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Without consulting Orson Pratt (who was away on a mission), Joseph Smith proposed to Orson’s wife, Sarah. Orson was feared to have committed suicide when he heard the news. This would lead directly to both Orson and Sarah to be excommunicated.
Table of contents
- Without consulting Orson Pratt (who was away on a mission), Joseph Smith proposed to Orson’s wife, Sarah. Orson was feared to have committed suicide when he heard the news. This would lead directly to both Orson and Sarah to be excommunicated.
- A1) Sarah Platt claimed Joseph Smith propositioned her to become a plural wife while her husband was away on a mission.
- A2) Joseph Smith denied Sarah’s claim and disparaged her character.
- A3) Orson Pratt went missing when he heard the news that Joseph Smith had proposed.
- A4) Orson Pratt and Sarah Pratt are ultimately excommunicated.
- Issues these Facts Raise
- Questions these Facts Raise
A1) Sarah Platt claimed Joseph Smith propositioned her to become a plural wife while her husband was away on a mission.
Supporting Sources and Quotes
Sarah Platt claims that Joseph smith propositioned her to become a plural wife. Orson Pratt, her husband was away on a mission. In a later interview she claimed, “Am I called upon to break the marriage covenant ... to my lawful husband! I never will. I care not for the blessings of Jacob, and I believe in NO SUCH revelations, neither will I consent under any circumstances. I have one good husband, and that is enough for me.” Although this was quoted by Sarah after she had plenty of reason to be angry and was quite anti. (History of the Saints by John C. Bennett)
- Also quoted at Wikipedia here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orson_Pratt#CITEREFSmith1971
“Sometime in late 1840 or early 1841, Joseph confided to his friend that he was smitten by the "amiable and accomplished" Sarah Pratt and wanted her for "one of his spiritual wives, for the Lord had given her to him as a special favor for his faithfulness" (emphasis in original). Shortly afterward, the two men took some of Bennett's sewing to Sarah's house. During the visit, as Bennett describes it, Joseph said, "Sister Pratt, the Lord has given you to me as one of my spiritual wives. I have the blessings of Jacob granted me, as God granted holy men of old, and as I have long looked upon you with favor, and an earnest desire of connubial bliss, I hope you will not repulse or deny me." "And is that the great secret that I am not to utter," Sarah replied. "Am I called upon to break the marriage covenant, and prove recreant to my lawful husband! I never will" She added, "I care not for the blessings of Jacob. I have one good husband, and that is enough for me." But according to Bennett, the Prophet was persistent. Finally Sarah angrily told him on a subsequent visit, "Joseph, if you ever attempt any thing of the kind with me again, I will make a full disclosure to Mr. Pratt on his return home. Depend upon it, I will certainly do it." "Sister Pratt," the Prophet responded, "I hope you will not expose me, for if I suffer, all must suffer; so do not expose me. Will you promise me that you will not do it?" "If you will never insult me again," Sarah replied, "I will not expose you unless strong circumstances should require it." "If you should tell," the Prophet added, "I will ruin your reputation, remember that" (Bennett 1842a, 228-31; emphasis in original).
- Richard S. Van Wagoner (1986), "Sarah Pratt: The Shaping of an Apostate" (PDF), Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought, 19 (2): 79.
A2) Joseph Smith denied Sarah’s claim and disparaged her character.
