This is an excerpt from an article I found called, "Joseph Smith descendant has a story to tell". It talks about how rough it was to grow up Mormon and the restrictions they had:
"I am writing to tell you what it has been like to be raised a descendant of Joseph Smith Jr. and Emma Hale Smith.
We were not allowed to talk to Mormons (or anyone) about our lineage. We were raised to believe that Mormons would either try to kill us or recruit us (and as children, we didn't know which would be worse). We were encouraged to run from anyone with a Book of Mormon. We were sent to Baptist and Methodist churches and told to stay away from any other religion.
We were taught that the "Mormons in Utah" wanted to kill our great-great grandfather (though I didn't know it then, I now think they were speaking of Joseph Jr. and Emma's son, Alexander) and we were in danger around "them" (the "Utah Mormons").
The ironic part is that when my mother became very ill (when I was about 10 years old) it was a Mormon family (LDS) that took care of my two sisters, my brother and me for weeks. When we were welcomed in the LDS Church, we were surprised (and relieved). "
The whole article can be found at http://mormontimes.com/studies_doctrine/research_discoveries/?id=14281&hStack=1
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Detail of beadwork from an Ojibwe medicine pouch
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1 comment:
This is really interesting Spenser. It makes me curious to know why there was such danger for descendants of Smith. Perhaps it had to do with the succession of the prophets after the murder in Carthage, IL of Smith, his brothers, and other men who were high up in the church. Perhaps the line of direct descent from the founder and chief prophet, Smith, made his descendants a threat to the current church prophets and officials in Salt Lake City.
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