First Presidency counselor and orator
Sidney Rigdon
1793–1876
2 topics · 16 dated events · 2 sources
Their part in each topic
Violence and the Mormon Conflict
First Presidency counselor and orator
Rigdon preached the 17 June 1838 "Salt Sermon" against the Far West dissenters and delivered the Fourth of July oration that threatened "a war of extermination" against any mob. He is the presumed author of the letter ordering the dissenters out of Caldwell County. Later Latter-day Saint leaders, Brigham Young among them, blamed him personally for provoking the Missouri conflict.
The Succession Crisis of 1844
First Presidency counselor
The last surviving member of the First Presidency and Joseph Smith's vice-presidential running mate, sent to Pittsburgh nine days before the martyrdom. He hurried back and asked the Saints to appoint him 'guardian' of the church, not its president, on the theory that the church could only ever be built up to the dead prophet. Beaten on 8 August and excommunicated on 8 September, he organized his own church in Pittsburgh and argued his case in his own newspaper for two years.
In the timeline
16 events across 2 topics, chronological. Only events this person was actually part of — present at, responsible for, or the subject of — not every event where the name comes up.
Joseph Smith and Sidney Rigdon arrive at Far West
Fleeing the collapse of the Kirtland Safety Society and its aftermath, the First Presidency relocated to Missouri. Thousands of converts followed through the spring and summer, and the Saints began expanding beyond Caldwell into Daviess and Carroll Counties.
Rigdon's "Salt Sermon"
Preaching on salt that has lost its savour and is fit only to be cast out and trodden underfoot, Sidney Rigdon attacked the dissenters without naming them. John Corrill wrote that it was plainly understood whom he meant. Reed Peck testified at Richmond that Rigdon said in the same sermon that he would assist to erect a gallows on the square and hang them all.
The dissenters' letter orders five men out of the county
A long letter, presumably written by Rigdon and signed by eighty-three men, was delivered to Oliver Cowdery, David Whitmer, John Whitmer, W. W. Phelps and Lyman Johnson the day after the Salt Sermon. It accused them of joining "a band of counterfeiters, thieves, liars, and blacklegs of the deepest dye" and closed: "We will put you from the county of Caldwell, so help us God." The families left, and their property was attached.
Rigdon's Fourth of July oration at Far Westhinge
At a celebration that laid the temple cornerstones and paraded the Caldwell militia and a company of Danites, Rigdon declared that if a mob came against the Saints "it shall be between us and them a war of extermination, for we will follow them till the last drop of blood is spilled, or else they will have to exterminate us." The oration was printed as a pamphlet on the Far West press and reprinted in Missouri papers.
Far West surrenders; Doniphan refuses to execute the prisoners
Colonel George M. Hinkle brought Joseph Smith and other leaders into the militia camp, where they were taken prisoner. A militia court-martial sentenced them to be shot the next morning; General Doniphan refused to carry out the order, calling the proceeding illegal. Far West surrendered its arms and the inhabitants signed away property to cover the cost of the campaign.
The Richmond court of inquiry; Avard testifies
Judge Austin A. King heard evidence for more than two weeks against some sixty defendants. Sampson Avard, captured and threatened with prosecution, was the state's chief witness; he called Joseph Smith "the prime mover and organizer of this Danite band" and produced a Danite constitution. King found probable cause against thirty-four men. Smith, his brother Hyrum, Rigdon, Wight, McRae and Baldwin were held for treason.
Liberty Jail
Six prisoners were confined in a two-level limestone jail measuring about fourteen feet square, mostly in the cold lower room lit by two grated openings. They petitioned unsuccessfully for habeas corpus; only Rigdon was released. Meanwhile the body of the church left Missouri for Illinois through the winter.
Rigdon leaves for Pittsburgh; a letter is later dated to this day
The Rigdon family boarded the steamer Osprey for Pittsburgh, sent there partly to establish residency for the vice-presidential ticket and partly, according to Joseph Smith's diary, to get Rigdon out of danger. James J. Strang would later publish a letter dated the same day in which Joseph appointed him to plant a stake in Wisconsin and, Strangites held, named him successor. Strang further claimed that on 27 June, the day of the martyrdom, an angel ordained him a prophet, seer, revelator and translator, and that the letter reached him by mail on 9 July.
