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Affidavit, 6 December 1842 [City of Nauvoo v. Davis for Slander of Miles]
Source Note
Source Note
, Affidavit, before JS as mayor, , Hancock Co., IL, 6 Dec. 1842, City of Nauvoo v. Davis for Slander of Miles (Nauvoo, IL, Mayor’s Court 1842); handwriting of with insertions by ; signature of ; certified by JS, 6 Dec. 1842; docket by , [, Hancock Co., IL], [6 Dec. 1842]; two pages; Nauvoo, IL, Records, CHL. Includes docket.
Single leaf, measuring 4½ × 7¾ inches (11 × 20 cm) and ruled with fourteen horizontal printed blue lines. The leaf is torn on the right side of the recto and was unevenly cut on the top and bottom. The document was folded in half and docketed.
The document was docketed by , who served as city recorder and clerk of the Municipal Court from 1841 to 1843. It was presumably kept among Nauvoo city records. In 1845 the city of Nauvoo was disincorporated. Many if not most of the city records were likely included in the various collections of city records listed in an inventory produced by the Church Historian’s Office (later Family and Church History Department) in 1846, when they were packed up along with church records and taken to the Salt Lake Valley. The city records are also listed in inventories of church records created in 1855, 1878, and circa 1904. The Nauvoo, Illinois, records collection was arranged and cataloged by the Family and Church History Department (now CHL) in 2006. The document’s likely inclusion with the city records listed in early church inventories and its inclusion in the Nauvoo, Illinois, records collection in 2006 indicate continuous church custody since 1845.
Footnotes
- [1]
“Officers of the City of Nauvoo,” Times and Seasons, 15 Dec. 1841, 3:638; “Municipal Court of the City of Nauvoo,” Times and Seasons, 1 July 1843, 4:244.
Times and Seasons. Commerce/Nauvoo, IL. Nov. 1839–Feb. 1846.
- [2]
“An Act to Repeal the Nauvoo Charter,” 14th General Assembly, 1844–1845, Senate Bill no. 35 (House Bill no. 42), Illinois General Assembly, Enrolled Acts of the General Assembly, 1818–2012, Illinois State Archives, Springfield.
Illinois General Assembly. Bills, Resolutions, and Related General Assembly Records, 1st–98th Bienniums, 1819–2015. Illinois State Archives, Springfield.
- [3]
“Schedule of Church Records. Nauvoo 1846,” [1], Historian’s Office, Catalogs and Inventories, 1846–1904, CHL.
Historian’s Office. Catalogs and Inventories, 1846–1904. CHL. CR 100 130.
- [4]
“Inventory. Historian’s Office. 4th April 1855,” [1]–[2]; “Index of Records and Journals in the Historian’s Office 1878,” [11]; “Index to Papers in the Historians Office,” ca. 1904, 7, Historian’s Office, Catalogs and Inventories, 1846–1904, CHL.
Historian’s Office. Catalogs and Inventories, 1846–1904. CHL. CR 100 130.
- [5]
See the full bibliographic entry for Nauvoo, IL, Records, 1841–1845, in the CHL catalog.
- [6]
“Schedule of Church Records. Nauvoo 1846,” [1], Historian’s Office, Catalogs and Inventories, 1846–1904, CHL.
Historian’s Office. Catalogs and Inventories, 1846–1904. CHL. CR 100 130.
Historical Introduction
Historical Introduction
See Introduction to City of Nauvoo v. Davis for Slander of Miles and Historical Introduction to Complaint, 6 Dec. 1842.
| State of Illinois) | State <City> of Illinois <> |
| Hancock Co <Ss>) | vs |
| <City of .>) |
being duly Sworn makes oath that Joseph Smith Mayer is so prejudised against him that he Cannot have a fair and Impartial trial and he asks A Change of Venue to sum other Court Where the Said Causes do not Exhist.
Sworn before me, this 6th day of Decr 1842.
Joseph Smith Mayor [p. [1]]
Source Note
Source Note
Document Transcript
Document Information
Document Information
Footnotes
Footnotes
- [1]
“Ss” is a legal abbreviation for scilicet, a Latin adverb meaning “that is to say, to wit, viz.” (“Scilicet,” in Jones, Introduction to Legal Science, appendix, 28.)
Jones, Silas. An Introduction to Legal Science: Being a Concise and Familiar Treatise . . . to Which Is Appended a Concise Dictionary of Law Terms and Phrases. New York: John S. Voorhies, 1842.
All insertions in this document are in the handwriting of James Sloan.
- [2]
Illinois law stipulated that prior to the commencement of a trial before a justice of the peace, a defendant could make an oath that he or she believed it impossible to “have an impartial trial” before that justice. At that point, the justice was to “transmit all the papers and documents belonging to the suit, to the nearest justice of peace, who shall proceed as if the said suit had been instituted before him.” (An Act concerning Justices of the Peace and Constables [3 Feb. 1827], Public and General Statute Laws of the State of Illinois, p. 408, sec. 25.)
The Public and General Statute Laws of the State of Illinois: Containing All the Laws . . . Passed by the Ninth General Assembly, at Their First Session, Commencing December 1, 1834, and Ending February 13, 1835; and at Their Second Session, Commencing December 7, 1835, and Ending January 18, 1836; and Those Passed by the Tenth General Assembly, at Their Session Commencing December 5, 1836, and Ending March 6, 1837; and at Their Special Session, Commencing July 10, and Ending July 22, 1837. . . . Compiled by Jonathan Young Scammon. Chicago: Stephen F. Gale, 1839.
Signature of Amos Davis.
Certification by JS in the handwriting of James Sloan. Because of lack of space, Sloan inscribed the certification above Amos Davis’s signature, overlapping some of the letters.
Signature of JS.