Supporting Sources and Quotes
On July 14, 1842, in a public speech Joseph Smith calls Orson Pratt's wife Sarah "A whore from her mother's breast." Sarah had publicly accused Smith of proposing plural marriage to her while her husband Orson was away on a mission. Sarah later reported in an interview that Joseph told her, "If any woman, like me, opposed his wishes, he used to say: 'Be silent or I shall ruin your character!'" Orson Pratt writes a 'suicide' note: "I am a ruined man! My future prospects are blasted! The testimony upon both sides seems to be equal: The one in direct contradiction to the other . . . [I]f the testimonies of my wife and others are true then I have been deceived for twelve years past-my hopes are blasted and gone as it were in a moment . . . If on the other hand the other testimonies are true then my family are ruined forever. . . .My sorrows are greater than I can bear! Where I am henceforth it matters not." (D. Michael Quinn Papers—Addition—Uncat. WA MS. 244; Accession 19990201-h, Box 1—Quinn, card file "Mormon Polygamy Chronology, 1829-1902)
“Years later, when disaffected from the Church, Sarah gave her account of the Goddard incident: In his endeavors to ruin my character Joseph went so far as to publish an extra-sheet containing affidavits against my reputation. When this sheet was brought to me I discovered to my astonishment the names of two people on it, man and wife, with whom I had boarded for a certain time. . . . I went to their house; the man left the house hurriedly when he saw me coming. I found the wife and said to her rather excitedly: "What does it all mean?" She began to sob. "It is not my fault" said she. "Hyrum Smith came to our house, with the affidavits all written out, and forced us to sign them. 'Joseph and the Church must be saved,' said he. We saw that resistance was useless, they would have ruined us; so we signed the papers" (Wyl 1886, 62-63; emphasis in original).
- Richard S. Van Wagoner (1986), "Sarah Pratt: The Shaping of an Apostate" (PDF), Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought, 19 (2): 79.
“Orson, along with other campaigners, returned to Nauvoo by early fall in response to news of Joseph and Hyrum Smith's murders on 27 June 1844. After a brief power struggle between Sidney Rigdon and Brigham Young, the Quorum of the Twelve emerged as the governing body of the Church. The group's continued, secret promulgation of polygamy outraged Rigdon. "It is a fact, so well known," he wrote in a letter published in the 15 October 1844 Messenger and Advocate, that the Twelve and their adherents have endeavored to carry on this spiritual wife business . . . and have gone to the most shameful and desparate [sic] lengths to keep it from the public. First, insulting innocent females, and when they resented the insult, these monsters in human shape would assail their characters by lying, and perjuries, with a multitude of desparate [sic] men to help them effect the ruin of those whom they had insulted, and all this to enable them to keep these coorrupt [sic] practices from the view of the world.”
- Richard S. Van Wagoner (1986), "Sarah Pratt: The Shaping of an Apostate" (PDF), Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought, 19 (2): 79.
A3) Orson Pratt went missing when he heard the news that Joseph Smith had proposed.
Supporting Sources and Quotes
Joseph Smith Journal: “It was reported early in the morning that Elder Orson Pratt was missing. I caused the Temple hands and the principle men of the city to make a search for him. After which a meeting was called at the Grove, and I gave the public a general outline of John C. Bennett’’s conduct” (LDS History of the Church 5: 60–61)
Bennett reported that during a 14 July public speech Joseph spoke of Sarah "in a manner only befitting the lowest and most degraded vagabond in existence" (Bennett 1842a, 225). And visitors to Nauvoo on this date heard the Prophet call Sarah a "[whore] from her mother's breast" (Sangamo Journal, 1 Aug. 1842). Bennett's second letter, published on 15 July, exposed the details of the Prophet's polyandrous proposals to Sarah Pratt and urged her to confirm the story.
Orson was thrown into a quandry. As was evidently his habit during personal turmoil, he sought solitude, leaving family members a note that seemed to threaten suicide. When Joseph heard, he "caused the Temple hands and the principle men of the city to make search for him" (Manuscript History, 15 July 1842). Ebenezer Robinson, an editor of the Church-owned Times and Seasons, later remembered, "Apostle Pratt had been told Joseph Smith wanted Orson's wife as his own plural wife and John C. Bennett was accused of having committed adultery with his wife. Both men denied these charges. Under these circumstances his mind temporarily gave way, and he wandered away, no one knew where. . . . He was found some five miles below Nauvoo, sitting on a rock on the bank of the Mississippi river" (Robinson 1890, 287).
- Richard S. Van Wagoner (1986), "Sarah Pratt: The Shaping of an Apostate" (PDF), Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought, 19 (2): 79.
A4) Orson Pratt and Sarah Pratt are ultimately excommunicated.
