AM. Ok. And how do we know that? Because it’s after supper? 2nd March 1840 Alice Hardman with me, Sarah and Rebecca came to the workhouse to meet us 3rd March 1840 uh dinner with and water. So for whatever they call it, they call it taking water. I don’t, it’s just must be a break or something. Dinner and water was just white to Mary Aspen. Mary Aspen will later become a woman he’s interested in marrying was there and T Miller to pancakes. There was too much lightness. Um, oh, by the way, this is, um, this is the be at HS went to see brother Burgess’s wife and child. She had been disobedient. She seems very penitent. She has a cow dung plaster on her breast. She’s the woman. She’s the woman that he, he anointed her breast and and prayed, prayed with them, not plead with them just to be clear. So people understand we’re not taking liberty. Ok?
[51:32] Michelle: Um And it is also interesting, I also want to point out how much he talks about the women being disobedient or rebellious or because that is echo. That’s the exact same language we see about Emma later on. It’s really fascinating that that is his perspective and he records this woman is rebellious like it’s so like, really don’t let this wash over you get in and think how weird this is
[51:55] Jeremy Hoop: semis alert. It gets worse in no. Sarah. Sarah crook’s bath or bt my forehead with rum and gave me some mint drops. Sis Booth gave me some raisins. Sarah’s anxious to know where to go to lodge that. Uh She and Rebecca need a place to say. I told her I preferred rulings 5 March uh Sarah Rebecca came to Oldham Road. Um oh, wrote a letter to my wife. Ok, good. We got that at least. Um 6 March 1840 after a long day of preaching and a very strange dream about Lord Richards. Uh Sarah and Rebecca had been at rulings, but they cannot take them in yet. Sarah is much troubled. She says, Susan keeps hinting that she is tired of them. She cannot bear. It gave me some reasons. 7 March 1840 Sarah and Rebecca are in trouble. They cannot go to peas, they can they come up with me to assist hs and engage to come next week, they tarried till 12 o’clock. Um And then eight of March 1840 S and R went with me. S gave me two oranges used great liberty towards Alice Hardman. Don’t know what that means. Um Could be a good talking to, could be thing else. Flirtatious. Have no idea.
[53:04] Michelle: Get off my man. Possibly
[53:07] Jeremy Hoop: 99, March 1840. Um Betsy Crooks bought a fur collar for my cloak. So there’s some interesting gifts that are just of a um of an ornamental nature. 12 March 1840 Sis Mary Aspen offered me a sovereign to buy a polyglot Bible, but I refused to take it. She pressed much s at Lee Ss. Crooks gave me some Raisins M Aspen gave me two oranges. 13 March wrote a letter to S Perkins, one to E Des Nip. He’s writing lots of letters to, to women. Um, who knows what he’s saying? I’d be interesting if we could find some of those 14, March 1840. But Crooks gave me some figs. Sarah Crooks and Rebecca part, uh, Partington are come to live at Hardman and now they live full time basically where he’s boarding. I should have gone to our hardman to see the child.
[53:55] Michelle: He is living, his mission home is with four of his wives.
[54:02] Jeremy Hoop: It’s right next door. Yeah, it’s either in the hard or right next door. So he’s, he’s right there. Um S and HS so that’s at the hardman. Separate hardman S and R seem low. So lots of um grievousness and feeling low and rebellious. 15. March B with Ss Nr took C with Snr. Um There’s a letter from his wife on the 16th of March. Uh R gave me some uh Rebecca gave me some egg milk, 17th of March um dinner at Charlotte. Grundy’s more dinnering with single women. 19th of March to sis booths, Newton to d dinner. She gave me two oranges. Uh Sis Mary Whitehead gave me five yada yada prayed with brother Green. Had a few words with sis do snip. She will not acknowledge that she’s done wrong. I said, I believe there were faults on both sides who up much. So he’s constantly dealing with real, just angst between the saints and their big bickering and their, and their backbiting and, and it’s really interesting. I mean, there’s a lot of, uh, interpersonal drama, um, r gave way and rose up as if to strike, uh, Jonathan but fainted back in the chair. I mean, this was a, this is a big in incident that he’s dealing with, with the saints where there’s fighting going on. It’s pretty dramatic. S with Rebecca Supper with Rebecca T Miller gave me a crown for Brother Richards. S Crooks gave me et cetera. And then um 40th of March with um D with srr, gave me um gifts and a new pair of boots s gave me two oranges. I was resolved not to have it. He’s he, he refuses the gifts a lot. Then I took the railway, got home about five
[55:34] Michelle: o’clock. But can I point out he, he tries to refuse the gifts a lot and he never wins. They always insist he always, he always resists but gets the gift. So I think it’s one of those like, oh, no, please. No, no.
[55:46] Jeremy Hoop: The little man Doth protest too much. Stop,
[55:53] Michelle: don’t stop at
[55:54] Jeremy Hoop: two and a quarter and got home about five o’clock. Found the Children rather poorly. Wife and rest of family. Well, they rejoiced to see me. That’s about what we get at home.
[56:04] Michelle: That’s the one positive thing about home and they were excited to see him. They rejoiced to see him, but he doesn’t stay.
[56:14] Jeremy Hoop: There’s no, it was a glorious reunion. I had missed my little ones and think about how Joseph will describe things in his correspondence, letters in the journal that we have um about family members, friends, loved ones, even old majors dog, um, and
[56:32] Michelle: his letters when he’s talking to them, how are they remind them that their father loves them? Remind them that like Joseph is thinking constantly about his wife and his Children and
[56:42] Jeremy Hoop: even Hebrew Kimball will do that for vate, you know, there’s a lot of tenderness between V and Hebrew Kimball. Um But there’s, this is just what it is here. 21 March. Um By the way, I would assume that he’s writing nice things. I would hope he’s writing nice things to Ruth when he’s writing. I would hope and assume he would be doing that at least. But in his private thoughts, in his private recordings, at least she’s absent. Um written five letters that now he’s away. He’s at a conference in Preston, which is right near his hometown. So he’s at home and then going to the conference just mile away or whatever. Um written five letters, one to Jane Millward, one to Sis Ravencroft, one to Sis Crooks and one to sis a hardman. So, um no word
[57:25] Michelle: about his wife. So he writes and, and that’s another point just as we’re going through this, you would think I got a letter from Ruth and my, this child, this, the news of my Children, like, like you would record in your journal. So and so has been sick or so and so has learned to walk or do you know, you know, like the amount he’s recording each raisin from these girls? Right? And has no words about his Children and his wife that is really noticeable that where, where his priorities are. Like there is a serious, you’re probably going to go here, but there is a serious narcissism already coming through. It’s only about how he is viewed, not about what anyone else is feeling, even his wife and Children, especially his wife and
[58:08] Jeremy Hoop: Children. And I wish I could say it gets better. They, well, in the all of these interactions. 22nd, 23rd, 24th, he’s doing things with women preaching, doing stuff, but no mention of his wife. Let’s pause a second. I want, I want to remind everybody you said previously that we discussed in the last one, Brigham and Heber, they knew about the principle of plurality of wives before they went home. They Brigham says he learned it here. But I wanna remind people these two were best of friends, Brigham considered or Hebrew considered Brigham his God.
[58:46] Michelle: This is why we called it the Godfathers because they were, they were their God and their father. It was like there’s a real literalness to that title we chose. So OK, then I think I have to give Eli credit for suggesting it was brilliant. It’s
[59:02] Jeremy Hoop: a perfect title because both of them had a testimony of the principal while in England. And perhaps before that Hebrew was practicing a form of spiritual wifey or the principle or the what he called the law that leads to the celestial world while in England. Uh And I would defy any historian who claims they believe Joseph did stuff based on fragmentary, what they know is fragmentary, piecemeal evidence and then statements from people long, long afterward to look at Hebrew’s journal and, and, and, and talk that away. What we, what we went through last time is direct proof that he was practicing a form, some form of spiritual wifey. Later, testimonies also suggest that Brigham may also have been practicing it. Um And so, what is the, what does this fact say about the consensus consensus? Joseph Smith polygamy narrative that both the apologists and antagonists hold to and why don’t they ever address these facts? Uh Brigham said, I learned this in England. Brigham was accused of these things. And then I wanna just quickly reiterate if you haven’t gone through the presentation, watch these things because we go through Hebrew’s journal and we show how he had a, he had a relationship with this woman named Ellen Redmond, not unlike what we’re seeing with Sarah Crooks and William Clayton to the point where he takes her to his apartment, they wash their feet and they go to bed together, which entry is subsequently. Um An attempt is made to to scratch it out and the feet washing is really important. It’s really critical vate. His first wife washed his feet on the 4th, 1st day of April 1844 as his wife, I, he Hebrew Kimball received the washing of my feet and was anointed by my wife late be before my burial. That is my feet head stomach. Even as Mary did Jesus that she might have claim on him in the resurrection. And the late writes in the same journal, I have a late Kimball do hereby certify that on the first day of April 1844 I attended to washing and anointed washing and anointed the head stomach and feet of my dear companion, Hebrew Kimball that I may have claim upon him in the morning of the first resurrection. This is a very significant ordinance for these men. It will later become a part of the second anointing ordinance whether Joseph Incorporated that or not. I don’t know, I believe he might have, but we don’t know because there’s no actual record from the time, but Hebrew was doing it here um uh with his wife and he would later do it with one of his plural wives. Sarah and Whitney on March 27th, 1845 he records in his own journal in the evening, received the washing of my feet by Sarah Whitney. You know, why do we know that this brings them together as husband and wife? Because shortly thereafter she becomes pregnant with his baby.
[1:02:05] Michelle: OK.
[1:02:06] Jeremy Hoop: That’s why. So it gives him license to now have conjugal relations with her.
[1:02:12] Michelle: OK. At the time,
[1:02:15] Jeremy Hoop: at the time, she was verifiably living as a wife with Joseph C Kingsbury, which is in William Clayton’s journal. As late as October of 1845. She’s cohabitated as a wife with Joseph Kingsbury while she is also having sexual relations with Hebrew Kimball. So the washing of the feet was the kick off to that as far as I can ascertain why? Because of the pregnancy that she uh later experiences and the birth of their son, David.
[1:02:52] Michelle: OK. So she was Joseph King Barry’s only wife, right? He didn’t have plural wives at the time.
[1:02:59] Jeremy Hoop: Not yet after she, after she is taken from him. But
[1:03:04] Michelle: I want to point out the important thing here with the later doctrine that speech that Brigham maybe you’re going to get into it about that. If, if you can get someone with bigger keys, we’ve talked about to take you on, then you can leave your first husband. So Kingsbury and Clayton, OK. I mean, Kingsbury and Kimball are a prime example of that. I also just wanted to point out that the um those who claim, who believe polygamy and claim they have to claim that Jesus was a polygamist and one of the huge evidences they have of it is that a woman washing Jesus’s feet is evidence that they were married. So this is part of their doctrine on and we have so many ways to verify that this is for polygamists, washing feet is evidence of marriage. That was an,
[1:03:51] Jeremy Hoop: it was an integral ceremony of the Cochran kites who were a spiritual wifey, free love sect in Boston and Maine that the 12 apostles had great contact with in their own journals. They talk about much of their, their interactions starting with Samuel Smith and Orson Hyde, their interactions in 1832 um which is the year Brigham Young is converted. Brigham Young um becomes acquainted with them at least in 1836 maybe before that. But in 1836 he becomes acquainted, at least with the Cochran kites at that point based on conferences in the area. The Cochran kites practice that there’s no necessary connection to washing of the feet with sexual relations amongst the Cochran kites. But it is a part of their sacred ceremonies in their spiritual wife practice or their spiritual spouse practice as it is here as it is amongst the fundamentalists. And so I think we firmly established that this feet washing is a critical component that says something about what’s going on.
[1:04:52] Michelle: Um OK. And I want to add one more thing right here just as we’re talking about all of this, for people that are maybe not staying right focused on the point. This is what I think the point is, we claim that we have zero evidence of anything to do with plural marriage with Joseph Smith because it was illegal and it had to be secret, right? And I want to point out we have all of this evidence starting in 1840 in England in these journals in um nuvo, we have all of this evidence from all of these other people. At the same time, we can point all of this out. They were under all of the same constraints that Joseph Smith was. So all of our reasons to explain a way that utter complete lack of anything like this about Joseph Smith fall completely flat because they should apply equally to everybody. The only logical reason that there is zero evidence of anything with Joseph is because Joseph was doing none of it. It was these other people. OK.
[1:05:51] Jeremy Hoop: That, that’s what you do not see both in terms of what Joseph did not do or leave behind and also from what other people leave out in their, in their remembrances and their tales, we’re going to examine that later. Um There’s a lot to read in between the lines about what’s happening here in terms of what we’ve been talking about with Brigham and Hebrew Hebrew would call this the cause I have embraced, he would call it that in a number of letters to his white wife, the late or the cause we have embraced that cause I believe firmly is the principle of plurality of wives or celestial plural marriage. He calls it the law that leads to the celestial world. At this time, we know from his own daughter that he believed in the principle. He knew it had to come back if the restoration of all things was to, to reach its fullness. And so in summary, Hebrew taught and baptized William. William considered Heber his father. We’ll see in a second, William appeared to be doing something similar to Hebrew. Brigham and Heber had constant interaction with William in England. Both Brigham and Heber had private meetings with Sarah Crooks, which we’ll see a second during their England mission. This is really interesting. Um So Hebrew Hebrew writes a letter to his wife for late. He says something that I think is, it maybe goes over people’s heads, but I think it’s important. He says, um the people in Manchester, they called me their grandfather because elder Clayton had built them up and he claims me as his father in the gospel. Now, why is that important? That is not a term that Joseph Smith used in connection with conversion to the gospel um with missionary efforts with the 12 Joseph did not use that, that you become someone’s father when you bring them in by baptism.
[1:07:47] Michelle: It’s, it’s really network marketing. It’s your up line, right? Like this is the am way like you’re my sponsor, you’re my sponsor sponsor. That’s what they started a network marketing, a pyramid scheme gospel and Joseph never taught anything or used any of this language. He has all we have all of the, the entire doctrine and covenants even like there is nothing that leads to this kind of understanding at all.
