David Bettisworth, constable of Carthage, Illinois, arrested JS on 12 June 1844 on charges that JS had committed a riot during the destruction of the Nauvoo Expositor press two days earlier. JS was released from that arrest at a hearing before the Nauvoo Municipal Court on 12 June but then agreed to travel to Carthage to be tried on the charges. When JS and Hyrum Smith arrived in Carthage on 25 June, Bettisworth arrested them on charges of treason. At an examination that day before Justice of the Peace Robert F. Smith, JS and the other defendants on the riot charge were released on bail to appear at the next term of the circuit court. Later that evening Bettisworth presented a mittimus, signed by Robert Smith, to commit JS and Hyrum Smith to jail on the grounds that they had been arrested for treason. JS acquiesced to the mittimus when he learned that Illinois governor Thomas Ford had consented to it. On the following day, 26 June, Bettisworth came to the jail with an order from Robert Smith directing him to bring JS and Hyrum Smith “for an examination on the charge of treason.” According to JS’s attorney H. T. Reid, jailor George W. Stigall refused to release the prisoners to Bettisworth, as he “could find no law authorizing a justice of the peace, to demand prisoners committed to his charge.” According to Bettisworth, JS said that he would not go, “that the Constable should have nothing to do with him—that he intended coming out on a writ of habeas corpus.” Stigall stated that he then asked the governor if he (Stigall) had authority to surrender the prisoners and was told that he did. Bettisworth soon returned and took the prisoners before Robert Smith for an examination. James W. Woods, another of JS’s attorneys, wrote that Bettisworth returned to the jail with the Carthage Greys and forced Stigall “by intimidation and threats . . . to give up the prisoners.” Bettisworth and Stigall, on the other hand, stated that Stigall delivered the Smiths to the constable without any threat or disturbance. (JS, Journal, 10 and 12 June 1844; Richards, Journal, 25 June 1844; H. T. Reid, “Statement of Facts,” Times and Seasons, 1 July 1844, 5:562; David Bettisworth and George Stigall, Affidavits, Warsaw [IL] Signal, 24 July 1844, [1], italics in original.)

Times and Seasons. Commerce/Nauvoo, IL. Nov. 1839–Feb. 1846.

Warsaw Signal. Warsaw, IL. 1841–1853.