Nauvoo is a small city in Hancock County, Illinois, United States, on the Mississippi River near Fort Madison, Iowa. The population of Nauvoo was 1,149 at the 2010 census. Nauvoo attracts visitors for its historic importance and its religious significance to members of several groups: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints; the Community of Christ, formerly the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (RLDS); other groups stemming from the Latter Day Saint movement; and the Icarians. The city and its immediate surrounding area are listed on the National Register of Historic Places as the Nauvoo Historic District.
The Nauvoo Expositor was a newspaper in Nauvoo, Illinois, that published only one issue, on June 7, 1844. Its publication, and the destruction of the printing press ordered by Joseph Smith, set off a chain of events that led to Smith's death.
Emma Hale Smith Bidamon was the wife of Joseph Smith and a leader in the early days of the Latter Day Saint movement, both during Joseph's lifetime and afterward as a member of the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. In 1842, when the Ladies' Relief Society of Nauvoo was formed as a women's service organization, she was elected by its members as the organization's first president.
Times and Seasons was a 19th-century Latter Day Saint newspaper published at Nauvoo, Illinois. It was printed monthly or twice-monthly from November 1839 to February 1846. The motto of the paper was "Truth will prevail," which was printed underneath the title heading. It was the successor to the Elders' Journal and was the last newspaper published by the Church in the United States before the schisms that occurred after the death of Joseph Smith.
Orson Pratt Sr. was an American mathematician and religious leader who was an original member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles of the Church of Christ. He became a member of the Quorum of the Twelve of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and was a leading Mormon theologian and writer until his death.
Willard Richards was a physician and midwife/nurse trainer and an early leader in the Latter Day Saint movement. He served as Second Counselor to church president Brigham Young in the First Presidency of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints from 1847 until his death.
William Smith was a leader in the Latter Day Saint movement and one of the original members of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. Smith was the eighth child of Joseph Smith Sr. and Lucy Mack Smith and was a younger brother of Joseph Smith Jr., the founder of the Latter Day Saint movement.
The Kinderhook plates were a set of six small, bell-shaped pieces of brass with unusual engravings created as a hoax in 1843, surreptitiously buried and then dug up at an Indian mound near Kinderhook, Illinois.
William Wines Phelps was an early leader of the Latter Day Saint movement. He printed the first edition of the Book of Commandments that became a standard work of the church and wrote numerous hymns, some of which are included in the current version of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints' hymnal. He was at times both close to and at odds with church leadership. He testified against Joseph Smith, providing evidence that helped persuade authorities to arrest Smith. He was excommunicated three times and rejoined the church each time. He was a ghostwriter for Smith. Phelps was called by Smith to serve as assistant president of the church in Missouri and as a member of the Council of Fifty. After Smith's death, Phelps supported Brigham Young as the church's new president.
Amasa Mason Lyman was an early leader in the Latter Day Saint movement and was an apostle. He was also a counselor in the First Presidency to Joseph Smith.
John Cook Bennett was an American physician and briefly a ranking and influential leader of the Latter Day Saint movement, who acted as mayor of Nauvoo, Illinois, and Major-General of the Nauvoo Legion in the early 1840s.
James Adams was a nineteenth-century Illinois lawyer and close friend of Joseph Smith, founder of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.
The life of Joseph Smith from 1839 to 1844, when he was 34–38 years old, covers the period of Smith's life when he lived in Nauvoo, an eventful and highly controversial period of the Latter Day Saint movement. In 1844, after Smith was imprisoned in Carthage, Illinois, he was shot and killed when a mob stormed the jailhouse.
Joseph Smith, the founder and leader of the Latter Day Saint movement, and his brother, Hyrum Smith, were killed by a mob in Carthage, Illinois, United States, on June 27, 1844, while awaiting trial in the town jail.
The Nauvoo Neighbor was a weekly newspaper edited and published by Latter Day Saint apostle John Taylor in Nauvoo, Illinois, from 1843 to 1845. While it was not an official publication of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, the Neighbor was consistently pro-Mormon and its primary target audience was the Latter Day Saint residents of Nauvoo. When The Wasp ceased publication in April 1843, the Neighbor replaced it as Nauvoo's premier secular newspaper.
Thomas Coke Sharp was a prominent opponent of Joseph Smith and the Latter Day Saints in Illinois in the 1840s. Sharp promoted his anti-Mormon views largely through the Warsaw Signal newspaper, of which he was the owner, editor, and publisher. Sharp was one of five defendants tried and acquitted of the murders of Smith and his brother Hyrum.
James Sloan was an official historian and recorder of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, a secretary to Joseph Smith, and one of the first Mormon settlers in Nauvoo, Illinois.
The history of Nauvoo, Illinois, starts with the Sauk and Fox tribes who frequented the area. They called the area "Quashquema", named in honor of the Native American chief who headed a Sauk and Fox settlement numbering nearly 500 lodges. Permanent settlement by non-natives was reportedly begun in 1824 by Captain James White. By 1827 other white settlers had built cabins in the area. By 1829 this area of Hancock County had grown sufficiently so that a post office was needed, and in 1832 the town, now called "Venus", was one of the contenders for the new county seat. However, the nearby city of Carthage was selected instead. In 1834 the name Venus was changed to "Commerce" because the settlers felt that the new name better suited their plans. In late 1839, arriving Mormons bought the small town of Commerce, and in April 1840 it was renamed "Nauvoo" by Joseph Smith, the latter day prophet of the Latter Day Saint movement. Nauvoo grew rapidly and for a few years was one of the most populous cities in Illinois. Within two years of Joseph Smith's death by a mob in 1844, most of the population had departed, fleeing armed violence. Most headed west with the group led by Brigham Young.
An attempted assassination of Lilburn Boggs occurred on May 6, 1842, when an unknown assailant fired buckshot into Boggs's home, striking the former Missouri Governor. Boggs was shot through a window as he read a newspaper in his study and was hit in four places: two balls were lodged in his skull, a third lodged in his neck, and a fourth entered his throat and was swallowed. Boggs was severely injured. Several doctors—Boggs's brother among them—pronounced his injuries fatal, and at least one newspaper ran an obituary. To general surprise, Boggs not only survived, but his condition gradually improved.
Phrenology has been a cultural factor in the Latter Day Saint movement since around the time of its founding in 1830. Phrenology is a pseudoscience which involves the measurement of bumps on the skull to predict mental traits. Developed in the 1790s, it became widely popular in the United States in the 1830s and 1840s, coinciding with the rise of the Latter Day Saint movement.