[1:08:16] Jeremy Hoop: Had a, had a flat institutional organization with, with distribution of, of authority, with the ability to vote out the president if you, if you got so Joseph himself real
[1:08:25] Michelle: balance of powers, he, there were a lot of balance of powers built in. But
[1:08:30] Jeremy Hoop: this notion of, of, of, of a system of fathers I believe is the beginnings of the Adam God doctrine is the beginnings of the hierarchical model. OK. And so, and
[1:08:40] Michelle: polygamy goes into it beautifully because it’s also relies on polygamy. And
[1:08:45] Jeremy Hoop: what, what were they looking to do to do the works of Abraham who was father Abraham? And so when you enter into this order, the law that leads to the celestial world, you’re doing the works of Abraham, I’m putting some pieces together. But I believe that’s probably what he’s saying here. What does this indicate about William’s relationship to Hebrew? Did, did Hebrew teach William the cause that he embraced? Did Hebrew teach William about uh foot washing and spiritual marriage? Those are legitimate questions to ask. So let’s pause a second. But let’s ask chat GP T about Victorian England. So I decided now, if you don’t know about chat G BT, basically, it’s an A I program that, that has access to the to the vast library on the internet and
[1:09:33] Michelle: did an episode on it. OK. So
[1:09:37] Jeremy Hoop: this, this I don’t believe is a biased answer based on the question because the question is not in a politically charged arena. OK. It’s just a neutral, let’s let’s dig up some historical stuff and see what, what we get. So chat says the following in Victorian England, the social norms and expectations regarding interactions between men and women were generally quite strict and conservative. Personal boundaries were highly emphasized, particularly when it came to physical contact and displays of intimacy as such. It would have been considered inappropriate for a woman to wash a man’s feet if he was not her husband or a close family member. During the Victor era, there was strong emphasis on the concept of separate spheres which delineated distinct roles for men and women in society. Men were primarily associated with the public sphere. While women were expected to focus on domestic responsibilities and the private sphere, it was believed. So he’s bringing all these women by the way into the public sphere. It was believed that men and women should maintain proper decorum and observe social codes to preserve the moral fabric of society. Foot washing as an act of physical intimacy and servitude would have been considered highly immodest and intimate between individuals who are not married or closely related. It would have been seen as a as breaching the boundaries of appropriate behavior and could have elicited social disapproval. It’s important to know the societal societal norms, expectations can vary depending on factors such as class, religion and personal circumstances. They certainly would not have extended to the working class that uh a pass on this um in Victorian England. While the information provider represents general Victorian attitude, they may have been exceptions and variations within certain communities and circumstances. So chat gives us a little, a little possi possibility of an exception. But I think we get the picture.
[1:11:27] Michelle: But I also think we don’t even need to go to Victorian England or Chat G BT because we can think ourselves again. I said this in our last episode. But would you go to the elders corm president and wash his feet? It’s so bizarre. Like we’re not Victorian, we wear pants and shorts, but we wouldn’t do
[1:11:47] Jeremy Hoop: this. You would have to be in a commune um with a, an open um open relationship scenario,
[1:11:58] Michelle: right? A lot of free love, a lot of nudity type of that type of thing is where this would be acceptable to go
[1:12:04] Jeremy Hoop: to your, to your neighbors house and just let the woman there wash your feet in front of her husband, see what happens.
[1:12:12] Michelle: Right. Right. Or not in front of her husband. Right. Like me, go do that. Like, like this is not, this is not OK. It doesn’t take much imagination to realize this is bizarre. It’s extremely intimate,
[1:12:23] Jeremy Hoop: by the way, I also asked chat GP T about Hebrew’s behavior and getting his hair combed and cut by women also off limits just so, you know, which Hebrew gets a lot in his journal. Meanwhile, back in Manchester, we rejoin our hero. Back to that, that, um, February 27th, 1840 entry where he’s tempted. And you had said, uh, presently he didn’t just run away. Well, did he act like Joseph or like Samson? You know, did he lay down and let, let his hair get cut? Well, let’s get going. So on the 30th of March 1840 my feet were very sore tonight. Sarah washed them and gave me a pint of warm porter and lent her a book of doctrine and covenants. So he’s, he’s got to mix the spiritual with the carnal on the first of April 1840. Now, by the way, I want to be really clear, there is no reference to them having sex together in here. I, for those of you who are saying I’m saying that I’m not saying that I don’t know what’s exactly going on here. Something very inappropriate is going on here and all of the time and the effort and the, and the, and the gift giving and receiving and the, and the consternation and the, the noticing of, of, of grievousness and all the things that he’s documenting whilst being a minister of the gospel is rather incongruent. I think even James Allen, if we press James Allen. He would have to say that. So on the first of April 1840 s with Sarah, she washed my feet. She had a dream last night, something like this. She sh she thought a man brought a young man before her and said he was to be her companion when I had told her was not true and et cetera about eternity. He said we were in different of different dispositions. She was troubled and thought in her own mind she would not be in a hurry and et cetera.
[1:14:10] Michelle: Oh my word, his concern about her being with her getting married, right?
[1:14:18] Jeremy Hoop: And this goes on for years, by the way, 6 April 1840 with S and R. Sarah washed my feet. 8 April 1840 she washed my feet and I then went to bed. He doesn’t say we went to bed. He says I then went to bed. So at least he was clear about that. I don’t know, but it’s kind of late. So 19th of April. Oh and then he sees Sarah every single day until the 14th. Then leaves for a conference in Preston returns on the 19th and immediately sees Sarah and Rebecca 19th S brought me some wine and an egg B with S and R. Um he goes out preaching the whole day. Then he says, I told B Crooks, I think that’s Sarah’s sister that she should have her companion again. She’s a loving young woman and desires to do, right? I feel to love her much. I don’t know s with Snr. He has a very magnanimous spirit. 1220 April 1840 um took water with SNRs with Snr. So lots of um suffering with Snrsnr. By the way, in case you’re not following is Sarah
[1:15:17] Michelle: and Rebecca. Sarah and Rebecca. And this is obviously his social circle. They have dinner together every night. This is who he is hanging out with. OK. These are his companions.
[1:15:28] Jeremy Hoop: 22nd, April 1840 Sarah Crooks went with me, preached at Worsley. So there’s some preaching going on here. Sis pool, washed my feet. So now we have a, it’s this pool. Sarah Crooks gave me an orange. Is it that normal? Just to you, you, you get one woman to wash your feet. Now you can definitely have another one and that’s no big deal. Uh Sarah and Williams see each other 23rd, 24th, 25th fifth. They’re having supper each day on the 26th B with Ss Nr and S with Snr. So that’s breakfast and supper 27th of April uh B with S to bro. Greens. S Crooks told me this am something more that she was fretting up. When she was among the Methodists, she began to weep and to keep company with George Buchanan. But on some accounts, she took a kind of dislike to him. She went to Carlisle for two weeks and when she came back, there had been some report about her. George came to her and humbled himself to her. And when she still resisted him, he said he would leave class again, et cetera. She felt afraid and said if he would not leave class, she would go with him and again, et cetera. The report spread abroad that she begged of George to go with her. She was to have been called before the school for it. But she never told them any other than that, which they believed. When Mary Darra spoke to Sarah on Saturday night, all these things came to her mind. So he’s a, he’s a therapist of sorts.
[1:16:55] Michelle: Oh, ok. I’m like, what is this even? What is, what is happening? This is, this
[1:16:59] Jeremy Hoop: is Sarah. He doesn’t necessarily articulate the whole conversation, but he’s got enough notes in there for him to make sense of it later. But she’s spilling some major drama that experienced, she experienced a school at one point with a guy named George Buchanan and it was so troubling to her, it’s still troubling to her. But oddly enough, the rest of the entry is scratched out. Well, we’re gonna look at it here in a minute on 28th of April. Sarah washed my feet when we got home. I took s with Rebecca 29th, got home about 1130 s washed my feet and gave me supper 30th of April 1840 spent much of the day with Sarah and took water with her hurt. My tooth was pained all night. Rns gave me a pint of warm Porter. Sarah’s birthday the 23rd first of May 1840.
[1:17:43] Michelle: B. Is he right about his children’s birthdays or his wife’s birthday ever? Ok.
[1:17:50] Jeremy Hoop: Well, to be fair, he’s only in this part of it about half the year. So they could have later half of your birthdays and he’s traveling to uh America and there’s this,
[1:18:03] Michelle: he doesn’t,
[1:18:05] Jeremy Hoop: I don’t know when their birthdays are. So I, I need to go look up Ruth’s birthday and find out. Um, 1st May 1840 be with us, went to Newton, Sarah and I took a walk into the fields. She appeared low and fretful. He always mentions when she appears low and it seems to really bother him when she’s low. Um And I wonder why, I wonder why she’s always so low. Second of 1840 went to Oxford with Snr. Spent the evening upstairs with SNRs, had repaired my clothes and showed me much kindness. S with Snr. Ok. Uh 3rd may be with SNRs. Uh Snr A and H came to meet us and now he’s meeting with Alice Hardman. Sarah Anne Booth who is also another marital interest that we will see in Nauvoo gave me a small sweet cake which came from France. Um, for me a hardman and her mother is vexed at each other. Spent the PM with sister and with S and Alice. So now he’s with Sarah and Alice. One that will become his wife, one that he wants is his wife. Water with S and then she went with me to Pendlebury. 5 May be with S but Mrs Booth, Sarah went with me. 6 May. Sarah washed my feet again. May 7th s with SNR two lines are scratched out. 8 May D with SNR 9 May. Sarah is rather greed because she thinks she is too bold and et cetera. She re she remembers the liberty which has been taken with her before time and how she suffered by it. I don’t know men taking liberty. Now remember that, remember that because we’re going to read something that she writes to Brigham Young. I
[1:19:38] Michelle: just was doing a little bit of research while you were going on just to make sure. Yes, Margaret, his second daughter’s birthday was in April. We’ve just passed it. No mention of it and um Ruth’s birthday is coming up in June. We’ll see. I just wanted to like verify and we’ll see if he mentions the birthdays of his Children and his wife or just Sarah and the sweet cakes. Ok,
[1:20:00] Jeremy Hoop: Allison Jane, these are, that’s the Allison Jane that he will later marry was both weeping but would not tell me what for. I got to r um at 530 set sail by steamboat, arrived in Liverpool. So now he’s gonna be in Liverpool for a conference till the 13th again again, no mention of his wife and family. Then right back to it on the 13th, supper with Snr 15th, dinner with Snr 16th, breakfast with Rebecca D with Rebecca Water with SNRs with Snr all day. 17. May be with SNRs with Snr. Are you guys following? It’s the breakfast and the supper. It’s not some strange sexual activity. 18 May B and D with S and R. Mary Aspen is mentioned, he’s gonna later flirt and want to marry her s with Snr 19. May be be with R. Sarah one pint of porter. She washed my feet. We sat together till two o’clock. This is a late one. So supper, wash his feet. Now they’re up till the wee hours. William sees Sarah every single day while in Manchester until late July. And then he prepares to mo go to America and then we don’t hear a lot about it other than some letters. And so if that weren’t enough, there’s all these pages. This is very bizarre. Now, we’ve got this one from Hebrew right where somebody went in there. And hey, rightfully, one of his relatives maybe who said, hey, we can’t have that in there. Can’t have Grandpa Hebrew Ellen got to get that out and they, they didn’t do it well enough. This time we’ve got this. Now, these are not high enough resolution image images that we can see behind them. And I’ve got to make a trip. I think to um, the BYU library, maybe after this presentation, they’ll actually shut it down. You won’t be
[1:21:46] Michelle: able to. But even then you can’t see the originals. We don’t have access to the original.
[1:21:50] Jeremy Hoop: They won’t give the originals. Ok.
[1:21:54] Michelle: And if you consider how much is left in, if you consider that, what is left in, what can we imagine is crossed out,
[1:22:05] Jeremy Hoop: see if we can find out to what the redactions referenced. Page 12 entry scratched out. And then Sarah and Rebecca brought Coco to the room for me. Sarah Crooks gave me one farthing towards postage besides two oranges. OK. Page 26 came home and found Sarah Crooks here with Christina who was sick. We prayed with her. Sarah with the other entry scratched out. Page 32. Sarah Crooks gave me one. I objected but she wouldn’t another objection. She would make me have it. Rebecca went a little on the way with me. Entry scratched out page 35. Um Went to see sister Burgess pray with her anointed her breast, prayed with Maria, prayed with r that’s the woman anointed breast, prayed, prayed, maybe this is maybe this is why the entry scratched out. I have no idea. She also, she also saw in a dream brother Richards and Robert Williams and one of the hardman, sons and old Richard Hardman sitting in a room together. Brother Richard seemed sick and in trouble, the room opened above their heads and she saw 12 small Children dressed in white. One of them was brother Richard’s child. She knew it. It came down and sat on his shoulder and bending down, looked in his face, the scene closed. She says, bro, r will not live long. He’s expecting many things, but in some, he will be disappoint disappointed. He died fairly early compared to the others. I don’t know if that’s prescient or not. Page 30
[1:23:27] Michelle: six. Ok. And, and let me also just let me just point out one more thing. Sorry, Jeremy, I don’t mean to slow you down, but they left in where he admitted that he was lusting and struggling, but that he was fighting mightily against it. Now let’s consider how these things go if you are lusting after someone already to where you’re struggling, but you continue getting more and more intimate. What happens? What direction does it go? And then we start seeing the redactions like it doesn’t take much to kind of have a pretty plausible idea of what’s going on here. Ok. Continue
[1:24:03] Jeremy Hoop: on page 36. We see Mary Aspen whom he will let later have interest in as a, as a plural wife. Uh Mary Aspen gave me some a sieve as if drops. I don’t know how to say that Sarah and Rebecca have been at rulings but they cannot take them in yet. Sarah is much trouble. They gave me some raisins and then the entry scratched out page 36 Sarah Rebecca in trouble. They cannot go to Peas. They came up with me to Sis Hs and engaged to come next week, they tarried till 12 o’clock and Jones gave me two oranges. Um and on this page, um I want that has mentioned Mary Aspen and Sarah Crooks on October 1980 8084 in his NAVOO journal, he mentions this. Mary Aspen is ready to unite to me as her savior. So we’ll talk about that later. That’s really interesting phrase. But I wanted to point out that I’m not just making this up. He mentions later on Mary Aspen page 37
[1:24:57] Michelle: and I was again, just studying, again, studying polygamy today. And they truly are. It is your husband who gets you into the celestial kingdom. It is your husband who you look to. So if, if your husband sins you’re all in trouble. So that’s why you serve your husband, why you wash his feet while you wait on his hand and foot, while you give him the best of everything. Because he’s your ticket to exaltation, right? And so it’s interesting to see this doctrine here this early.
