Though life was difficult for Joseph and Emma, they loved and supported each other through their letters. During the 17 years of their marriage, Joseph and Emma Smith endured many hardships. Joseph traveled extensively for the Church and was often obliged to find safety among friends to avoid angry mobs or numerous legal harassments. While […]
Preview She was a name in our family database, but nobody knew much about her. Family tradition said her mother and step-father took her to Chicago where she grew up and became a professional nurse. It was rumored that she had been baptized into the LDS Church[i]; it was also rumored that she had joined […]
Emma crossing the Mississippi in the middle of winter We honor Emma as the first president of the Relief Society—an Elect Lady—Mother in Israel. These titles were given her by the Lord and carry a peculiar meaning for a peculiar people. Her mission was unique and her sacrifice unparalleled. She labored in the heat of […]
Darcy Kennedy Towards the end of 2004 our stake president, Conrad Gottfredson, came to our home to visit. My husband, Michael Kennedy, Sr., and I [Darcy] knew our stake president was a very inspired man and heard how he would call someone or visit with them in their home, day or night following promptings that […]
Written by Mark L. Staker Published: 08 June 2015 Mark Lyman Staker serves as a Senior Researcher in the Church History Department of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and has beeninvolved in historic sites restoration for more than fifteen years. His Hearken, O Ye People: The Historical Setting of Joseph Smith’s Ohio Revelations(2009) […]
In 1846, Lewis decided to move to Nauvoo where he was able to purchase goods and property being sold cheap by Latter-day Saints who were moving west after being driven out of Illinois in the wake of the Martyrdom of Joseph and Hyrum Smith.3 During the months after the Nauvoo Charter was canceled by the State […]
Lucy Mack Smith: “I have never seen a woman in my life who would endure every species of fatigue and hardship from month to month and from year to year with that unflinching courage, zeal, and patience which she ever has done.”
Emma was promised throughout her relationship with her husband, Joseph, the Prophet of God, she would have all of her children. That promise continually gave her strength and hope as she would lose many of her children. Emma had 9 children of birth and 2 she adopted, but only 5 lived to adulthood. Even then […]
Did you know Emma had one covert, due to her influence eventually led to the conversion of thousands? Dan and Jane Jones immigrated to the United States, and by 1841 they were residents of St. Louis, Missouri. On May 10 of that year, Dan Jones, as an American citizen, applied for a license to ply […]
During their seventeen-year marriage, nine children were born to Joseph and Emma, and they adopted two. Emma’s first three children died shortly after birth: Alvin in 1828 and twins in 1831. They adopted twins, Joseph and Julia Murdock (born on May 1), whose mother, Julia, had died the day after the birth of Emma’s twins, […]
