"Oh Lord, my God!"

     Footsteps clamor on the wooden staircase of the two-story Carthage jail.  Absurdly-dressed men, superficially discontent with their once beloved, rush the large wooden door separating them and the inhabitants thereof.  Shots go off.  With a bangs and pops, intertwined with profanity, four men, on the other side of that door push back the door, the impending death awaiting.

Depiction

     The firearms slip through the doorway.  The eagerly evil group of men release their flintlocks, igniting a hue of black smoke, propelling those lead shots into the direction of that room; many more come from the opposite direction-- from the window adjacent.

     "I am a dead man!"

     Shouts of shock.  Cries of help.  Panics of peril.  The four inhabitants of that room were then overpowered by these disgruntled men-- the mens' target, the "infamous" Joseph Smith, had attempted sanctuary, leaping toward the only exit remaining.

     Four shots having penetrated his body, the prophet Joseph Smith had fallen down those two stories, having cried the words:

     "Oh Lord, my God!"

     His dead or dying body now vulnerable to the mob members below, these people aimed to take him and disgrace him, even unto death.

     "The Mormons are coming!"

     The retreating cry of the mob members scurried frighteningly away at the news, leaving the dead bodies of Joseph Smith and his brother Hyrum, and the wounded, affrighted souls of two others, laying around Carthage jail.  In a matter of less than twenty minutes after the charge, hell had indeed broken loose.

Memorial

     Set June 27, 1844, four somewhat ordinary citizens of Nauvoo, Illinois were molested by the wrath of disgruntled townsfolk.  With the death of the very first church leader of the Latter-day Saints, it had sealed a testimony of his work.  The influence of God upon him and his followers are evidently shown through the events that had ensued.  A legacy left behind, Joseph Smith had influenced tens of thousands at the time-- millions, following.

Praise to his mem'ry, he died as a martyr; 

Honored and blest be his ever great name! 

Long shall his blood, which was shed by assassins, 

Plead unto heav'n while the earth lauds his fame.

     This year marks the 161st anniversary of this event.  Let it be known that if this man was not called of a higher deity, the Church would not have been true.  The Church would not have had a priesthood.  The Church would not have had an anointed servant of the Lord guide it.  The church would not have had 141+ temples in operation.  The church would not have been a major influence in domestic and international affairs of the world.  Praise to the man.  Praise unto God.