[1:25:28] Jeremy Hoop: Well, that, that’s in NAU. So that’s to be fair. That statement is in NAU. So I just wanted to show it there to connect what he’s writing about Mary Aspen. He’s later going to want her for a wife or she’s going to want him for a, for a husband uh page 37 SNR went with me s gave me two oranges s at HS used great liberty towards Alice Hardman be at HS. So he’s mentioned both Sarah Rebecca and Alice on this page entry scratched out um on page uh 30. Um Let’s see. Oh, I wanted to mention this 13 September 1844. So later on in his NAVOO journal at three, went to see Alice Hardman who is sick and was united in the everlasting covenant. So he is married to her in September of 1844. Um Nearly over four years later. Ok, back. Um And then Jane Hardman, by the way, uh he will later marry his sister on uh it’s the eighth of November 1844 page 44 B at SNRs went to Stockport, Snr went with me entry scratched out s gave me two oranges page 45. Um Seems very humble and comfortable with Sarah. Uh He had this is I believe a, a male member of the crooks family. He has had a, a deal of hard feelings against her, but all seems to be gone. After all. I feel to have little hopes that he will hold out to the end. I believe he will again turn against us and be cut off, et cetera entry scratched out. So he’s talking about Sarah here big long entry scratched out page 46 mother and Sarah was waiting with Sarah. She washes my, she washed my feet. She had a dream last night and I read that dream before she was troubled, thought in her mind that she would not be in a hurry and et cetera, the entry scratched out, that’s about her getting married entry scratched out
[1:27:14] Michelle: Jeremy. Can I ask you also quickly, were these entries scratched out before Alan had access to them? Do we know when
[1:27:23] Jeremy Hoop: I believe so? But I don’t know, we don’t know if these appear to be some kind of pencil or I don’t think a felt pen but some kind of wide um tipped pencil. Um But I don’t know, but we don’t know
[1:27:37] Michelle: who or when redacted these, we have no
[1:27:40] Jeremy Hoop: idea. It would be a very important question to have answered. But they look, they’ve been in the custody of various historians in the church, et cetera for a very long time. So I have no idea. Um on page 46 be with Rebecca S with Snr um after the entry is scratched out page 47. Uh and then the 40 00 sorry. So we, we’re gonna learn on page 46 and then 47 was talking about. It’s the same days I believe D with Snr had some conversation with Sarah. Seems that the saints generally appear to envy her. Feel a little j jealous for some cause which they will not. Why are they jealous of her? Because you’re spending so much time with her uh with which they will not make known. Rebecca has seemed very much grieved at her, but I think she is mending of it. So even Rebecca is mad at Sarah and then boom, this long entry is scratched out. What the heck is going on there? Page 54 be with Ss crooks told me in this am something more than what she was fretting of when she was among the Methodists. I told you that story about George Buchanan, that strange embarrassing moment she had with George Buchanan in school. Then on the next page, uh after that story, the entry is scratched out on page 54. Continuing. Sarah has come off work poorly. Spent the morning Wither took d with her dinner, sent some prospect to Preston water water with Sarah. She went with me to Eccles. So whole day, Sarah washed my feet when we got home. I took s with Sarah entire day with Sarah. But that entry scratched out on page 54. Alice Hardman says her mother is very kind to her and is almost about to break up house. Be with, be with Sarah ping pong between the women. It’s, it’s nuts. Page 56.
[1:29:31] Michelle: And it is just keep in your mind. They are all his wives. He marries all of these women. So the ping pong continues.
[1:29:38] Jeremy Hoop: He doesn’t marry Sarah.
[1:29:41] Michelle: That’s right. Yeah, he doesn’t, he doesn’t end up getting her but the others. Ok. Yep.
[1:29:48] Jeremy Hoop: Uh, on page 56. Be with S came home with C to see with Sarah. She paid coach fare to pay uh Patra Croft. Sarah washed my feet be with S Sarah and I went to Mechanics Institution S with S and R entry scratched out page 59 s with Sarah one pint porter. She washed my feet. We sat till two o’clock be with R and then one night, uh one Monday night, Alice and Hannah went to brother Pratt’s, that’s Parley Pratt by the way and tarried till near 11. Um, entry scratched out. Um That’s on page 60. Um So with one exception, on every single page, the redactions have to do with something he’s addressing with women on um 10 of those pages it has to do with Sarah on two of those pages, it has to do with Alice and, or Mary Aspen. And on one of those pages, it has to do with a very strange dream about Willard Richards who, who knows, um, happens to be one of the people involved in the whole mess later and maybe involved here. We don’t know if this, as you mentioned previously were in Joseph’s journal. If this, Brian Hales were in Joseph’s journal, I couldn’t argue with you, couldn’t argue with
[1:31:10] Michelle: you and we don’t have any of the problems of someone else keeping his journal like, right? I mean, this is, this is Clayton’s journal in Clayton’s writing and it is a day to day record this this journal is and to compare this journal. Well, I mean, that’s part of what helps us know that the later one is not, they’re different. Go ahead
[1:31:31] Jeremy Hoop: along that lines of keeping journals. We will talk about Willard Richards. Why? It’s not a journal? It’s a memo book and it’s a, it’s a, it’s notes to create a history. He’s the historian. Even
[1:31:43] Michelle: the Joseph Smith papers admit that even the Joseph Smith,
[1:31:47] Jeremy Hoop: he’s the historian for the church at the time. He’s just recording the daily doings of, of, of, of the, of the prophet at the time and other things that are going on. Um It’s not a journal, so I, I don’t like that. We call it that because it’s, he doesn’t, he’s not even there every day. In fact, he’s not there most days. Most likely he’s getting reports from Joseph about what’s going on in writing things down. But we don’t have that stuff like Clayton has in Joseph’s journal at all. We certainly don’t have this foot washing as you had mentioned previously. And if we did, we would just say it’s over. So remember, please, everybody, this is all going on three years before William says in his own journal that Joseph supposedly says the first word about this and William says that Joseph teaches him, ok. Um In connection with Sarah Crooks, by the way, which is interesting and why again, William, why would you lie about this? Now, I think I know he’s not gonna sign up. This is an affidavit, OK. A legal document.
[1:32:51] Michelle: This is the affidavit that tells us about 132. This is where he’s talking about it. OK.
[1:32:57] Jeremy Hoop: This is where the whole story is congealed. Now, there are entries in the journal that talk about Joseph’s activities in relation to supposed or alleged because I call them alleged activities in relation to plural marriage and things to do with Emma, et cetera. And
[1:33:19] Michelle: G BT even chat GP T pointed out that Clayton didn’t witness any of those things he records. So at best, even in his journal, he’s second hand someone, Joseph, someone had to tell him. So we have to believe that Joseph was coming and like bearing his soul to Clayton about his crazy life, which
[1:33:37] Jeremy Hoop: is the things that he actually says he witnesses and the things that are supposed reports to him. Absolutely. That’s a thanks chat GP. T there’s more to the Sarah Cook saga though Sarah Crooks wrote a letter to Brigham.
[1:33:55] Michelle: This is, oh, this is the ok,
[1:33:58] Jeremy Hoop: crazy in her letter.
[1:34:02] Michelle: What’s the date on this letter? Do you know?
[1:34:04] Jeremy Hoop: I believe March of 1841
[1:34:08] Michelle: the year after all this time.
[1:34:11] Jeremy Hoop: Not quite about 8 to 10 months. So, so July, um uh William starts packing up for America within the next couple of months. He’s gone and now he’s, he’s in travail doing some crazy stuff trying to survive and uh as he’s moving into the Nauvoo. Um And he’s getting some letters from Sarah, but now she’s on to other things. And in this letter, she’s going to mention very three very important priesthood leaders, Brigham Heber and Parley. Ok, I’m going to read it. This is important to hear. As far as I’m aware, I found this in a really obscure paper just referenced and I was like, what? Wait a minute, she wrote a letter to Brigham. So I found the letter, ok, Manchester March the 14th, 1841 dear, sir. Pardon? My boldness which I have used in writing to you. Were it not that my spirit has been wounded? Beyond measure? I would not attempt to write. I suppose I may as well speak plain as I want that you should know what it is that has wounded me about Christmas. It was reported that B Brotherton and I were keeping company. Now, I don’t know who this B Brotherton is. It could be just a Brother Brotherton or a somebody named B Brotherton like a Billy Brotherton. But there’s a Brotherton family that plays prominently in this whole story with Martha Brotherton and Elizabeth Brotherton and Hebrews interacting with the Brotherton family. I don’t know if it’s the same, but uh she is hanging out with a B Brotherton and I were keeping company in consequence of which I was much slandered and slighted. I never before had such a thought in my head. Uh, neither, neither had, uh, BRBR which is, I think is, that must be brother, brother gotta be brother. Ok. For, he has said so more than once in about a month after he began to come to my lodgings and I will leave you to guess the rest. Now, what that means we can only speculate but here’s what we know from that. She’s spending a lot of time with a brother, Brotherton. He’s coming to her house uh more than once a month. Um And it’s causing some trouble that’s causing her to be slandered, suffice it to say that he came very constant. So it’s more than once a month for sure. And his sisters were friendly to it. His mother also, they also seem to think it was the mind of God. There’s some scribbles in consequence of which and what elder Kimball had said to me for, he had told me more than once that if any one came along that I thought I could love to give my heart to them inasmuch as it was consistent with the mind of the Lord. And what made me think the more was his coming at the very time that I had determined to give the Lord no rest till he would hear my prayer and send me away from all them by some means or other. For no sir being mortal, but myself knows uh for sir, no being moral, no being mortal, but myself knows what I have suffered through evil and false reports. What in the world is causing these evil and false reports? I now begin to think it would have had an end but alas, alas, it is not. So for what I’ve suffered was not. And I can’t read out this word, having, being living to this for, if I have been, by the way, I type scripted this, there’s no existing typescript but this one for I have been rightly informed those that declared they would defend my character, have laid the foundation. And now sir, I will draw to a close and give it you in short about the time of your last coming to Manchester. What about the time of your la last coming to Manchester or a little before mother and sister began to turn away from me and be cooler towards me in consequence of evil reports. He also he brother Brotherton also ceased to speak to me and all this and with other things that I could not help but see made me to weep and cry unto the Lord. Sometimes I would moan and sigh for the Lord to plead my cause for he only knows my heart. All this caused Rebecca, her friend, Rebecca to feel for my welfare for. It was evident that I was injuring my health but how to ease my mind. She knew not for she could see as well as I that I was as it were the byword amongst many. When at last, she thought that she would find out the cause if possible. And on her seeing brother Brotherton BRBR last night, she said, why had he done as he had? If he had heard anything, why not come and tell me and break up acquaintances properly? Stating at the same time that I was as virtuous a girl as ever lived to which he replied, he did not know that she said, but I know, but I know he then said it was brother Young that told me I give you the foundation of my, of my knowledge said he meaning the evil and false reports had come as a consequence of something that Brother Brigham Young said to him. Now sir, I ask you in the presence of the great God, how I have endeavored to serve who uh how it probably is who I have endeavored to serve all my life long if you have so soon forgot what you said in Pratt’s upstair room that you would defend me and stop even a word that might be spoken against me. Now, sir, has the spirit of God given you to see that I would not that I was not virtuous if so, why not tell me of it as a friend seeing I am friendless, if not the spirit of God. Have you seen anything or do you know of iniquity being found in my hands? I have looked up to you as being a man of God and having what I called a noble spirit. And therefore I was determined to ask you before I would tell anyone else.
[1:40:25] Michelle: Holy crap. That, what is that? Oh my gosh.
[1:40:33] Jeremy Hoop: I have some questions.
[1:40:36] Michelle: You think?
[1:40:37] Jeremy Hoop: What does this indicate about what Brigham and Hebrew we’re doing? Why is cable teaching her about relations between men and women even if it’s innocent? Why, why is he going to her and saying, dear sister, if you want to give your heart to a man, if it’s in the mind of God, go and give your heart to a man. I, I don’t understand that. I don’t understand why Brigham is meeting with her alone in Pratt’s upstairs room and why Kimball came to her more than once, what’s going on here?
[1:41:12] Michelle: Well, I’m making some connections because this is similar to what she was experiencing when Clayton was there the year before, right? Everyone was all. She was already ostracized even from Rebecca for a time and suspicious. She was so depressed. So she was already struggling. Clayton’s
[1:41:31] Jeremy Hoop: coming over her lodgings all the time.
[1:41:33] Michelle: Yeah. And then it’s Brotherton and the same thing has happened, but Clayton’s not there. What is she being taught? And she says, I’m virtuous, you know, I’m virtuous. So, I mean, it’s easy for me to, to see this later teaching or whatever this spiritual wifey was that you’re virtuous as long as you’re doing it in God’s way. Right. So, OK, I hope I didn’t add too much.
[1:41:59] Jeremy Hoop: Why would Brigham need to tell her? Hey, look, if anybody says anything, I’ll defend you,
[1:42:06] Michelle: I’ll defend you your honor.
[1:42:11] Jeremy Hoop: What does this indicate about Sarah’s relationship to William? And does it indicate a pattern if, if this were in Joseph’s journal, if these, we could connect these things together? There’s just no, there, there’s no answer to it. Now, I I’m not going to take the time to go through this, but I highly recommend people who want to see a connection go through the Nauvoo um High Council minutes from 1842 where a number of women,
[1:42:44] Michelle: I’ll be sure and link them so people can find the link
[1:42:47] Jeremy Hoop: including the widow, Sarah Miller, um Catherine Warren and others who testified about John Bennett, which you see on your screen and chauncey Higby and others. I think nine other men who went around teaching women that Joseph Smith was saying it’s ok for us to have these open spiritual relationships, to have more than one wife or to have free intercourse among the sexes or if you’re a single woman, it’s ok. But if you’re a married woman, it’s not. And as
[1:43:17] Michelle: long as nobody finds out, as long as nobody
[1:43:19] Jeremy Hoop: knows, nobody finds out and promising them that they would defend them, they would marry them, they give them food. If they got pregnant, John Bennett would, would perform an abortion. Uh But they set up these scenarios where a number of women fell prey to it and were passed around from man to man to man to man to man.
