Lamoni, Iowa, Oct. 24 1898

Bro. Heman C. Smith, Lamoni, Iowa.

In compliance with your request:–

The papyrus from which the Book of Abraham, was said to have been translated by Father, was with other portions found in a roll with some Egyptian mummies, pasted on either paper or linen and put into a small case of flat drawers, some dozen or sixteen in number. This case, with two cases of mummies containing five persons, one much smaller than the others, were in the keeping of Grandmother Lucy Smith, Father's mother, for some time before Father's death, and were still in her possession both at the time he was killed and after. She took them from our house, some time after Father's death, and had them at her daughter Lucy Millikin's, when they moved into Knox County, Illinois, not far from Galesburg. I cannot give you dates, but during a part of 1846–7 Mother and family were away from Nauvoo and Grandmother was at Lucy Millikin's. Grandmother finally came back to Nauvoo with Lucy's family, but came without the mummies and case of drawers. We learned that while living near Galesburg, Uncle William undertook a lecturing tour, and secured the mummies and case of records, as the papyrus was called, as an exhibit aid to making his lectures more attractive and lucrative. Uncle William became stranded somewhere along the Illinois River, and sold the mummies and the records with the understanding that he might repurchase them. This he never did. Part of the stock, one case of mummies and part or all of the cases of drawers, found their way to Wood's Museum, Chicago, and a part to St. Louis, where, we never learned.

I personally, in company with Elder Elijah Banta, of Sandwich, Illinois, saw the mummies and case of drawers in the museum in Chicago, before the great fire, in 1871; in which they undoubtedly perished with the rest of the accumulated relics and curiosities.

Uncle William never accounted for the sale he made, except to state that he was obliged to sell them, but fully intended to repurchase them, but was never able, before the fire; and of course could not after they were burned.

So far as anything is known by us about the fate, or final disposition of the papyrus, the foregoing is correct, and I was knowing to the facts as they occurred; and saw the mummies and case of drawers in Wood's Museum, Chicago, not long before the fire of October 1871. I was at the time living at Plano, Illinois, fifty-three miles west from Chicago, and did business in the city in behalf of our Publishing Department and Herald, and visited the city frequently.

Respectfully,

Joseph Smith