William Sayre reports to James Cobb that Joseph used the stone from Palmyra to translate the Book of Mormon.

Date
Aug 31, 1878
Type
Letter
Source
William S. Sayre
Non-LDS
Hearsay
2nd Hand
Reprint
Reference

William S. Sayre to James T. Cobb, 31 August 1878 in Dan Vogel, ed. Early Mormon Documents, 5 vols. (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 2002), 4:145

Scribe/Publisher
Signature Books, William S. Sayre
People
Joseph Smith, Jr., William S. Sayre
Audience
James T. Cobb
Transcription

He Said Smith was poor & was living in a house which had only one room <in which he could keep [for?]> & Smith had a sheet put up in one corner & went behind it from observation when he was writing the bible. He Said Smith kept the bible hid or covered up & put it in a hat & had the Stone which <he> found in Pal=mira & look[e]d through it Sc then wrote what he read in the bible. He Said <he> would not let him see the bible but let him feel of it when it was covered up. Smith read to him a good deal of the bible & he repeated to those in the Stage verse after verse of what Smith had read to him; & I afterwards remem^bered Some of the names <& language> when I read the Mormon bible.

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