[1:43:39] Michelle: I also just have to pause for a second and let the resonance of the our hearts need to go out to Sarah crooks, this young girl who was, who suffered and suffered and suffered again. It’s Jacob two, you know, the, the broken heartedness of the women being taught these deceptions by these dirty, selfish narcissistic men.
[1:44:07] Jeremy Hoop: Ok. By the way, that’s why Joseph Smith, one of the primary reasons for the inception of the Relief society was because of things like what I’m showing you on your screen, which is, are the minutes from the Nabu High Council hearing the stories of these women who were seduced and tricked by these nefarious scoundrels and, and the, the things that they would convince them of based on spiritual premises. And so, and, and that’s precisely what Brigham and Hebrew did. And so also one other is the story of Martha Brotherton and Nancy Rigdon. And if you haven’t, for those of you um who have not encountered Rob Fathering Ham’s work, I highly commend what he’s done. Um He has done incredible research and the way that he presents material I think is, is absolutely astonishing and frankly, uh Brian Hales, um your critique of Rob’s work is um it lacks a lot of substance.
[1:45:05] Michelle: I’ve already talked about this. And so I’ll link to it again, but I’ve already, I’ve got,
[1:45:09] Jeremy Hoop: he addresses this. Rob, addresses this in great detail and what you see in the interactions with Martha Brotherton and what she accuses Brigham Young of doing. Do we know that Martha Brotherton’s story is true? No, because it’s her word against his. But when we know we have this letter from Sarah Crooks boy, if you had an accusation against Joseph and then that a letter from a, from a woman to him, it would be done, it would be done.
[1:45:36] Michelle: So so that the the one of the things that Brian says and others, even Todd Compton says, the reason we don’t have evidence against Joseph is because he died. If he had lived, we’d have all of this evidence. I want to point out that this letter, all of this evidence that you are talking about today was Joseph was alive. We have all of this evidence contemporary for Brigham and Hebrew and Clayton and others in those years that we say we can’t have any evidence from Joseph, right? We don’t need to doubt Brigham’s and Hebrews and Clayton’s polygamy even we have contemporaneous evidence for all of them, right?
[1:46:17] Jeremy Hoop: That is very clear within a 14 month period.
[1:46:21] Michelle: Yeah. Well, that, that’s what I’m saying. Like, like all of the excuses about Joseph fall flat because we have that letter was while Joseph was alive. There’s nothing like that.
[1:46:31] Jeremy Hoop: So we, we have this saga about Sarah and now we gotta find out what happens with Margaret. So in um Navoo, he has not forgot about Sarah, but he has turned his attentions to another woman. Um Margaret Moon’s highlights of her bio born in 1820 um is the, she’s the daughter of Thomas Moon baptized in 1837 comes to England or comes to Nauvoo in 1840. She is engaged to a man named Aaron Farr. So between uh late 1840 1843 Williams getting settled with his family, there’s a lot of hardships, a lot of things going on finally gets to Nauvoo. Margaret’s also coming over, she’s engaged to a man named Aaron Farr. He goes on a mission.
[1:47:20] Michelle: Did you already point out that, that Clayton’s wife, Ruth Margaret is Ruth’s three year younger sister. So did you already say this is, this is Clayton’s wife’s younger sister? Ok.
[1:47:32] Jeremy Hoop: Which we’re going to see some very strange happenings with three of them. Um So remember she’s engaged to a man named Aaron Far on his mission. And again, like you said, they’re sisters and all of this comes from this NUVO journal that we’re gonna talk more about in detail. Um And some people might say, well, why do you give any credence to the journal since you don’t think it’s contemporaneous? I don’t believe he’s gonna lie about himself. I don’t believe he’s going to lie about the things he’s recording about his interactions and his thoughts. As you will see, I think he has an opinion of himself that comes through.
[1:48:16] Michelle: I also Jeremy, my, my feeling on the journal reading it and I’ll, again, I’ll link it so people can read it. I don’t think it was a finished product meant for public consumption that it really doesn’t strike me that way. It strikes me as a work in progress of some sort. That’s the impression I get,
[1:48:35] Jeremy Hoop: I’ll give you a hint. I believe it’s a draft.
[1:48:38] Michelle: Ok. So like I said, a work product,
[1:48:42] Jeremy Hoop: it’s not intended to be a novel, it’s not intended to be a prepublication. Um but it’s a, it’s a fragmentary draft, but I’ll, I’ll explain that later. Um It’s in the pages of these journals that we have what the other side thinks is the smoking gun and it is very understandable to believe that or why people believe that what Clayton rights connects him to Joseph Smith and why they have such a hard time with Joseph because of the things that, but the things Clayton is doing on his own, they even connect those things with Joseph Smith because they say that he learned it from Joseph and we will address what Clayton writes about Joseph at a late later time. I just want to make that very clear. Um We’re gonna uh address those things and then show why it is that I do not believe that those stories are trustworthy and why the journal is not contemporaneous. Um This, this presentation here about Margaret will focus on what Clayton writes about his own practice. That’s really important to understand. Um There are very important things to discuss later on about the nature of the fragmentary extracts that we have. They’re just fragmentary um from the Clayton Journal. We’re gonna talk about that and what that means. And then keep in mind, Clayton refers to four people as president in his writings, four people. So just keep that in mind, we’ll talk about that later. But he refers to Joseph Hiram Brigham and Heber as president in his writings. OK. Um And a word about Ruth um as in the Manchester England mission, William barely speaks of his first wife Ruth in this journal. Either it is at least in the fragments that we have. Um he mentions her six times at least perfunctorily um by name in connection with ceremony, but there are no expressions toward her as he does with others. It’s consistent at least 24 April 1843. Sister Margaret Moon went with me to Carthage. She is a lovely woman desires to do right in all things and will submit to counsel with all her heart. There we go. Now he’s fully on board with the submitting to council
[1:50:55] Michelle: which becomes a very common. Another very common phrase in Utah like submit to counsel is a very polygamous phrase that I don’t ever recall. Joseph using. It’s nowhere in the revelations and nowhere in his own sermons.
[1:51:10] Jeremy Hoop: You’ll notice I’ve notated in these entries, whether what book they come from that’s important. Um It’s important to track where the entries are come from. There’s a compiler named Robert Filler up who does a good job of helping us understand where the various entries come from, which journal they come from. There are different volumes, three different volumes of the NRI journal. And we’ll talk about that later. But 27 April 1843 um I went to presidents who rode with me to broke HC Kimball’s where Sister Margaret Moon was sealed up by the priesthood by the president. And m to me, OK, everyone agrees. Meaning the consensus is Joseph Smith sealed um Margaret to him on that day. OK. Uh And then on the 30th of April S Anne, that’s Sarah Anne booth would obey her instructions. Wait, didn’t he just marry somebody on the 27th? Three days later? Yes, he’s courting Sarah Anne as well. OK. S Anne would obey her instructions. Evening, walked out with Margaret and accomplished a good object. I don’t know. But he makes these phrases throughout this journal that to me indicates I got busy, you know, I, I, we had sex, we did the deed. I think that’s what he means, but I can’t be sure. Uh 2nd May 1843 talked with Jane Charn. She loves me and would sooner unite to me than are meaning a man named r uh Joseph wrote out today with Flora Woodworth. That’s one of the big smoking guns they have that they believe about Flo Flora Woodworth. 3rd May 1843. Now, look, I understand there are people they’re throwing crap at their, at their computer screens right now because they think I’m just crazy because I dismissed this stuff. There’s a reason for that. I don’t just dismiss it. Um There’s a reasoned reason for it. 3rd May 1843 Diantha Farr, we’ll learn about Diana here in a while, went with me to Carthage. So he’s just recently married and two of the three of the women actually that he will consider as marital partners. He’s in some kind of courtship with or some kind of flirtation with already 7 to 1843 P MS sister Booth, by the way, who wants to marry him at some point with my wife’s with my wife’s plural evening, walked with president with Margaret, 1318 43. Sister Desdemona Foer came to see me, see if she could board with me. I don’t know what that’s about 1418 43. Uh Walked out with uh Margaret, who promises to be true. Ok. Uh You’ve already married her, but she’s promising to be true. 1518 43 at the temple office night, my wife and Margaret slept together. I don’t know what that means exactly. Maybe we can find out later. I don’t know. 12 May 1843 conversed with HCK concerning a plot that is being laid to entrap the brethren of the secret priesthood by bro H and others. What member of an authority in NAVOO would have the initial of h other than Hiram? I don’t know.
[1:54:35] Michelle: Well, and it goes along with the story that he, we have other sources that he was trying to root this out.
[1:54:42] Jeremy Hoop: But that’s a really interesting admission that there is quote, a secret priesthood. Interesting 31. May this am Sarah Crooks? All right. In Nauvoo Sarah’s back. Second of June 1843 wrote to Susan Conrad. I don’t know what that’s about this evening. I talked with Sarah again and she appears willing to comply with her privilege.
[1:55:08] Michelle: Oh, it’s so gross. That’s so gross. Ok.
[1:55:13] Jeremy Hoop: 3rd June 1843 I took my wife and her child. Also Margaret Moon and Sarah Crook. So they went on a little trip four ju 4 June 1843 conversed with Sarah and Elizabeth Brotherton. Now that’s interesting because right in this time Elizabeth Brotherton is hooking up with Parley Pratt. Interesting 11, June 1843 Margaret received a letter from Erin Farr which made her feel bad. It also gave me unaccountable sorrow. Third. You now
[1:55:46] Michelle: that was who she was engaged to, right? That was her fiance still
[1:55:50] Jeremy Hoop: is technically never broke it off. 3rd June 1843. Well, you’ll see this is, it’s actually, this is actually tragic what we’re reading here. And as we’ll see, M uh, President J started north. I’ve had some conversation with M she promised she would not marry a if she could possibly avoid it. And if she ever feels disposed to marry, she will tell me as soon as she thinks of it. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, I thought you married her William. So, what’s the deal? She will seek my counsel and says she will abide it last night. S crooks went away abruptly to those Millers but came back. This am OK. 8 July 1843 Margaret wrote a letter to Aaron which I dictated, informing him that she should not marry. Now, I gotta read these entries because it’s really important to get a sense of his mindset. 12 July 1843 Saturday, Margaret had had a long con and Margaret and a had a long conversation and I had a long conversation together. She has stood true to her covenant with CW. Uh Everyone believes that means William Clayton written backwards. I also
[1:57:09] Michelle: that happens quite a bit. That’s not the only time. So there is precedent for it. I also
[1:57:14] Jeremy Hoop: had some talk with him and although this, this is Aaron. Ok. So I had some talk with Aaron and although the shock is severe, he endures it patiently and I pray the great Elohim to make up the loss to him in 100 fold and enable him to rejoice in all things, my heart aches with grief on his and M’s account and could almost say, oh, that I had never known her but thou o God knowest the integrity of thy servant, thou knowest that I have done that which I have understood to be thy will. And I am still determined to do so. And I ask thee in the name of Jesus Christ, either to absolutely wean my affections from m or give me her entire and then I am content but to live in this state of feeling. I cannot if I have done wrong in this thing, show it me that thy servant may repent of it and obtain forgiveness. But oh Lord, have mercy on me and by some means release me from this grievous bondage of feeling and thy servant will praise thee President Joseph came to see me and pronounced a ceiling blessing upon ruth and me and we mutually entered into an everlasting covenant with each other. Now he is sealed the roof.
[1:58:20] Michelle: Ok? And that’s that, that actually could be true. That fits with what Joseph was teaching eternal marriage with his wife, right? And again, again, I’m sorry, I have to keep harping on this because it’s so important. Joseph couldn’t write any of it down. Like for example, Melissa Lott’s name couldn’t be written in her Bible because it was so secret and it was against the law. And yet Clayton is writing this garbage right. Like that’s important for people to, I want someone to respond to that. Ok.
[1:58:56] Jeremy Hoop: 23 July Sunday em appears dissatisfied with her situation is miserable. O that the Lord will bless my house and deliver us from, from every evil principle and feeling that we may be saved for. I desire to do right? Oh, Lord, make my heart and my affections, right and pure as it shall please thee that I may enjoy the blessing of peace and happiness. Even so. Amen Hiram preached am Joseph pm evening, I had some more talk with em and fine. She is miserable which makes me doubly. So I offered to her to try to have her covenant released if she desired, desired it. But she said she was not willing. I wonder if that’s really true. 24 July Monday M is still miserable and unhappy and it does seem that my heart must burst. What shall I do? How shall I recompense? And how long must I suffer worse than death for that? Which I’ve always regarded as being the will of the Lord. Always regarded as being the word of the Lord by the help of the Lord. I will do right. I have repeatedly offered to m to try to get a release from the covenant and I have done all I know to make things comfortable but to no effect. She appears almost to hate me and cannot bear to come near me.
[2:00:03] Michelle: What power does he have over her? Wow. Ok.
[2:00:07] Jeremy Hoop: We’re going to see 24 July 1843. 0 God. If thou will give me, if thou will give me MS affections and cause things to be pleasant and happy between us. If thou will bless her and comfort her by thy spirit and cause her to rejoice in what she has done and bring to pass that I may secure her truly with all her affections for time and for eternity, I feel to covenant to try to serve thee with more diligence if possible and to do all that thou shalt require at mine hands. Now, by, by the way, I believe this guy is fully sincere and fully a nutcracker. He’s, he is a sincere nutter in my view. I don’t believe, I believe he’s being really honest here.
[2:00:51] Michelle: It sounds like, have
[2:00:52] Jeremy Hoop: you known people who get a revelation to do something nutty?
[2:00:55] Michelle: Absolutely.
