Brigham Young

American religious leader

• Born: June 1, 1801
• Birthplace: Whitingham, Vermont
• Died: August 29, 1877
• Place of death: Salt Lake City, Utah

Young’s leadership of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the Utah territory influenced both the religious and the secular development of the American West. After the murder of the church’s founder, Joseph Smith, Young held the church together, led its members from Illinois to Utah, and oversaw its development into a mature institution that has continued to expand into the twenty-first century.

Early Life

Born shortly after his parents moved from Hopkinton, Massachusetts, to Whitingham, Vermont, Brigham Young was the last of four sons of the nine children whom his consumptive mother, Abigail (Nabby) Young, bore her husband, John Young. His father was probably a tenant farmer, and the life of the Young family was harsh. After moving several times, the family settled in Sherburne, New York, at the junction of the Chenango and Susquehanna Rivers. When Brigham was thirteen, the family moved to Aurelius, where Nabby finally lost her battle against consumption in June, 1815. Accounts of the early life of Brigham are based largely on anecdotes, because accurate factual information concerning this period of his life is scarce.

Because of the family’s poor circumstances, Young received no formal education, and he worked beside his father from an early age. In 1824, when he was twenty-three, he married eighteen-year-old Miriam Angeline Works, the second child of Asa and Abigail Works. Both her father and John Young were Revolutionary War veterans. Brigham and Miriam were married on October 5, 1824. Gilbert Weed, the justice of the peace of Aurelius, married them at the James Pine tavern. At the time of the marriage, Brigham worked in a factory. They joined the Methodist Church shortly after their marriage. Elizabeth, their first child, was born on September 19, 1825. Several years later, Miriam contracted chronic tuberculosis, becoming a semi-invalid. In order to make a living, Young did a variety of odd jobs: building homes; putting in window panes, doorways, staircases, and fireplace mantels; and making and repairing furniture.

Young was not a stern religious type like his father; it was not until he and his entire immediate family joined Joseph Smith’s Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in April, 1832, that he embraced a religious doctrine. This conversion was the turning point in Young’s life. He had not joined a church earlier because he could not accept many of the religious doctrines that were prevalent. He believed that most clergymen dwelt only on the way to get to Heaven, but none of them ever told him anything about Heaven, God, or salvation. He desired a more positive approach in his search for religious truth.

During this period, Young familiarized himself with Baptist, Freewill Baptist, Wesleyan and Reformed Methodist, Episcopalian, and Presbyterian theologies. Because of the intensity and emotionalism of the evangelists in western New York, Young became cynical about professors of religion. This cynicism was extended to many social, business, and other customs in society and on the frontier.

After his conversion to Mormonism, Young had no immediate contact with the people in his new church. He spent much time reading and examining the Book of Mormon, which he admired for its simple biblical style and its clear explanations of many passages in the Old and the New Testaments. Young was greatly impressed by the Mormon missionaries he met, but it was not until January, 1832, at Bradford County, Pennsylvania, that he actually attended a Mormon meeting.

Life’s Work

One week after being baptized in his new faith, Young preached his first sermon, without using notes or a text. This practice was followed in all of his future sermons. In order to propagate Mormonism, Young placed his wife Miriam in the care of Vilate Kimball and spent the summer of 1832 traveling and preaching. He returned home in time to attend Miriam during her last days. She died in his arms on September 8, 1832. He now devoted himself completely to his new church.

Young’s first meeting with the Mormon prophet, Joseph Smith, was in the summer of 1832, in Kirtland. He was impressed tremendously, and at one of the meetings spoke in tongues, a gift he seldom used after 1832. After having a vision in February, 1835, Joseph Smith held a meeting, which resulted in twelve men being chosen as apostles; these twelve became the Council of Twelve. Young was the second selected and only two were older than he. In his ordination, Young’s future was thus predicted: He would do great things in the name of Jesus; he would behold heavenly messages; and he would have influence among heathen nations.

The entire Mormon community was shattered on October 27, 1838, when Lilburn W. Boggs, governor of the state of Missouri, reacted to religious pressures and prejudices and issued his “Exterminating Order.” This order stated that the Mormons were to be treated as enemies and were to be exterminated or driven from Missouri and made legal the pillage, killing, and burning that followed. Young was active in helping Mormons to escape from Missouri.

After returning from a mission in Great Britain, Young joined his family in Nauvoo, Illinois, in August, 1841. From Nauvoo, the Council of Twelve directed the proselytizing activities in the United States, in Canada, in Great Britain, in continental Europe, and in the South Pacific. Young became the most important of the Twelve and was its president.

Joseph Smith introduced to the Council of Twelve four new doctrines in the fall and winter of 1841-1842. The first was the performance of baptism for the dead. The second and most controversial of the four was plural marriage. The council became convinced that it was a biblical injunction, and Young accepted the doctrine. With the consent of Mary Ann, his second wife, he married his first plural wife, Lucy Ann Decker Seeley, in June, 1842. At that time, all plural marriages were performed secretly. The actual writing down of the practice did not take place until July, 1843. The word “polygamy,” meaning plural mates (husband or wife) was used rather than the word “polygyny,” meaning more than one wife. Despite the choice of words, the Mormons never accepted the idea that a woman could have more than one husband.

