Mormon History
Nauvoo After the Mormons - 1852
The Dixon Telegraph – July 3, 1852
Nauvoo.
A correspondent of the
Madison (Ind.) Courier has been making a pilgrimage to the ruins of what
was the stronghold of the "Latter-Day Saints" -- in the time when Joe Smith was
the Prophet. We extract the following from his interesting letter: --
The city of the Mormons once had 20,000 inhabitants; there are now but 2,000.
One-half of the houses the Mormons left have been removed or pulled down, and
the other half are tenantless. Each lot contains an acre. In walking through its
deserted streets I startled several quails, in the midst of the once populous
city. -- The mansion of Joe Smith is kept by his wife, once his widow, but now
again a wife -- of another and a live man -- as a tavern. Between this mansion
and the river are the remains of a famous hotel, which was abandoned after its
walls had reached the second story; the walls are of fine pressed brick, with
marble door-sills and caps. The Masonic Hall is a fine brick building three
stories high. I am told that all the Mormons were Masons. Their lodge was under
the jurisdiction of the Grand Lodge of the State of Illinois. Smith, I am told,
initiated some of the "mothers of the church," when the charter was taken from
them, and the lodge closed. The front wall and the one next to it, which formed
the vestibule, [are] all that is left standing of the achievement of fanaticism
called the "temple," which as the inscription on a large stone, worked in the
inner wall, informs the visitor, is THE HOUSE OF THE LORD, Built by The Church
of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, Commenced April 6, 1841.
A company of French socialists have purchased a portion of the property -- the
site and the ruins of the temple included. They number about 400. While I was
viewing the temple they all came out of their boarding-house from dinner. Their
foreign aspect and clothing as they grouped about the stones of the temple to
smoke their pipes and talk -- probably of la belle France -- made me
almost fancy I was viewing a ruin in an older country. One group were
gesticulating and laughing over the face of one of the ornaments which decorated
each column, which I cannot describe it better than referring the reader to the
picture of the full moon, which usually ornaments the cover of a Dutch almanac.