Supporting Sources and Quotes
The final conclusion is that Orson Pratt is wracked with torment for a time. On August 20, 1842, "after four days of fruitless efforts at reconciliation, the Twelve excommunicated Pratt for 'insubordination' and Sarah for 'adultery'".
- Van Wagoner, R. S. & Walker, S. C. (1982) A Book of Mormons (Salt Lake City, Utah: Signature Books ISBN 0-941214-06-0) p. 212. (As quoted at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origin_of_Latter_Day_Saint_polygamy)
“Nearly a year after Orson's return to Nauvoo, in mid-July 1841, another incident, according to Bennett, forced Sarah to tell Orson of the Prophet's behavior. If one believes Bennett's account, Joseph kissed Sarah in his counselor's presence. Sarah caused a commotion that apparently roused at least one neighbor, Mary Ettie V. Smith, who lived across the street from the Pratts. She recalled eighteen years later that during the fracas "Sarah ordered the Prophet out of the house, and the Prophet used obscene language to her" declaring that he had found John C. Bennett "in bed with her" (Green 1859, 31).
Bennett recounts (1842a, 231) that when Sarah told her husband of the Prophet's behavior, Orson approached Joseph and told him "never to offer an insult of the like again." Though full details of the confrontation between the two men have not been uncovered, it seems certain from subsequent events that Joseph not only denied Sarah's allegations, but accused her of being Bennett's paramour. Orson believed Sarah, however, a position that caused serious difficulties between him and Joseph Smith.
The rift between Joseph and Orson Pratt became public on 11 May 1842, one day after Sarah had given birth to daughter Celestia Larissa, when Church leaders announced that John C. Bennett would be disfellowshipped. According to Bennett, Orson Pratt refused to sign the announcement because, as he put it, "he knew nothing against him" (Bennett 1842a, 40-41). Perhaps as a result of this mild resistance, six days later, on 17 May, Joseph Smith wrote to Church Recorder James Sloan, "You will be so good as to permit Bennett to withdraw his name from the Church record, if he desires to do so, and this with the best of feelings towards you and General Bennett" (Bennett 1842a, 40-41). Two days later at a Nauvoo City Council meeting where Bennett turned over the mayorship to the Prophet, Joseph asked Bennett if he had anything against him. The former mayor responded: "I know what I am about, and the heads of the Church know what they are about, I expect. I have no difficulty with the heads of the Church. I publicly avow that any one who has said that I have stated that General Smith has given me authority to hold illicit intercourse with women is a liar in the face of God" (HC 5:38).”
- Richard S. Van Wagoner (1986), "Sarah Pratt: The Shaping of an Apostate" (PDF), Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought, 19 (2): 79.
Wilford Woodruff corroborates in his 10 September 1842 diary: "There was a counsel of the 'Twelve' held for four days with Elder Orson Pratt to labour with him to get him to recall his sayings against Joseph & the Twelve but he persisted in his wicked course & would not recall any of his sayings which were unjust & untrue, The Twelve then rejected him as a member of their quorum & he was cut off from the Twelve. Dr. John Cook Bennet was the ruin of Orson Pratt" (2:187; emphasis in original)
- Richard S. Van Wagoner (1986), "Sarah Pratt: The Shaping of an Apostate" (PDF), Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought, 19 (2): 79.
Issues these Facts Raise
After further examples I see this is a pattern with Joseph. If the women refused to marry them then he would begin to call them whores and speak out and publish libel against them. Then if it still kept up he would just excommunicate anyone involved. This feels like using church power as a means to get what Joseph wanted and not an inspired prophet.
So I have to assume God wanted Joseph to marry a faithful members wife without even talking to him beforehand? If so, this changes what I think of God. If not, this behavior is despicable by Joseph.
Questions these Facts Raise
Why would the Lord put Orson Pratt through such turmoil that he contemplated suicide when he found out that Joseph Smith had proposed to his wife while he was away on a mission? And why would the prophet excommunicate them over this “insubordination”?
