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Letter to Garret Bias, 28 March 1843

Source Note

on behalf of JS, Letter, , Hancock Co., IL, to , [ or possibly LaPorte Co., IN], 28 Mar. [1843]. Featured version drafted 28 Mar. 1843 in Garret Bias, Letter, St. Joseph Co. [or possibly LaPorte Co.], IN, to JS, Nauvoo, IL, 7 Mar. 1843; handwriting and signature of ; one page; CHL.
Bifolium measuring 12⅛ × 7½ inches (31 × 19 cm). This letter draft was inscribed on the verso of the second leaf of the 7 March 1843 letter from . A 3⅞ × 3½–inch portion of the upper left corner of the bifolium has been torn and is lost, resulting in the loss of some text in the drafted response.
The document was endorsed by , who was serving as JS’s scribe when the letter was received. After this, the early provenance of the letter is unknown. At some point the letter came into the possession of collector Floyd E. Risvold, who died in 2009. The letter was offered for sale in 2010 by Spink Shreves Galleries as part of lot 584 of the Floyd E. Risvold collection. The Church History Department (CHL) acquired the letter the same year.

Footnotes

  1. [1]

    See Letter from Garret Bias, 7 Mar. 1843.

  2. [2]

    JS, Journal, 13 Dec. 1841.

  3. [3]

    Floyd E. Risvold Collection, 2:113.

    The Floyd E. Risvold Collection: American Expansion and the Journey West. 3 vols. 2009. Catalog of the 27–29 January 2010 auction of the Floyd E. Risvold estate at New York City by the Spink Shreves Galleries and Spink Smythe of Dallas, TX.

  4. [4]

    See the full bibliographic entry for Garret Bias, Letter, St. Joseph Co., IN, to JS, Nauvoo, IL, 7 Mar. 1843, in the CHL catalog.

Historical Introduction

On 28 March 1843 in , Illinois, replied on behalf of JS to a 7 March letter from of and declined Bias’s offer to sell fifty stands of military arms to the members of a new militia unit that he proposed to form in Nauvoo.
penned the terse response directly on the letter JS received from , likely as a draft for a more formal response. Because the document is heavily damaged, much of the text is either missing or illegible. Portions that are legible appear to question the legality of Bias’s sale of the weapons. The response also characterized as a peaceful city that was not in need of the military arms. Bias’s failure to pay the postage on his letter also appears to have elicited a complaint.
If did send the response, he likely rewrote the letter on blank paper. had apparently not received a response to his 7 March letter by 3 April, when he wrote another dispatch to JS, again requesting JS’s attention to the matter addressed in his earlier letter.

Footnotes

  1. [1]

    Letter from Garret Bias, 7 Mar. 1843.

  2. [2]

    Bias noted his neglect to pay the postage on his March letter in another letter he wrote approximately one month later. (Letter from Garret Bias, 3 Apr. 1843.)

  3. [3]

    Letter from Garret Bias, 3 Apr. 1843.

Asterisk (*) denotes a "featured" version, which includes an introduction and annotation.
*Letter to Garret Bias, 28 March 1843
Letter from Garret Bias, 7 March 1843

Page [1]

March 28, 1834 [1843]
[page torn] query of March 7th I want [page torn] have no right to dispose of said [page torn] order from the War Secretary. [page torn] wishing to arm companies on [page torn] ours is a city of peace [page torn] & no circulating medium but [page torn]ough [enough?] of that to pay postage on any bodys Letter.
Yours Respectfully [for?] J. Smith [p. [1]]
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Source Note

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Page [1]

Document Information

Related Case Documents
Editorial Title
Letter to Garret Bias, 28 March 1843
ID #
10743
Total Pages
1
Print Volume Location
JSP, D12:125–126
Handwriting on This Page
  • Willard Richards

Footnotes

  1. [1]

    TEXT: “Nauvo[page torn]”.

  2. [2]

    It is unknown how Bias obtained the arms he sought to sell. (See Historical Introduction to Letter from Garret Bias, 7 Mar. 1843.)

  3. [3]

    TEXT: The text shifts from the bottom of the last page of the bifolium to the top of that page.

  4. [4]

    Scribes occasionally wrote on behalf of JS. (See, for example, Letter to Sirs, 1 Apr. 1843; and William Clayton, Nauvoo, IL, to Justin Butterfield, Springfield, IL, 14 June 1843, Newel K. Whitney, Papers, BYU.)

    Whitney, Newel K. Papers, 1825–1906. BYU.

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