[2:00:58] Jeremy Hoop: Yeah, I’ve known a bunch of them. In fact, one of these days my wife, who we’ve talked about this may talk about that because she’s had experiences with guys like this or a guy like that man. Um If possible, let’s see. Will thou thou not grant me this blessing? Relieve my aching heart from this worst of all troubles which ever befell me in this course of my life. Oh God, plead my cause and give me thine everlasting blessing and do remember am for good that she may be comforted even so. Amen. Amen and amen. 25 July today. M much as usual 26th July. M seems quite embittered against me in consequence of which I called her to me and asked her if she desired the covenant to be revoked. If it were possible to this, she would not give me a satisfactory answer. Only saying if it had not been done, it should not be meaning our union. Meaning if we didn’t either get sealed or have sex or whatever, then I wouldn’t have done it if we didn’t get, if we didn’t do it already, I wouldn’t have done.
[2:01:57] Michelle: I regret it. But, and also I’m so curious about this covenant that’s irrevocable like, like it, I’m so like it seems like this manipulative tactic like we can have the covenant undone, but then you’ll be an adulteress if you marry anybody else. Like what is he saying to her? Because in Utah, one of the big plus perks of polygamy is how easy divorce was, right? And is Joseph Smith, is he claiming? I mean, he never claims that Joseph is saying that the covenant can’t be undone. Like it’s so strange to try to get into his mind
[2:02:28] Jeremy Hoop: and we’re going to find out that he counsels with Sarah and Whitney and Nel K Whitney about what to do, which is 26 July 1843. I then asked if she would consent if a would take her under all circumstances. But she would not be sent to
[2:02:47] Michelle: Sharon will take you anyway. Even though I’ve def flowered you saying
[2:02:51] Jeremy Hoop: she did it not for her sake, but for the sake of the peace of my family under these circumstances, I could not rest until I, I had ascertained whether the sea covenant could be revoked. And although contrary to her wish I went to see President Jay, now he’s gonna talk about President Jay and see if this claim is true or not. Uh I took a to talk with him and asked him some questions whereby I ascertained that he would be willing to take her under all circumstances. I reasoned considerable with him. So now he’s being magnanimous. I’m gonna try to get you out of this sweetheart. Ok. I reasoned considerable with him to prove that I had done right in all these matters. So far as I knew it, I called President out and briefly stated the situation of things and then asked him if the c covenant could be revoked. He shook his head and answered no. At this conclusion, my mind seemed for the moment to get relief for the twofold reason that I had done all I could and I did not want to see and I did not want the seat revoked. I thought you
[2:03:44] Michelle: were ok. Let me also just point out here if we are accusing Joseph Smith of this, remember Fanny Alger, she left, she married someone else like, like how many of Joseph’s supposed wives left? And the, the, the c was revoked, the sea was undone. They married other men,
[2:04:01] Jeremy Hoop: the Partridge sisters who immediately, uh Emma demanded a divorce and he granted it
[2:04:07] Michelle: and they’re kept out. Right. So there’s no, there’s no consistency. Just like 132. Just like all of this. They can’t make a plausible story.
[2:04:16] Jeremy Hoop: Let me acknowledge what the, the antagonist side would say. Well, of course, there’s no consistency. He’s a fraud. He’s a con man. He’s, he’s a megalomaniac. He’s, he’s a brilliant uh uh huckster. He’s selling snake oil for the purposes of doing whatever he wants to do. OK? I understand that. Um I and I get that this feeds into that narrative. This helps people feel solid that Joseph was those things. But that’s why we have to examine these things. I came back and
[2:04:51] Michelle: I have responses to that. Keep going. But I
[2:04:54] Jeremy Hoop: came back and M and A were together in forest Garden, Margaret and Aaron were together in forest garden. I told them the answer I got and advised them to take the best measures to make all things right between them. I cannot help thinking that M has treated me not only unkindly but meanly and cruelly, but I forgive her before the Lord for I sympathize with her in her grief, but can’t console her for she will not speak to me. 26 July 1843 my earnest prayer to God is that all things may soon become right and pleasant that the Lord may bless her and save her from sinning against him. And if I have done wrong in asking him that the sea could be revoked and seeking to have it done, oh, Lord, forgive me for, I desire to do right in all things that I may be saved, that I may be saved. I feel that I have done right in the sight of God and that he has abundantly blessed me for which I thank him. And something tells me that the time will come when M will love those whom she uh whom she ought and when she will feel perfectly satisfied with her situation and rejoice, that things remain as they are. Oh, now, oh and now, oh, God bless thy servant and handmaid and stamp the peace upon us and fill us with the spirit of truth for Jesus Christ’s sake. Amen. 1227 July 1843 Thursday am went to see President J in our conversation about M and A. He said, if a went to making me any trouble, he would defend me to the uttermost and stand by me through all for which I feel thankful. 13 August 1843 at night, my wife’s mother went into the garden. Ok. Margaret’s mother, Ruth’s mother, William has married both her daughters at night. My wife’s mother went into the garden to pray just as we were going to bed, Margaret and Lydia. That’s a sister whom he also wants to marry. But he will say Joseph forbid me because I, because I got a new revelation, William, I got a new revelation. You can’t marry him. You can’t marry more than 22 sisters in a family. Sorry. And by the way I want her. So, will you go proposition her for me? Ok. That’s a story that William will tell. Yep, my wife’s and this is why they hate Joseph. That’s why they hate him. Ok?
[2:07:12] Michelle: Because Clayton’s version of Joseph is awful. It’s Clayton that paints this picture. It is a valid awful picture. But he’s the only source.
[2:07:22] Jeremy Hoop: It’s, it’s only Clayton in an interaction like this other than somebody like John Bennett who’s just making crap up,
[2:07:28] Michelle: right? And there’s no consistency between their stories though, right? Ok. Continue.
[2:07:32] Jeremy Hoop: Let’s keep my wife’s mother went in the garden, Margaret and Lydia went out to find her on her knees. She was deranged. He characterizes her as deranged. She came into the bedroom trembling and seemed as though she had been frightened but was altogether delirious. Her feet and legs were cold and I feared she was going to die. She got into bed and we got some hot water uh to her feet and rubbed her legs and feet with flannel and went to bed. She soon seemed some better from her conversation with Lydia this afternoon. It seems she took President Jay’s remarks very deeply to heart and that with her fears for Margaret uh overwhelmed her. I feel as though I was in some measure, a child of sorrow, but I am determined to do right in all things. May the Lord bless my family, my father’s house and save us with an everlasting salvation. Let peace and intelligence beam upon us in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen. What in the world did she listen to? This is one of his really famous sermons. He preaches against wickedness going on in the city. And then he delivers this incredibly lofty sermon on, on Elijah. Um He, he um expounds on Second Peter chapter three, calling an election, the principles of ceiling for whatever reason, whatever he said sunk into her heart. And she reflected on that and felt that the circumstance going on in her own household with her, with her two daughters was extremely troubling. 18, August 1843 I had some conversation with bro Whitney and have learned that Farr’s family are conspiring with Walker boys and girls and they with e that’s I believe Emma to accomplish my downfall. He writes a lot about people conspiring against him by the way, as I’ve mentioned before, I find they are my secret enemies, but I fear them not for God who knows the secrets of all hearts knows mine also, I told em of this and ascertained that she had no acknowledged to a that I had slept with her. Holy
[2:09:26] Michelle: cow.
[2:09:27] Jeremy Hoop: Why would that even be necessary if they were really married? Because Aaron’s privy to all this. Now, apparently, apparently Joseph’s even talked with her. What’s the deal? Why does he, she even need to say I’ve slept with him? So we can’t, I can’t have you. I can’t be with you now. I’m, I’m, I’m no longer a virgin or I’m no longer yours or whatever. Really strange. He’s already
[2:09:47] Michelle: didn’t Joseph just send him on a mission if we’re going right? That
[2:09:50] Jeremy Hoop: he was already on a mission.
[2:09:52] Michelle: I know
[2:09:53] Jeremy Hoop: the first person to steal a girl while somebody’s on a mission. Wasn’t Joseph? Ok. And I’m not saying Joseph did by the way. But according to the narrative, it was, but
[2:10:04] Michelle: it gives them the things that they are doing are the things that they can just naturally write in that Joseph is doing right. That, that seems to be the pattern.
[2:10:13] Jeremy Hoop: They are, they are classic project projectionists. 19 August 1843 Saturday, Margaret says D Farr, that’s Diantha Farr who will later become his wife, Aaron’s sister.
[2:10:30] Michelle: Oh my gosh, ok.
[2:10:32] Jeremy Hoop: Aaron’s sister, Margaret says Diana Farr said to day she believed, she believed him. Ok. So Diana believes Margaret, I was vexed at her, meaning I William was vexed at Margaret and she almost felt disposed almost to go to every house in the city and tell all she knew and then come home and kill herself. I felt my heart ache tonight. This makes me wanna weep. This is awful. I felt my heart ache tonight when we lay down, being, being downstairs and Margaret up. So he’s downstairs with the Ruth and Margaret’s upstairs. My soul loves m and that my desire is to see her happy and comfortable. Oh, may the Lord bless her. Um This reminds me of Sweeney Todd and the caged bird, the judge’s ward. He’s kept her in a little cage. Everybody knows the story. Sweeney Todd
[2:11:29] Michelle: that she’s threatening to go to go blow the secret, right? Like with what we claim about all of Joseph’s wives. I mean, this, this woman is suffering and is going to go below the secret that he, that Clayton is keeping it. It’s
[2:11:43] Jeremy Hoop: fascinating and what and what is, what is, what is so powerful that it’s keeping her with him? 20 August 1843 Sunday, Margaret came upstairs to me PM I went to sister booths. So going to other women had some conversation about Ess A Sarah Anne, her daughter at sister B’s request. I have evidence that S A is true to me and desire to revive, to receive her. Um I also had talk with Mary Aspen who is in trouble. PPP part B Pratt has through his wife made proposals to her but she is dissatisfied. Sister P is obstinate. When P went away, sister P cautioned Erin against me and said the 12 would have more glory than me and et cetera. I tried to comfort her and told her what her privilege was.
[2:12:30] Michelle: It’s a key battle. Holy cow. I’ve got the more direct course to heaven. Come on,
[2:12:39] Jeremy Hoop: there’s a mad girl rush going on here 24 August 1843 Thursday. At night. I asked mother if m might sleep with Ruth and me, she appeared very rebellious and would not consent but said we might do as we have in mind. Now. I mean, granted he can’t take Margaret home to his house. You know, he can’t be seen with two women in his house. So he’s gotta have, if he wants both to sleep with him, he’s got to do it somewhere else. But he asked their mom.
[2:13:16] Michelle: It’s so weird and there are quite a few entries that hint at him sleeping with more than one of his wives. It’s really strange.
[2:13:24] Jeremy Hoop: There’s two that I can find. There might be more. But these are the two that I found. There’s the one previous where those two slept together. I don’t know if he was there, he doesn’t say. But this one, I, I mean, I don’t know. Is this, um, is this some form of interesting um, predilections here? I don’t know, but it certainly seems like it, if it was Joseph, they would certainly say that 27 August 1843 I went to sister Booths and talked with her and Mary Aspen 3rd September 1843 Sunday at AM at home. Unpleasant feelings with M still 10. September 1843. In the evening, I went to Sister Booths 23rd. September 1843. I went to Sister Booth’s essay. Did not come 1st October 1843. Um Monday first had some meditation at home. Never did. Margaret and my little family appear more lovely.
[2:14:17] Michelle: His little family. No mention of ruth still. Ok.
[2:14:20] Jeremy Hoop: Um S A had been home at home two weeks ago and had gone back. I felt much disappointed. 14 October S A uh went to sis Booth saw essay but could not have any chance to converse any 16 October essays to be married to Jonathan Needham tomorrow. Oops. But that’s that story is not over 18 October spent two hours with lovely M 28 November. My feelings have been harrowed up while reflecting on the disappointment Aaron must have felt when he returned home and found he had lost m so spent two hours with lovely m probably having a nice time or a romantic time thinks things are OK. Who knows? And now things are OK in his mind. Now he’s now he’s compassionate toward Aaron. I would gladly recompense him if it were in my power. I pray that the Lord would
[2:15:14] Michelle: listen. I see gloating in that like his whole journal. He’s so self, righteous and arrogant and you know, he’s writing the story of himself. He actually
[2:15:24] Jeremy Hoop: says that he, he is one of his afflictions is vanity. I pray that the Lord may bless him and give him a companion worthy of him. 17, he’s, he’s extraordinarily magnanimous 17 December Sunday, mother-in-law in trouble which causes m also to weep evening, my feelings were insulted while hearing em and her mother in conversation. 18th February uh 12 a.m. M began to be sick and continued to grow worse until five o’clock when she was delivered of a son, baby Adel Bar. She did remarkably well for which I thank my heavenly father mother attended to her. This is I, this is the um second that I’m aware of or third child born in a polygamous marriage prior to Joseph’s death.
[2:16:14] Michelle: Yeah. And this is four months before
[2:16:18] Jeremy Hoop: mother tendered her. I was home all day. M seems to do very well. Ok. Then he gets very busy after this, very busy. Um He’s, he’s inducted into the quorum of the council of 50. He’s also finally inducted into the what’s called the anointed quorum. Oddly enough, he wasn’t inducted previous to this, which is interesting. The anointed quorum is polygamist. Yeah, the anointed quorum is where Brian Hale says all the, the secret polygamy insiders are, although William Marks William law is part of that as well and others. Ok. But um council 50 he’s very, very busy at this point. So there’s a lot less to do. Uh However, let’s talk about Sarah a little bit. What about her on the 18th of April 1844 he writes this, Sarah Cook has been at my house today and before she left again, she, she showed her enmity toward Joseph and others in full. She’s got a wicked spirit in her and will be cursed if she did not repent. Why do you call her Sarah Cook? Because she married William Cook on August 14th, 1843.
