July 2025
Joseph Smith’s Missouri Prison Letters
Come, Follow Me Resources from the Church Historian’s Press
On 27 October 1838, Missouri Governor Lilburn W. Boggs declared members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to be enemies of the state, ordering that they “must be exterminated or driven from the State if necessary for the public peace.” In forced compliance, thousands of Latter-day Saints abandoned their homes in northwestern Missouri to make an arduous journey to Illinois and Iowa Territory. During this time of trial, the Prophet Joseph Smith was incarcerated for his alleged role in the 1838 conflict between the Saints and their antagonists. Although confined to the dungeon of the Clay County jail in Liberty, Missouri, Joseph Smith sought to maintain some communication with church members. Following the example of the apostle Paul and others imprisoned for the sake of conscience, the Prophet sent letters to his beleaguered followers to encourage and sustain them in their scattered and traumatized state.
Church members eagerly read the Prophet’s letters, were buoyed by their contents, and made copies to share with others. On 11 April 1839, Mary Fielding Smith wrote to her husband, Hyrum Smith, who was imprisoned with his brother Joseph in Clay County, stating that she and others in Quincy, Illinois, had “seen the [Prophet’s] Epistols to the Church and read them several times[.] they seem like food to the hungrey[.] we have taken great pleasure on perusing them.” Over time, the Prophet’s letters became treasured distillations of his teachings on suffering, resilience, revelation, and the righteous use of priesthood power. In 1876, selections from Joseph Smith’s Liberty jail letters were canonized as sections 121–123 of the Doctrine and Covenants. The Church Historian’s Press offers substantial resources for anyone studying these Missouri prison letters in historical context. Readers should consult the following material for information on the 1838 conflict, the expulsion of the Saints from Missouri, and the Prophet’s imprisonment:
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Saints: The Story of the Church of Jesus Christ in the Latter Days, Volume 1, The Standard of Truth, 1815–1846, chapters 25–33
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Church History Topics
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Revelations in Context: The Stories behind the Sections of the Doctrine and Covenants, edited by Matthew McBride and James Goldberg
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Jacob W. Olmstead, “Far West and Adam-ondi-Ahman”
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Justin R. Bray, “Within the Walls of Liberty Jail”
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David W. Grua, “‘We Weep When We Remember Zion’: Early Latter-day Saints as Refugees”
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Joseph Smith Papers, Legal Records Series
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Joseph Smith Papers, Documents, Volume 6
For more from David W. Grua about these letters, read “Joseph Smith’s Missouri Prison Letters and the Mormon Textual Community,” in Foundational Texts of Mormonism: Examining Major Early Sources, ed. Mark Ashurst-McGee, Robin Scott Jensen, and Sharalyn D. Howcroft (Oxford University Press, 2018).