The prophet Joseph Smith received revelations in the fall 1830 calling Oliver Cowdery, Peter Whitmer Jr., Parley P. Pratt and Ziba Peterson on a mission to the Lamanites -- the native Americans then living in the Indian territories bordering the state of Missouri. Just four months earlier, President Andrew Jackson had signed the Indian Removal Act. Even before the act became law, the Shawnee and Delaware Indians had begun moving from Ohio to the territories in 1828-29; both tribes would settle near the Kansas River, just west of the Missouri border.
Leaving in late October, the four missionaries soon arrived in northern Ohio; this was an area popularly known as the Western Reserve because during the colonial period it had been allotted to Connecticut as a "western reserve." Parley Pratt was already familiar with the area, having lived in Amherst. In fact, Parley had studied under Sidney Rigdon, then a prominent minister in the area.
While in the area, Parley persuaded his companions to visit Rigdon in Mentor, Ohio ere they would stay for four weeks, baptizing some one hundred converts, before continuing on to Missouri. Pratt and Cowdery bore testimony of the truthfulness of the restored gospel; while Rigdon was not immediately converted, he did allow the missionaries to preach their message in his church.
Many members of Rigdon's congregation live in Kirtland, a village five miles away from Mentor. The elders went door-knocking in the village and over a period of four weeks they baptized about 127 converts. These efforts more than doubled the membership of the church.
Among those baptized in Kirtland were Frederick and Rebecca Williams. Frederick Granger Williams, a doctor and a prominent member of the community, at first had some reservations about the restored gospel as taught by the four elders. "The Elders presented him a book of Mormon which he was determined not to read," wrote Lucy Ellen Williams Godfrey, Frederick's granddaughter, many years later. "He would read a little would lay it away but soon was reading it again. He became converted and was baptized into the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints."
Once converted, Dr. Williams was ready to give his all to the work. "When the Elders were going on they desired F. G. Williams to accompany them," wrote Lucy Godfrey, "which he did furnishing part of the outfit which left his wife alone with four small children to get a long as best she could. He was gone ten months on this mission to the Indians."
Another descendent of Dr. Williams, his biographer who also happens to share his name, has written: "By accepting the invitation to serve, Williams in effect became the first 'senior' missionary in this dispensation, as well as one of the first married missionaries of the restored Church to leave his family for an extended period. His willingness to sacrifice the comforts of home and family for a season in order to serve the Lord -- while paying his own way and at the same time supporting the missions of others -- would be a pattern that thousands more would emulate over the years."
The missionaries traveled south to the Ohio River, and along the way, the elders continued to preach to all who would listen. "Some wished to learn and obey the fullness of the gospel," wrote Parley P. Pratt. "Others were filled with envy, rage and lying."
On his return to Amherst, Parley would be arrested, tried and convicted on a frivolous charge. Lacking the money to pay the fine, the missionary had to spend the night locked in public inn. The next morning he was allowed to go his way when he challenged his surprised jailer to a race.
From there the missionary went to Sandusky, where they preached among the Wyandot tribe, before continuing on to Cincinnati. By steamboat they proceeded to St. Louis, then, as it was late in the year and there was ice at the mouth of the river, they proceeded by foot, in deep snow -- the winter of 1830-31 was remembered as the winter of the deep snow -- across Missouri to Independence, Jackson County.
As it would happen, the elders, on their arrival in western Missouri, did not receive permission from the Indian agent of the U.S. government to preach among the native Americans. Still, Oliver Cowdery, Parley Pratt and Frederick Williams were able to cross the border into the territories to introduce the Book of Mormon to forty tribal leaders, including William Anderson, the chief of the Delawares -- his father was Scandinavian while his mother was a native American.
Despite the limited success among the indians, the mission to the Lamanites would nonetheless have a major impact on the church and its history. The Saints in New York would soon decide to move to Kirtland, Ohio and, after the prophet Joseph received a revelation declaring it to be Zion, to Independence, Missouri. Frederick G. Williams would first meet the prophet in Independence before traveling with him back to Kirtland.
The prophet Joseph once said that "Brother Frederick G. Williams is one of those men in whom I place the greatest confidence and trust, for I have found him ever full of love and brotherly kindness. He is not a man of many words, but is ever winning, because of his constant mind."
Years later, in August 1841, Parley P. Pratt would write an open letter from Manchester, England, to the authorities and members of the church, in which he would recall the mission to the Lamanites and the elders with which he served:
"It is now eleven years since I first embraced the fullness of the gospel. . . . I was one of those who took the first mission to the western states, in which the fullness of the gospel was first introduced into Ohio (commencing at Kirtland,) Indiana, Illinois and Missouri, and into the Indian territory, among the Lamanites.
"When countless millions shall throng to the courts of the New Jerusalem which is soon to be built in Jackson County, Missouri, upon the consecrated spot, then perhaps it may be remembered that in 1830, in the depth of a howling winter five men penetrated Missouri's wilds, and traveled on foot from St. Louis to Independence, Jackson County, wading in snow to the knees the greater part of the way for 300 miles; and all this as may be said, without money or friends, except as they made them. These are the first footsteps ever made in that state by Latter day Saints -- these first placed their feet upon that holy ground, where shall stand the great temple of our God, the resort of nations, and the joy of the whole earth. . . .
"Of those five men, Peter Whitmer is now in his grave, two [Oliver Cowdery and Ziba Peterson] are turned away from the fellowship of the church, and the other two, F. G. Williams and myself are yet alive, and blessed with the grace of God we are yet counted worthy of a place among you. Thus I find myself a monument of mercy, spared like an oak amid the tempest, and to God be ascribed all the glory; for were it not for his peculiar longsuffering and goodness I might now have been an outcast from the commonwealth of Israel, or cut down by untimely death without beholding in this life the establishment of Zion."
Frederick G. Williams would have a prominent place in the history of the church in the Kirtland period, and you may yet read more about him for he is my great great great grandfather.
Sources:
Williams, F. G. (2012). The Life of Dr. Frederick G. Williams: Counselor to the Prophet Joseph Smith. Provo, Utah: BYU Studies.
Church Educational System. (1989). Church History in the Fulness of Times, Student Manual. Salt Lake City: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
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