[2:17:25] Michelle: So this is Sarah Crooks Cook. This is ok. So Sarah Crooks, he lost her. So now she’s wicked
[2:17:34] Jeremy Hoop: and now she’s wicked. Mhm. And then the day after the martyrdom, William writes a little uh paragraph about the conspirators who plotted to kill Joseph. And he lists William Law and Wilson law and the fosters and Higby and Joseph Jackson etcetera. And down below, he says William Cook and Sarah, his wife, formerly Sarah, formerly Sarah Crooks of Manchester, England. He puts the only woman in the list by the way of the conspirators to murder Joseph and Hiram as Sarah Crooks,
[2:18:17] Michelle: the one who broke his heart, the one who got away. So now
[2:18:23] Jeremy Hoop: and that star is not over yet. 11, August 1840
[2:18:25] Michelle: four. Can we just back up? Is there any evidence anywhere that Sarah Crooks was in any way
[2:18:31] Jeremy Hoop: involved? Somebody correct me if that’s, if that’s the case. Um she
[2:18:36] Michelle: had just recently come from England, right? Like it
[2:18:39] Jeremy Hoop: is, it is possible that, that she, that she went to his house and said, I am done with you and Joseph too and everything and, and, and I have, we don’t know, but we know for sure we know for sure she writes Brigham. She’s being taught stuff. She’s also being propositioned by William as a plural wife. Likely he’s saying Joseph says we can do this. And so who knows what she knows, who knows what if the conversation happened the way he reports it. But I could easily see her having gotten her fill of it all. Martha Brotherton had her fill. Others had their fill of the whole thing and they left uh Katherine Lewis who we we will meet later. They have their fill and they leave.
[2:19:19] Michelle: But I just want to say you’re completely speculating about Sarah. We have no evidence of anything from Sarah. We just have William Clayton damning her to hell. Basically saying she’s the wickedest of all the women just like Emma was because she wouldn’t do what Brigham wanted.
[2:19:33] Jeremy Hoop: I’m open, I’m open to evidence that shows that she was involved or that William Cook was involved. It’s possible that William Cook was if that’s the case, something had happened to her in Nauvoo turned her so much against the whole thing that then she’s in league with people who want to murder the prophet 11. August 1844 Sunday am had conversation with Diantha Farr on various subjects. She seems to be true and faithful. Margaret is miserable and unhappy. And then on the 27th August during last night D A that’s Adel Bar. His son thus ended the early earthly career of an innocent sufferer who has no no comfort in life but has suffered since his birth to his death. So he, they lost their son just horrible experience. Fifth of September, um Clayton becomes convinced Allen writes about this, James Allen does. So this is not in the journal, but James Allen having access to the journal writes that Clayton is convinced that Sarah Crooks is laying a snare for him. 13, September 1844 Friday. Um William Clayton worked on the minutes of the excommunication trial. September 8th at three, went in to see Alice Hardman who is sick and was united in the everlasting covenant receives another wife. 20 September 1844. Also Friday also wrote a letter for Hebrew Kimball after he and I went to see A H that’s Alice Hardman and Eb could be Elizabeth Brotherton. I don’t know the latter will obey his instructions. He again earnestly told me that all the 12 were my very warmest friends, which is interesting because he will say some interesting things about them and how he’s disgruntled and seems like he’s on the outs. It’s very interesting. They’re my very warmest friends. He will accom and he will help me to accomplish all my desires in as much as they are right? He says I shall yet have sc Sarah Crooks Oh
[2:21:29] Michelle: my gosh. Yeah. So she was that wicked. She did all of that. But I’m still lusting after her. My ego is hurt. Ok.
[2:21:40] Jeremy Hoop: And then another strange dream, Saturday the 19th, last night I dreamed I was in a nice building in a very pleasant place. I thought I was married to brother Cutler’s youngest daughter and she seemed as happy as an angel and I felt full of joy and peace. I thought I had received Miss Cutler in addition to those I had already got. When I awoke, I felt disappointed and felt to pray in my heart. Oh God, if it be, thy will give me that woman for a companion and my soul shall praise thee, but they will be but thy will be done and not mine. Later. Sister Booth tells me that Sarah Anne sister Booth tells me that Sarah Anne, her daughter, who did, who did she marry? Jonathan? Needham is very unhappy and wants to see me. She says Jane Charnock is perfectly unhappy and if there’s any way she can be loosed, she’s married or at least in a spiritual relationship. If she can be loose, she wants me to take her Mary Aspen is ready to unite to me as her savior and sister, as savior, as her savior and sister Booth even says she shall not risk her salvation in Robert’s hands and wants me to interfere.
[2:22:52] Michelle: We, oh my word. He’s
[2:22:55] Jeremy Hoop: gonna get a four for Wait, is that four? Sarah’s sister? Booth? Sarah Jane, Mary Aspen. He’s gonna get four at once. That’s quite a haul.
[2:23:06] Michelle: And, and remember Margaret’s covenant couldn’t be undone. She couldn’t be freed from him. But all of these women from their husbands,
[2:23:15] Jeremy Hoop: no
[2:23:15] Michelle: problem. It’s a one way door. We had the,
[2:23:21] Jeremy Hoop: we had considerable conversation on many subjects and felt pretty well. Y you’re feeling pretty well. 21 October Monday PM. I went to see Mary as she’s made up her mind to go with me. I also went to see A H she is better 27 October called it Brother Cutlers. And then now he’s following up on the dream 8 November Friday went to see Jane Hardman. She prefers me for a savior to anyone else. So she says the, the savior notion is OK. I challenge anyone of the apologists to find anything in Joseph’s writings anywhere that confirms that utter blasphemous nonsense. Ok. Now, speaking of blasphemous nonsense. Where did William get this from? Later on? In 1861 Brigham Young will stand up in general conference. Mind you. This is general conference and say the following. Everyone needs to understand this. Everyone the second way in which a wife can be separated from her husband while he continues to be faithful to his God and his priesthood. I have not revealed except to a few persons in this church and a few have received it from Joseph, the prophet as well as myself, this uh by the way, he didn’t say he received it from Joseph. Hm. That’s interesting. And nor do I believe anybody else received it from Joseph. But at least he puts Joseph in the mix this other path a woman may take if she can get a chance and do it in accordance with the order of heaven. If a woman can find a man holding the keys of the priesthood with higher authority and authority than her husband and he, meaning the man with higher authority is disposed to take her. He can do so. Otherwise she’s got to remain where she is. This is the second way in which a woman can leave her husband to whom she has been sealed for time in all eternity. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, what
[2:25:17] Michelle: seals for time and all eternity until you find someone else
[2:25:22] Jeremy Hoop: in either of these ways of separation. You can discover there is no need for a bill of divorcement to recapitulate. First, a man forfeits his covenant with a wife or wives becomes unfaithful to his God and his priesthood. That wife or wives are free from him without a bill of divorcement. Don’t even have to be divorced. Your husband’s a jerk. You can, you can leave second. If a woman claims protection at the hands of a man possessing more power in the priesthood and higher keys, if he’s disposed to rescue her and has obtained the consent of her husband to make her his wife, he can do so without a bill of divorcement. Which by the way, that last piece was not always followed in the case of, for example, Harley P Pratt who took a wife, a wife from a woman. Uh uh and he ended up being murdered by the man who, whose wife he stole.
[2:26:11] Michelle: Well, and also again, Joseph Smith always was consistent with the scriptures as he understood them, he carried them out. This, there’s no definition of this is straight up adultery no matter what. And it’s hard to see how it’s different than wife swapping or spiritual wifey or whatever. Like, hey, if you find a guy, you like better that has bigger keys go, you know, it’s, it’s insane. Says the guy with the biggest keys, right?
[2:26:37] Jeremy Hoop: With the, with, with a, with a uh a belt full of them. Um He’s the, he’s the janitor just jangling with massive keychains all down the hall. Uh When you study the Cochran nights and John Bennett and other spiritual wife systems and free love societies, there was much more free love going on, especially in the early days, they codified it a little more when they got to Utah. John D Lee, for example, John D Lee. Now take it for what it is. John D Lee was the only one con convicted of the Mountain Meadows massacre. He writes in his tell all book um without slanderous um uh tone of the navoo period, uh which he remembers fondly that they were exchanging wives. Just flat
[2:27:31] Michelle: wife swapping right up there and, and back back to Brigham Young though. The other interesting thing is there’s no escape for any of Brigham’s wives. There’s no further up line
[2:27:42] Jeremy Hoop: escape until he wants to let them go. And then, yeah, just get out of here. You’re gonna complain anymore.
[2:27:47] Michelle: But they can’t, they can’t trade up. There’s no one with bigger keys than bri.
[2:27:51] Jeremy Hoop: No, no, no, no, no. Now back to William and Margaret on the 20th of November. Um he went with President Young to see sister Jane Hardman and at that point got married to Jane 21st November. Uh then went to see Jh and prospered. I think that means probably what I think it means. 22nd November. Yep, Friday evening with brother Kimball sent for me to write two letters for him. We had considerable talk on the priesthood. Margaret don’t seem happy which makes my headache. This is a year and a half later 5 December 1844 bro. Kimball asked President Young concerning D Farr, that’s Diana Farr. He gave full consent and ordered bro K to attend to it. I feel hor humbly grateful for this grant. I feel that by the way, did he get a grant for all the other women that he’s been that, that want him for a savior? But now he’s got to get a grant from the big man. Ok. Um And, and Field to ask the father in the name of Jesus to give me favor in her eyes and the eyes of her parents that I may receive the gift in full 24 December evening. I went to converse with brother Far, concerning d he and sister Far feels well towards me and are quite willing to give me what I ask. He wishes to converse with, bro Kimball, brother Kimball and D before he decides thus, has my prayer been answered to the full and my heart is full of joy and gratitude to God for his mercies to me in my house. If my heart was as pure as I desire, it should be no sin nor evil would ever be found there. But I am subject to Vanity 27 December. So it’s a, it’s a merry merry Christmas Friday. After meeting, I asked brother Far if he had come to a conclusion and he gave assent to my request and seemed to feel well, 9 January Thursday, Hebrew Kimball about uh four something came at that time and we went over to brother forests to spend a little season together. Winslow Farr was married to Olive H Freeman for time in all eternity. After which the seal of the covenant was put upon Diantha. The question was asked of each present. Did they freely give her up? And they all signified their willingness by saying they had no objections. There were present Winslow Far her father and his wife. Um, also Lauren Farr and Nancy, his wife and William Walker and all of his wife. The blessings pronounced upon her head were great and one promised was that her s should become numerous as the sands on the seashore. Hck gave her some very good advice afterward and she seemed to feel well. Oh my gosh, everyone should get advice from Hebrew Kimball.
[2:30:25] Michelle: Oh, yeah. I also want to point out like all of the stupidity and inconsistency. There’s absolutely no Lara of Sarah Ying going on here, Ruth hasn’t given a single wife to her husband like this guy is just a complete lectures
[2:30:44] Jeremy Hoop: and no, no mention that she refuses, which is their escape clause to the law of Sarah. No mention that Ruth’s upset. No mention of Ruth at all. This is Diantha, by the way. Um Boy, she’s fierce. She’s a pretty
[2:30:57] Michelle: woman, poor women in
[2:30:59] Jeremy Hoop: January. Then this is what she said. He says about her considering what he’s gone through with Margaret. May she never violate her covenant? But may she with her companion realize to the full all the blessings promised and may there never be the first jar or unkind feelings toward each other exist to all eternity as thy thy prayer of thy servant William. Uh oh Lord. And may it ever be so amen in a very pleasant interview and parted about eight 12, January attended a high priest quorum with Aaron Farr. I conversed with him some concerning d um Aaron. I just wanna let you know that I married your sister in Margaret’s hearing and she felt bad. So he’s talking with Aaron about Diantha in Margaret’s hearing and Margaret feels bad. Diantha was at my house when I got home and tarried with us all night.
[2:31:53] Michelle: We also know from the experience with Sarah crooks, for example, this guy never has any sour grapes. He never has resentment that he wants to like dig into people. Ok.
[2:32:04] Jeremy Hoop: Yeah, Sarah who plotted to kill the prophet 13 January Monday. This ami had some talk with Dee in bed. All things seemed to go right 14 January Tuesday evening wrote out with lot to a fars, talked with Erin considerable also with Dee and was with her until uh 12. I don’t know if that’s noon or 12 midnight and accomplished the desire of my heart by gaining victory over her feelings. Oh, my gosh, this victory over her feelings. Does this sound like a when you read the words of Joseph Smith toward other people, there is no conquering the feelings of other
[2:32:41] Michelle: people. This is all conquest. This is male ego, conquest, period, grounded in lust. There’s nothing
[2:32:49] Jeremy Hoop: like this until her cup shall run over and her heart be as pure as gold. 22nd January Wednesday bought two rings and gave one to Sarah Anne Whitney for painting aprons. Don’t know what that means. 25 January, Aaron Farr seems to be working to get Margaret away from me. We had a long walk talk together on the subject. 26th January 1845 Sun. So now we are almost three years into this thing. Sunday spent the day very pleasantly with Diana Farr for. I felt so bad about Margaret. I did not like to go to the meeting evening, met with the quorum. Uh Erin Farr has been talking again to Margaret and has succeeded in alien alienating her feelings much. 27 January PM talked with Sarah Anne. Sarah Anne Whitney and brother Whitney who reminded me of some items of law which proves that m cannot get away unless I break the covenant. I talked with em again and told her these things and she seems more satisfied. So Sarah Anne Whitney knows pretty well what’s going on and is pretty well instructed in the matters of the celestial law, the law that leads to the celestial kingdom, as Hebrew would say 28 January Tuesday the 28th at the office all day, talked with brother Kimball who confirmed brother Whitney’s remarks and is of the same mind. He said he will converse with a and show him that he’s handling edge tools for. It cannot go down in as much as I hold more authority than he does at 11 o’clock, President, Young President, Young HC Kimball J Taylor Nil K Whitney George Miller, Lia Smith of the council. All Johnny Page went up into the council room at noon. I told em what Brother Kimball said and she seems to feel much better. 14 March.
[2:34:40] Michelle: I just going to say, I don’t trust his perception or reporting of Margaret’s feeling
[2:34:45] Jeremy Hoop: seems like a battered wife. She seems like a woman who is
[2:34:50] Michelle: at least emotionally abused and coerced and manipulated.