Sidney Rigdon returns to Nauvoo
Rigdon arrived from Pittsburgh, declined a request from Willard Richards, Parley P. Pratt and George A. Smith to meet with them, and preached at Sunday services instead. He told the Saints it was the Lord's wish that a guardian be appointed to build up the church to Joseph, and asked William Marks to call a special assembly. Marks announced it for the morning of 8 August.
The confrontation in the Seventies Hall
With nine apostles now in Nauvoo, Brigham Young convened the Twelve, the Nauvoo High Council and the high priests and asked Rigdon to state his case. Rigdon described a Pittsburgh manifestation shown to his mind rather than an open vision: no man could be Joseph's successor, and he would continue to speak for the dead prophet until Joseph descended and ordained him. Young replied that he did not care who led the church of God if God said so, but that he must know God said so, and that he had the keys and means of knowing.
Rigdon speaks in the grove
Thousands gathered in the grove near the temple. Rigdon stood in a wagon with his back to a steady wind and spoke for more than an hour, arguing that every man would stand in his own place and calling, that Joseph and Hyrum held their authority through eternity, and that authority remained in the church as Joseph had organized it. Thomas Bullock took the sermon down in Taylor shorthand; it was not deciphered until the twenty-first century. Brigham Young then called the congregation back for the afternoon.
The Saints vote for the Twelvehinge
The quorums took their places as in a solemn assembly. Brigham Young told the congregation that the Quorum of the Twelve held the keys of the kingdom of God in all the world and that no man could put another between the Twelve and the prophet Joseph. He asked whether the Saints wanted a guardian, a prophet or a spokesman; the church's own report says not a hand was raised. On the motion to sustain the Twelve, Woodruff later wrote, 'At once there was a sea of hands, a universal vote; a contrary vote was called and not a hand was raised in a congregation of about fifteen thousand Saints.'
Sidney Rigdon is tried and excommunicatedhinge
Before a congregation the Nauvoo Neighbor reported at six to seven thousand, Brigham Young laid out what he called Rigdon's secret plan to divide the church, and testified that Rigdon had ordained men prophets, priests and kings at private meetings. Rigdon was in St. Louis and did not attend. Bishop Newel K. Whitney and the high council voted to cut him off; W. W. Phelps moved that he be delivered over to the buffetings of Satan until he repents. About ten hands were raised for Rigdon. Two days later he left for Pittsburgh.
Rigdon's own paper begins in Pittsburgh
Within a month of reaching Pittsburgh, Rigdon had organized a church with himself as First President and launched the Latter Day Saints' Messenger and Advocate, reusing the name of the old Kirtland organ. Its first number carried his signed statement to the public and letters describing conditions in Nauvoo. Over the next two years it argued the succession case in print, branch resolutions and all.
William Marks repudiates Rigdon in print
Marks published a notice in the Times and Seasons saying that after mature and candid deliberation he was convinced Rigdon's claims to the presidency were not founded in truth, that he had been deceived by specious pretences, and that the Twelve were the proper persons to lead the church. He warned everyone under his influence against Rigdon's pretended visions and revelations.
Rigdon turns on Joseph Smith
Rigdon stopped emphasizing his own guardianship and began accusing Joseph Smith of having been a fallen prophet, principally over plural marriage. About forty per cent of the Philadelphia branch was excommunicated between September 1844 and 1847, most for rejecting apostolic succession; a number of those converts signed for Rigdon, then for Strang, then rejected Strang too.
Sources in their own name
Source records in the database whose author line names this person. Each links to the topic that uses it.
Sidney Rigdon
The 'war of extermination' language, published and circulated with Joseph Smith's endorsement four months before Boggs used the same word.
Latter Day Saints' Messenger and Advocate (Pittsburgh, 1844–1846)
Sidney Rigdon
The losing claimant's case in his own words: the scriptural argument from Doctrine and Covenants 90 that Rigdon was commanded to preside, the charge that the Twelve had decided to supplant him before the church ever voted, and branch-by-branch resolutions repudiating the Twelve.
Appears alongside
People who share the most dated events with Sidney Rigdon.
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