In the fall of 1831, while Joseph was yet at my father's house, a mob of forty or fifty came to his house, a few entered his room in the middle of the night, and Carnot Mason dragged Joseph out of bed by the hair of his head; he was then seized by as many as could get hold of him, and taken about forty rods from the house, stretched on a board, and tantalized in the most insulting and brutal manner; they tore off the few night clothes that he had on, for the purpose of emasculating him, and had Dr. Dennison there to perform the operation; but when the Dr. saw the Prophet stripped and stretched on the plank, his heart failed him, and he refused to operate. The mob then scratched his body all over, saying, "Damn you, this is the way the Holy Ghost falls upon you.' And in attempting to force open his jaws, they broke one of his front teeth to pour a vial of some obnoxious drug into his mouth.

The mob became divided, and did not succeed, but poured tar over him, and then stuck feathers in it and left him, and went to an old brickyard to wash themselves and bury their filthy clothes. At this place a vial was dropped, the contents of which ran out and killed the grass. About the same time part of the mob went to the house that Sidney Rigon occupied, and dragged him out, and besmeared him with tar and feathers. My father, hearing the outcry of the family, went to the door, but finding it held by some one on the outside, he called for his gun, when those who held the door left; he pursued, and was knocked down; his collar bone was broken; he was taken back to the house, and hands laid upon him by David Whitmer, and immediately healed. A few minutes after this accident, we heard the voice of Joseph calling for a blanket; some person handed him one, and he came in, the tar trickling down his face; his wife was very much alarmed, supposing it to be blood, until he came near enough to see that it was tar. My mother got some lard, and rubbed it upon him to get the tar off, which they succeeded in removing.