[2:34:57] Jeremy Hoop: I don’t trust his, his adjectives um in, in, in his descriptors of Margaret 14 March Friday. Brother Whitney tells me today that he’s notified Margaret to go and receive her washings and anointings at the same time, Ruth does. This makes my heart rejoice. I had heard of it on Wednesday, but not officially truly God is kind to me. So they haven’t had their anointings yet. They, they were not invited in the quorum. Uh um He and Ruth got it done later. This is finally ha he didn’t get in the first rounds of this with Brigham and Heber. Finally, this is happening for him. This stuff is important. We’ll talk about this more later. This is important. William Clayton is not in the inner circle. Yeah, he is on the outside looking in and working to make his way in Friday. The 28th sister Whitney went to attend my uh anointing my wife and Margaret, but was again prevented through Sarah Anne not being there in season, which is interesting. That’s the day after Sarah Anne washes Hebrew’s feet.
[2:36:00] Michelle: Ok. Ok. So, oh, my goodness. And isn’t this Sarah Anne that’s married to Kingsbury? Am I getting this right? Yeah,
[2:36:10] Jeremy Hoop: that’s Sarah Anne Whitney because Sarah Anne Whitney was going to attend to the washings with Elizabeth Whitney.
[2:36:17] Michelle: Ok. Uh It’s such a, ok, this is like worse than any soap opera. All
[2:36:23] Jeremy Hoop: right. And then this the 31st of March Monday on Saturday, Ruth and Margaret received their anointing for which I feel thankful Margaret had some good instructions and she feels satisfied and reconciled. She says she will never leave me on any consideration. And he says, I still feel determined to do all I can to be as faithful as I know. Uh as I know how for that is the desire of my heart. My greatest desire is to so live that I may secure for myself and mine, the highest degree of exaltation and glory, which is possible for me to obtain and to be with my friend Joseph in the eternal world. What happened just weeks before what happened? She was back
[2:37:11] Michelle: with Aaron.
[2:37:13] Jeremy Hoop: She says she will never leave me into consideration. I think we can, I think we can understand what happened that made her feel satisfied and reconciled and say she will never leave me on any consideration. So this is important, what I’m going to read now, most of you, some of you have watched one of Rob’s videos have heard some of this, I I referenced this in the talk that I gave. This is a woman named Catherine Lewis who was baptized into the church in 1841. And she tells of her experience, she never met Joseph Smith. She actually said some pretty awful things about Joseph Smith based on what she’s heard, but that’s based on her interactions with mostly Hebrew Kimball and Brigham Young. And so maybe we can understand what Margaret’s experience was. So I this is a bit long, but it’s important because it indicates, first of all, we have to ask ourselves is this woman telling the truth and you have to judge for yourself if she’s telling the truth. It indicates a lot about what was going on at this time in the year 1841. This is Catherine. I became acquainted with some of the Mormons joined their church and believed them to be a holy people. Zealous of good works. Two years passed on, I was still strong in the faith until the plurality of wives was taught. I from the first mention of it opposed it and told the elder. So some elders there, if we remember by the way about this time, shortly thereafter, Hiram is going to give a talk saying, hey, there’s I get 1000 reports a day of people coming to me saying, what about this? The elders preaching that you can have more wives than one. OK. Told that the elder it was I told the elder it was the doctrine of the devil but was sharply rebuked by one of the elders, apparently elders plural who said, ought we not to receive everything Joseph say it. How many times do we have to see people putting these things in Joseph’s mouth? And by the way, they’re not being, they’re not, they’re, they’re, they’re being pretty brazen by doing this in the open. OK. I know they’re doing, We
[2:39:17] Michelle: have Joseph and Hyrum saying repeatedly like we know on every, from every way that the elders are teaching this, claiming Joseph taught it and they are like, like this is what we know everywhere is happening. It’s the pattern. OK?
[2:39:32] Jeremy Hoop: No. Said I, Joseph is a man subject to like passions as ourselves. So this woman actually has a head on her shoulders. She doesn’t trust in the arm of flesh said, said the elder. Um this is a direct revelation immediately from heaven. I replied, I could not receive anything without a revelation for myself. The Book of Doctrine gave me that privilege, et cetera. And I was then cautioned not to tell this conversation. I next heard the Doctrine plurality of wives was put down and the teacher of it was under dealings with the church. Thus, things went on. Well, for a season until one returned home who had been in navoo. She, we’re gonna learn that this, she is Augusta Cobbs who was Brigham Young’s second plural wife. She plays a major factor in the early uh recruitment. There are women like Mrs Durphy, Vila Kimball and Augusta Cobb who are recruiters. As you will see she sent for me. She said she had something to tell me which was glorious. She said she would tell me under the injunction of secrecy. So these men used women who were fully on board to help in this process. I replied, could not promise before knowing. after a little pause, she said, let
[2:40:45] Michelle: me just clarify really quickly. Also let me just interject that part of the reason they were fully on board is because this is how they were earning their exaltation too, right? Like they were also manipulated. V we know this. Ok.
[2:40:59] Jeremy Hoop: At V’s funeral, he praised her for the, for the number of wives she had given, you know that the plurality of wives is true. She says, etcetera. And I brought an invitation to you from one of the 12 and do not refuse for, you know, not what you will lose. If you do, if you’re not satisfied with him, there are two others and you can have your choice of either they stand higher than he does. And if you take either of these, you will be highly exalted. This is 1843 by the way, ok. We need to clarify that you will be highly exalted and all your friends both dead and living will be benefited. Thereby, they professed this order. Would save the human family, dead or alive. It’s the plural marriage, celestial marriage, plurality of wives system that will save the human family and that it would bring the relatives as such as made the sacrifice, 4th and 1st resurrection. I told her, it did not look right or words to that effect. She said, make it a subject of prayer and you will receive an evidence. I have an evidence in answer to my prayer to uh I have an evidence in answer to prayer. My views on the prayer are these, some people set their hearts on things and pray for their desires. The Lord is pleased to give it to them, by the way, that’s a sermon Jo Joseph preached twice on Ezekiel chapter 14 and he preached it to the Relief Society which is interesting. She brings us up here. The Lord is pleased to give it to them as he did the quails under the Children of Israel. Now she resumed. Those two are on their way here. One of one of whom expects an answer from you after considerable conversation on the subject, which it is useless to mention. She then said, if you tell any one of the things I’ve told you, I will deny it and throw the lie on you. I want you to remember that those of you who are listening, this is how they operated. And there’s a whole subject called lying for the Lord. That must be understood in order to comprehend the tactics that were used to recruit women into this system and to recruit men as well. Um I will throw the lie on you. This, I thought was a jest at first. But I soon learned they were commanded to lie if they were exposed and they seek an opportunity when no other person is present to teach this doctrine, which if divulged, they must deny. I saw her several times before the men came and told her, my mind was confused that I had no evidence. It was right. She said the reason you’re so confused is because you have no head for man is the head of the woman. That is the way they pervert scripture to suit themselves. And many are deceived thereby. After some time, the men of whom we had been speaking, came to Boston to attend the conference. I also went to the conference and while there, one of these men came in, he was introduced to me and commenced the conversation by asking if Sister Cobb had said anything to me on the subject of plurality of wives and wished to know my views and et cetera. I answered Sister Cobb and I have conversed on the matter. But as yet, I have no evidence that it’s right. He said you can have a few days to think it over in conversation with him. Some days afterward, the subject was renewed. I told him my mind was as formally, I did not or could not see it right for me to acquiesce in his uh in his opinions. He said I’m going to Baltimore expect to meet my wife shall bring her here to Boston. May see, you may see her and when you have talked with her, you will say all is right. Whilst he was in Baltimore news reached them of the death of Smith which caused this wealth to hasten home. So the matter was postponed until I went to NAVOO. People may think it’s strange, I should go to Navoo after the foregoing conversation, but great things were promised in the temple at the time of the endowment. And the writer thought she would have a better opportunity of proving the truth of these promises by going there. Remember, let’s pause for a second, Joseph had promised great things in the temple in 1841. And thereafter until his death, he constantly urged the saints talked about the temple. And so the temple was in the minds of many of the saints when it’s built great things will happen. This is not merely because of the 12, ok. She would have heard these things that Joseph had promised. Um it was called a message from heaven and therefore feared, feared to oppose it until she was satisfied, it was false. The writer feared meaning herself. When I arrived at Navoo, I went to the house where two of my acquaintances lived and was very cordially received by them. The next, the next day, Sister Cobb came in, she uh who had taught me the doctrine of plurality of wives at the Eastward. She went to Navoo the summer before Kimball and Mr Young now Hebrew Kimball and B. Brigham Young entered the picture called on me. Kimball had a large hickory cane with an iron. On the end. Young had a pistol on each side pocket which they call the defense in the gospel or the preparation for the peace of the gospel. I asked Mr Young, is this the way you have to go armed? He replied, yes and shame on the nation, meaning they ought to be protected by the general government. I then thought as he for, I did not think they were then guilty. Kimball asked me what I thought to do. I replied, when my, um, what I, yeah, what I thought to do when my goods arrived, I intended to keep house. Thought I could obtain a comfortable living, et cetera. She’s a widow. By the way, he asked, what is your business? I answered dressmaking and almost any kind of needle work. He said, my wife, when speaking about the women, second hand wives, they do not call them wife. Um, wants someone who’s capable of doing all kinds of work. Will you come and stay with us until your goods arrived afterward? If you prefer keeping house, I can accommodate you in the room so, you know, we’re going to bring her in, we gonna put her under our wing. I said if his wife would be pleased to have me, I’d come on the following day, Mr Mrs K, that’s the late sent her son to show me the way I was engaged that day. The son came the next day, uh and I accompanied him to the house where I stayed 12 weeks. So she stayed in Hebrew. Kimball’s house was treated respectfully by all the inmates. Mrs Kay treated me as a sister. I think she would like to do right? But she is bound and must obey or suffer the penalty of their law. I was sitting in the room with Mrs Kate. So she even seems to notice the late um is a lovely woman and she has some affection for her. I was sitting in the room with Mrs Kay’s sick babe in my arms. When Mr Kay entered and commenced conversation on the subject of plurality of wives. He asked me how I felt about the matter now and I said I’ve not as yet had any evidence. That’s right. He said it is all right. And when the temple is done, my wife will come forward and give you to me for she likes you. Oh, some person then came in which stayed the conversation for that time. The circumstance of Hagar came to mind and I concluded never to become a Hagar good for you. Katherine, I afterwards told Mr Kay, I wanted to talk with him on the subject. He evaded the question but said, when the temple is done, you will be sent for and all, all will be right. Not now. We don’t have to discuss this one day. In my hearing, it was said that God intended man should transgress before he created him to this. I objected and said, I cannot believe God intended man should transgress then punish him for such transgressions. Mrs Kay said, you will see it as so when you go through the through the endowment, Mr Kay checked his wife and said, sister Lewis is right, Miss Mrs Kay was about to speak when she was checked. Kay saying sister Lewis understands she’s right when I went through the endowment as it is called, which by the way is as great an imposition as was ever practiced on any person. I then saw what Mrs K meant soon after they began to give the endowment in Nus. Sister Kay said to me, we think it best for you to go into the temple next Monday on Saturday evening. Previous to my endowment mister Kay said, uh Mr Kay said, sister, Sister Louis, how do you feel about having your endowment? I replied, I’m very ignorant. I know nothing about it. He said, you know, until you’ve been through for none are allowed to know. I asked, can I go through the first part without being attached to anyone. He replied, yes. OK. Meaning without being married, I said, if all had to go without knowing if there was any goodness endowment, he uh he replied, I must do as I as others did. Um I wanted it. The elders taught publicly, whoever went to Nabu and received an endowment in the temple would witness such a manifestation of the power of God which could not be doubted. The keys of the priesthood would be given and things which had been hidden from the foundation of the world would then be revealed and made known and et cetera under such representations which at the time I believed, I felt anxious to obtain information for good and accordingly made ready. So remember the curtain temple and the manifestations which some um reported seeing and that Joseph reported, Joseph promised manifestations if they built, if they had built the temple in a certain period of time, this is 1841 Joseph promised that the Lord himself would come to it. In fact, the Lord promised that he would bestow glory and honor upon the saints. He would reveal things that had been kept, hid from the foundation of the world. They would then receive their endowment by the way in the temple that was finished that Christ came to. He also warned them that if they didn’t do those things that they would be cursed. Well, section 124 of the Doctrine and covenants is highly important to understand what’s going on here. Ok. Then she gives a description of the Endowment of detail. I’m not going to read that um for uh just out to be sensitive uh to, to people, even though what she described, she does not divulge the things that are promised not to be divulged, but she describes parts of the ceremony that I think some people would not appreciate. So I won’t read that, but she describes it in such detail that it’s evident that what she went through, it’s absolutely evident. She knows what she’s talking about. And those of us today, there is enough similarity. Despite the many changes that have happened over the years, there’s enough similarity to know that she’s telling the truth. The reader, the reader would probably like to know what my views and feelings were while going through such, she calls it now. So for those of you listening, who have affection for the temple, this is her description going through such an impious blasphemous and indecent ceremonies. I was shocked at the conversation of Kimble and others. Although their language was studiously guarded in my presence and I feared to show my displeasure openly lest evil come of it. When in the temple at Navoo, everything appears so novel and strange as to bewilder and confuse almost all who go through the mockery of an endowment. It was so with me and I have been so informed by others. I have read other accounts as well by other people um that had a similar experience to this at, at a similar time in a similar time period. While this endowment was being rolled out by Brigham Young and the others, it was so with me and I have been so informed by others. Many there are who would gladly testify to the truth of the foregoing statements but are deterred from a slavish fear or dread of personal violence. Yet there is there are sufficient persons not under such restraint, ready to prove such allegations as have been or may hereafter be made respecting such consummate hypocrites. My motto is nothing extenuate or set down aught in malice. Kimble came home from the temple one day and said to me. So she’s been there a while. OK. I’ve been very scared today. There was a woman going through, she was obstinate and would now say and would not say she would obey her husband in all things for he wanted to go to the West to California, but they took her out and told her the consequences. She came back and went through. I was very glad indeed. Now, after going through the ridiculous farce of endowment, so this is her characterization of it. Mister Kimball came to the room, some other persons were then present. He Kimball asked if we understood the signs and was answered, we did not. Now I need to pause for a second for those of you who have gone through the endowment. Um after 1990 which I did, I went in 1990 there were changes made that year to the endowment that removed certain penalties, um that are no longer there,
[2:53:12] Michelle: right? The different ways that you would be killed, right? Severing your head, having, being disemboweled. Right.