The third and fourth doctrines were not as controversial as the second. The third doctrine was the full endowment, a ritualistic religious ceremony. The fourth doctrine was sealing—the binding of children to parents, and persons with unbelieving or worldly parents to faithful families. Young had several young men sealed to him as his spiritual sons.

Joseph Smith’s decision to run for the presidency of the United States in 1844 in order to propagate his faith infuriated his opponents. Young carried the message of church and politics throughout the nation, as did the other apostles. Meanwhile, in Nauvoo, a group of Mormons opposed the revelation on plural marriages and the ecclesiastical control that had become complete. Smith and his followers destroyed their newspaper, whereupon Smith and his City Council were charged with inciting a riot and suppressing a free press. This charge was actually an excuse for which many citizens and politicians of Illinois had been waiting. Smith and some of his followers were jailed in Carthage. On June 27, a mob broke into the jail and killed Joseph and his brother, Hyrum Smith. With the murder of Joseph Smith, Young became head of the Mormons. The church needed a strong, capable, and devoted leader; Young was more than able to fulfill that need.

At that time Emma Smith, the wife of the prophet Joseph Smith, split with Young over control of the church. Emma wanted the control of the church to pass to her son, Joseph Smith III. Young opposed this succession, and the Mormons split into Young and Emma Smith camps. The Smith group eventually formed the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Neither Emma nor the Reorganized Church ever accepted the practice of plural wives.

After this split in the Mormon Church, Young led the majority of Mormons from Nauvoo to Utah. With the extremely difficult march to Salt Lake City and the reestablishment of the church in Utah, Young stamped his mark on the future of Mormonism. It took a strong-willed, devoted, capable, and energetic man to establish a new settlement in the isolated West—to organize new political, economic, social, and religious structures that would accommodate and protect his followers and their descendants as well as the constant influx of settlers.

The Mormons were now outside the fundamentalism of the United States’ religious climate. Young’s great organizing skill, as well as his overall leadership, combined with the hard work of the Mormon people who followed him, resulted in the growth and prosperity of the area. The westward movement of the citizens of the United States greatly aided their prosperity. It was only natural that Young would become the first governor of the federal territory of Utah in 1857. The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo had brought the area back into the United States after the Mexican War. In 1871, Young was tried on charges of polygamy but was not convicted.

Young was a deeply religious as well as a practical man who was also a great leader. He died in his city on August 29, 1877, leaving behind at least seventeen wives and fifty-six children.

Significance

Without a doubt, Brigham Young was at the right place at the right time. However, had he not been a devoted and practical individual with visions of what he and his followers could create, the Mormons and the state of Utah would not be what they are in the twenty-first century. A lesser man would have failed miserably. Born in an age and an area of the United States known for its deep religious convictions and activity, Young focused his energy, belief, and ability to create one of the most rapidly growing churches in the United States.

Bibliography

Anderson, Edward Henry. The Life of Brigham Young. Salt Lake City, Utah: G. Q. Cannon and Sons, 1893. Anderson had some access to materials in the church archives in Salt Lake City. To a degree, the book is an expanded rewrite of earlier Mormon publications on Young.

Anderson, Nels. Desert Saints: The Mormon Frontier in Utah. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1942. A favorable account, most useful for the general reader.

Arrington, Leonard J. Brigham Young: American Moses. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1985. Written by a historian who used extensive materials in the church archives. This is probably the best biography of Young. Pro-Mormon, but basically objective.

Bagley, Will. Blood of the Prophets: Brigham Young and the Massacre at Mountain Meadows. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2002. In 1857, local settlers and Paiutes in southern Utah murdered about 100 people who were traveling via wagon train from Arkansas. Bagley recounts the incident, providing evidence to confirm an earlier account of Young’s involvement in the massacre and subsequent cover-up.

Bergera, Gary James. Conflict in the Quorum: Orson Platt, Brigham Young, Joseph Smith. Salt Lake City, Utah: Signature Books, 2002. Critical study that chronicles the dissension between Pratt, who preached a controversial brand of Mormonism, and rival church leaders Young and Smith. Describes how Young outmaneuvered Smith to control church doctrine and practice.

Brodie, Fawn M. No Man Knows My History: The Life of Joseph Smith, the Mormon Prophet. Rev. ed. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1971. First published in 1946, the first major critical study of Smith’s life by a professional historian. An essential starting point for any study of the Mormon prophet, this book proved so challenging to the Mormon Church that its author was excommunicated.

Newell, Linda King, and Valeen Tippetts Avery. Mormon Enigma: Emma Hale Smith, Prophet’s Wife, Elect Lady, Polygamy’s Foe. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1984. Both authors are Mormons; Avery is a professor of history. This is the most complete examination of Emma Hale Smith, a remarkable woman who was torn between her love for the church founded by her husband and her opposition to Brigham Young’s attempts to lead it.

Werner, Morris R. Brigham Young. New York: Harcourt Brace, 1925. Written by a New York sportswriter, who based his research upon published materials. Although Werner pokes fun at his subject, for years this was one of the best biographies of Young.