--- title: Times and Seasons description: Issues of 1841 to 1842. authors: - Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints editors: - Ebenezer Robinson - Don Carlos Smith - Smith, Joseph, Jr. - Taylor, John collections: - periodicals tags: - newspaper - times-and-seasons - nauvoo - nineteenth-century periodical: Times and Seasons volume: 3 number: 15 published: 1842-06-01 publisher: E. Robinson and D. C. Smith; later John Taylor publisher_place: Commerce and Nauvoo, Illinois language: en type: article reference: "“Letter to Mrs. Emma Smith,” *Times and Seasons* 3, no. 15 (June 1, 1842): 808–809." printed_title: LETTER TO MRS. EMMA SMITH. source: url: https://archive.org/details/per_utah-and-the-mormons_times-and-seasons_1842-06-01_3_15 transcription: Text from the Centerplace.org transcription (https://www.centerplace.org/history/ts/v3n15.htm), with its page breaks; this Internet Archive scan is the reference copy (its OCR was used only as a witness for OCR repair) identifier: per_utah-and-the-mormons_times-and-seasons_1842-06-01_3_15 start_page: 808 end_page: 809 curator_note: A Mormon newspaper published by the church in Nauvoo; included for historical study. Inclusion does not imply endorsement. rights: status: public-domain basis: US publication 1842 (Nauvoo, Illinois); published before 1931, so public domain in the United States source: https://archive.org/details/per_utah-and-the-mormons_times-and-seasons_1842-06-01_3_15 publication_year: 1842 --- # Letter to Mrs. Emma Smith EDWARDSVILLE, Madison Co., Feb. 14, 1842. Ever dear friend: I seat myself at this time to address a few lines to you, as it is a long time since I have seen you, or one of the saints; I always loved your company, and I have often thought of you when your affectionate husband was in jail. I wish you to inform me how much he suffered? and how you fared when he was absent, and whether any one administered to your wants or not? Do not be offended at me for intruding on your patience, for I feel as though you were my sister, and I have been in this State four years without friends and brethren until last October. Now sister Emma, I would tell you some of my trials and difficulties but what are mine to yours? nothing, no nothing! but great will be your reward and eternal your glory." "If light afflictions work out a great and eternal weight of glory?" what will great ones do! I know your mild temper and calm and peaceable disposition: I well recollect your bright eyes, and pleasant countenance. I remember the first visit I ever had with you, but I fear it will be long before I shall have the pleasure of beholding your face again, and of listening to the instructions of your dear husband, the prophet, and of hearing the gracious words of truth and intelligence that flow from his lips; we have nothing to come or gather with the saints with. . . . They say that Jo Duncan is up for Governor, if he is elected, I say that mobs and destruction await the saints if in his power to accomplish it, unless he is a better man than when I worked for him: I washed and ironed for his family, to the amount of six dollars and seventy five cents, and because we lived in a wretched old house not one cent would he pay me; he gave me the most abusive language that I ever heard a man utter, without the least provocation, I cannot tell you one tenth part; but I will tell you a little of the commencement; "did you see Joe when he dug out his gold bible out of the old hollow stump? I should like to have seen him peeping in, pity the devil had not kicked him so far in, that he could not get out again: but they have got him fast up in Jackson, and I am glad of it for he has deluded and robbed plenty of innocent men, and that's what makes you so poor: I suppose you have given him up all you had. Did he ever give you any thing," he said with a look of contempt. I could bear no longer, I said yes, he gave us a barrel of beef, barrel and all; this so astonished him that he stopped, and I proceeded, but cannot write half of what I said to him in this letter; suffice it to say that I was not at a loss for words; and although they called him governor, governor, he did not appear to me bigger than a skunk, nor of any more importance. The feelings of my heart I cannot describe when I hear such language about a man that I have never heard teach anything but truth and righteousness, for seven long years; but I cannot hear him now, this is not my happy lot. I must now close my letter, give my kind love to mother Smith, tell her I have not forgotten her, and that I sympathise [sympathize] with her in her great loss. Peace be with you and all that are saints, and preserve you from all your enemies; when you hear of a good sermon, think of a sincere friend and sister, in the new and everlasting covenant. MATILDA R. BAILEY. Mrs. Emma Smith. Such then is the conduct of this great man; we wish that we could say otherwise of him, but we feel convinced that the high minded and patriotic citizens of the State of Illinois will make choice of another man as their head, legal representative, then the one who will cheat his laundress out of her hard earnings merely because she is poor, and then taunt her with her poverty "Oh! shame where is thy blush!!!"