[2:53:17] Jeremy Hoop: So, what you’re about to read here, what we’re about to read is in reference to the earliest version of those. OK. He asked if I understood the signs and was answered, we did not. He explained them by placing his right thumb under his left ear and drawing it across his throat to the right ear and said, this means you will have your throat cut from ear to ear. If you divulge anything you have seen or heard in the temple, I want to pause there. Imagine Hebrew Kimball standing next to this woman and he sang to you. Do you understand what, what you did? What this means? This means if you divulge anything, your throat will be slit from ear to ear. He then drew his left hand across his breast saying this signifies, you must have your heart taken out and immediately thrust his right arm down to the right side but did not explain. I afterwards learned it signified the ripping open of the bowels, tearing out the entrails and the mangled body to be thrown into the river are not these hard sayings. He says to her, you are bound to obey the heads of the church, avenge the blood of your brethren in every way possible and strive to build up the kingdom. If you do not, you must suffer the penalties. Before mentioned. These things are not to be written. Therefore, it is necessary for all who have been through the temple to meet in quorum in order to become familiar with the signs and tokens because they are the keys of the priesthood. In this the seventh dispensation without them, you cannot learn the mysteries of the kingdom and these keys cannot be received without an oath.
[2:54:58] Michelle: So you weren’t allowed to know what it was going to be before and then you went through and were given all of these penalties and then afterward, it was explained to you. So now we have a better insight of how maybe they controlled the women. Is that something we can begin to infer potentially?
[2:55:14] Jeremy Hoop: So let’s just get our final thoughts and then let’s see if we can wrap it all up because we’re almost there afterwards, I was sent for and went to the temple to assist in making a covering for the altar to be used. And so she stays for a bit to be used at the ceremony on the second part of the endowment. While there, one of the 12 Kimball came into the room where I was the other woman having left the room a few minutes, Kimba drew a chair toward me seated himself and said, how do you feel now? Sister about matters? I replied, I have no evidence. It is right. He said it is all right. I feel right toward you. And so does my wife. And when this altar is done, the ceiling will commence, my wife will come forward and give you to me and all will be right for. She likes you and will choose you for her associate. I shall take you to the West in the first company. You will always abide in my family, which will be a great blessing to you. I have a number of women but do not lodge with all the probability is I shall lodge with you. All this was said and I had no opportunity to
[2:56:03] Michelle: reply
[2:56:05] Jeremy Hoop: for the door was open and one of the women came in, Kimba arose and went out. I had previously selected, I was, I had been previously selected to be one of Kimball’s wives from the time Mrs Cobb first introduced the subject of plurality of wives until the time of which I am now writing, my mind was unsettled about it for they had so much scripture intermixed and interpreted in such manner to make it appear right. It almost, it was almost impossible to refute their arguments. Besides I have professed immediate uh besides they have professed immediate revelation from heaven and a commandment from God. Um to take looks like the transcription failed there, but there was an article of the doctrine of the church that every person should have an evidence for him or herself. Which article I ever claimed is my right. And when anything was said to me on the subject, my answer was I have not an evidence that it’s right for me. But things were approaching to a crisis. I was troubled in my mind because I must soon say yay or Nata Kimball or some of his MEMS had they not claimed what is before stated? That is an immediate revelation and that by an angel, I should not have hesitated to have said as I did at first it to be a doctrine of the devil. My spirits became depressed, lest these things should be as they represented them. And if I should and if I said nay, I might be found raising my voice against the Lord’s anointed, which to my mind was no small thing in conversation with Kimball afterwards on this subject, he evaded my questions, turn the conversation upon something else. I then therefore wrote a letter addressed him explaining my views and expected an answer. But none has been received from that day to this. I know none of any letters being written by any of the apostles on this subject since the notor No, since the notorious letter to Nancy Rigdon. Interesting, she mentions that for fear of further exposure, that’s by the way, the notorious Happiness letter, the happiness
[2:57:55] Michelle: letter. Yeah.
[2:57:56] Jeremy Hoop: For fear of uh further exposure. Kimball probably thought, thought, I I need to pause. This is in 1848. This is not exactly contemporaneous, but this is really close to the event she’s talking about. Ok, for fear of further exposure. Kimber Kimball probably thought by, by by not writing my mind would be troubled, thereby giving him the advantage over me. His silence caused me still further doubt for had they received such a commandment of such importance as the salvation of my own soul. And that of all my ancestors, it was their duty as servants of the most high to have informed me. I had left Kimball’s house but I lived in the neighborhood about three weeks after I had sent the letter, I went to Kimball’s house to work. When Kay said sister, how do you feel about matters? Now? You do not feel so well. Since you sent me that letter, I replied, you are mistaken. It relieved my mind and I feel much better. No more was said at that time, for others were in the room, I believed it was the will of God that I should remain in a state of uncertainty for wise purposes. Only known to himself. At this time, I lived in the house with one of my former acquaintances there being but herself and two small Children. I thought to pass the summer with her because the 12 and others against whom the inhabitants of the neighboring towns were so enraged, were going away. I did not then apprehend any danger. But before many days, I felt not safe, it felt not safe for me. Even in navoo, my furniture was yet at Saint Louis. I was consigned to be to one man in common with other uh others furniture. I thought it best to go and see about it. Lest there should be any difficulty. I kept my own counsel. I said not a word until a few days previous to, to uh the day of departure. And then as I thought, only with a few friends, when it became known that I was about to go, Mrs Cobb came to see me. She seemed troubled and asked to see me alone. I went with her into another room. She said, I’ve come with the word of the Lord and do not resist counsel, sister. If you do, you know not what you will lose. I replied, I shall resist such counsel which does not suit me. She said I’ve come to beg of you not to leave this place without having your full endowment, the full endowments where they, they enter plural marriage. I have said I have no one to go through with. She named Kimball Brigham Young and a number of others. But to each of these I objected, she asked, is there no one you will take? I answered no. If I cannot be saved without, I will be damned. Therefore, you need say no more. She asked me to call on her before I went away and frequent in inquiries were made to ascertain the exact line and manner of my going. I went away without their knowledge and from whence from what I’ve learned without their consent for it is my opinion, firm opinion had they known of my exact departure means would have been used to waylay or otherwise maltreat me uh in order to prevent my escape. But a snowstorm was providentially the means of my deliverance. I arrived safely at Saint Louis after staying there. Uh less than a month, Mrs Cobb made her appearance at my house. Why she’s persistent. She said to me, you missed a good chance. One of the brethren and his wife were going to Warsaw to take a boat. They would have carried you for nothing and saved expense, but you went away. So privately they did not know where you were going until the night before you left. She continued, I hastened early in the morning to see you, but you were gone. I have no doubt this was a plan and a snare to entrap me because the these persons of whom she spoke remained in navoo for some length of time after I left her language, opened my eyes to see what a wonderful and narrow escape I had made. I could look back and see many times my life had been in danger for some things seemed mysterious. When Mrs Cobb called to see me in Saint Louis, she brought another woman with her and I did not care and I did not care to say much. They talked of those glorious things, the spiritual wife doctrine, the woman thought it was spiritual, nothing literal but the ceremony and et cetera. So she’s recruiting another woman. And after hearing them them some time, I said in my opinion, it is a damnable heresy and the doctrine of devils. They were both speechless for some time. News was brought to me at Saint Louis stating a letter had been received at Boston from NAVOO in which I was called an apostate. This was done to prevent any influence I might ha have had amongst them on my return. They threatened to excommunicate any member who visited tallied or listened to or uh or with an apostate because such they say are unworthy of belief. Now, I wanted to read that um a great deal of it. It’s, it’s quite a bit longer than that because I think we can see what Margaret was going through. That is pretty heavy, direct threats of violence against her, the uh manipulation. She says they were so convincing in their, in their twisting of scripture. They had made such glorious claims. These were men who held the title of Apostle and these, these vulnerable women looked to them early on as Sarah Crook said to Brigham young as a good man, a noble man.
[3:02:54] Michelle: Well, and they were being told you don’t have a head, the man is the head. You can’t, they didn’t have access to my podcast to be able to answer the scriptural challenges. They couldn’t search the scriptures in, in with any tools and they relied on what they were taught by their leaders and they were so vulnerable. I love, love Catherine Lewis. I just think that she is, you know, and it’s amazing also to see the patterns that consist even to this day with polygamist. This is the same pattern that was set early on. And it’s amazing to me that we know all of these stories attributed to Joseph. We don’t know anything about Catherine Lewis. Like no one talks about her story, even though it’s so critically important to see that this was Brigham’s and Hebrew’s pattern and William’s pattern.
[3:03:44] Jeremy Hoop: She put her life on the line and then she published this publicly. In 1848 Catherine woke up after quite a while struggling to understand it and finally separated herself from it, not having succumbed to it. Margaret on the other hand, succumbed to it early, tried to get away for three years, finally went through the endowment ceremony and afterwards said, I will never leave you under any consideration. And I think this helps us to understand why. So, so wrapping part one up, such strange behavior with women in England, such strange behavior with women in Nauru. Really strange doctrines promoted by later for sure, Brigham Young, but it appears early on in England and in Nuru that have no basis in connection with Joseph Smith, other than by their own telling. Next, we’re going to examine this man as a copyist. I call him a copyist for a reason. You’ll see, we will look at his evolving tales of the polygamy revelation. And we will ask, um we will see how his story connects to and helps us understand the other witnesses. Uh the other witness Joseph Kingsbury and ask a very important question who then is telling the truth? Mhm. And they are not compatible. One of the things I want to end on this, one of the things people are not aware of. And if those like Brian Hales on the apologetic or antagonistic side are aware of these, they ignore it the vast amount of evidence of Joseph and Hiram opposing this awful teaching. And it is not a few instances. It is a great many from 1829 onward, 1835 especially. But in all the revelations, the writings, the teachings, the publications, the many publications, the letters, the private journal entries, the excommunications, the lawsuits, the court cases, the the public sermons, the many public sermons, by the way, some of which many of which we don’t have that we know he gave,
[3:06:20] Michelle: right? And do you know what an interesting exercise that I just did today? People can just search um do a word search of the doctrine of covenants for adultery. There’s just an interesting little exp you know, thing to do like Joseph was consistent in his revelations, his doctrines, the book of Mormon and everything he did. There is a consistency there and there is a consistency there with Brigham Heber and William Clayton. That’s the anyway. Go ahead. Continue.
[3:06:49] Jeremy Hoop: And once again, this refrain, you’re gonna hear from us over and over again because this needs to be said, if all this stuff we’re presenting were anywhere in any of Joseph’s
[3:06:57] Michelle: stuff and one little smattering of it. One little hint of it. Yeah.
[3:07:03] Jeremy Hoop: And so next time we’re going to talk about the clever clerk, that’s our presentation for today.
[3:07:11] Michelle: OK. Wow, this was a marathon. I hope people found this valuable. I actually am glad you read all of Catherine Lewis. I will link to all of these things below for people to be able to find so that they can continue the research. And um thank you, Jeremy. This is like the more I, I know we’ve had a lot of fun. We’ve been talking quite a bit behind the scenes and um and finding all of these references in the journals. Anyone who wants to dig in to the William Clayton journals, it’s worthwhile. It is, it is something else.
[3:07:48] Jeremy Hoop: It’s a but I, but I would recommend that you understand what you’re reading. Yes.
[3:07:54] Michelle: Yes, absolutely. And which you’ve helped really set the foundation of that letter from Sarah Crooks to Brigham Young is an incredible find that the fact that these things have not been looked at have not been considered shows how motivated all sides are to only care about pinning it on Joseph. That’s the only value that anyone has brought to this study. So what, I don’t know, I just feel like what we are doing now is so critical, so important. I hope that people will really pay attention to this episode. You know, I know it’s long take it in snippets, try to digest it, share it with other people because this information is so important. People keep just chiming in about silly things like land deeds with no comprehension. I’m doing a deep dive into that, you know, like these really just silly kind of stupid little things and they don’t know any of this information.
[3:08:53] Jeremy Hoop: They talk about things they call smoking guns that when you, when you examine them are like wet paper, they just fall apart in your hands,
[3:09:02] Michelle: right? It’s not even a whisp of
[3:09:04] Jeremy Hoop: smoke. And what and what we’ve presented today, what we presented last time is literally on fire. Yeah. Yes.
[3:09:14] Michelle: This is, this is the firsthand contemporaneous sourcing that none of it exists for Joseph. And we have it all of this and there’s so much more so people need to take it seriously. The narrative needs to change. This
[3:09:31] Jeremy Hoop: has been fun and uh I hope people stayed with us. This is a long one. And there’s more to come, we have a lot more to say about Clayton, a lot more to say about Kingsbury. And there’s a lot more to say about the whole thing. Hopefully, I, I want maybe this is a great place to end. Hopefully, what people are getting the picture of is that this is far more complex than the narrative. The other side wants to present in terms of when you analyze the details of the story. And once you, when you look into them, it’s a rotten mess. When you look into them, it’s, it’s a, it’s a confusing uh uh Pandora’s box that you have to sift through in order to understand what’s happening. And when you can pull the pieces out the question, you have to ask yourself over and over again since the, since the tales of Joseph doing this and since the idea that he did it don’t come from him. They only come from other people. Can you trust what they’re saying? And I ask you to consider Brigham Hebrew and William now? And are these trustworthy men?
[3:10:42] Michelle: And is it possible that they are conspirators? That’s, that’s the question, are they trustworthy or could they be conspirators? So, OK, this was amazing. I’m looking forward to next time, let us know as soon as you have it ready to go and thank you and I will see you soon that was an absolute marathon. Um Such incredible information. I can’t thank Jeremy enough for the great research that he is doing and for what he is putting together. I hope that you guys found that valuable. And again, I hope that you will share it and pay attention to the things that are happening because I think incredible groundbreaking research and information is being done on this topic that I think is going to change things. So thank you so much for sticking around and I will see you next time.
