Legends of the Old West - ORRIN PORTER ROCKWELL Ep. 1 | “Faith and Fervor”

Episode Date: April 17, 2024

Orrin Porter Rockwell is born into an era of religious fervor in the eastern United States. His family soon becomes close with the Smith family, and Porter becomes the youngest convert to Joseph Smith’s new religious movement, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. The Saints immediately meet resistance to their ideology and they move west to Ohio and then Missouri. In Missouri, they begin years of conflict with the locals.   Join Black Barrel+ for ad-free episodes and bingeable seasons: blackbarrel.supportingcast.fm/join   Apple users join Black Barrel+ for ad-free episodes, bingeable seasons and bonus episodes. Click the Black Barrel+ banner on Apple to get started with a 3-day free trial. On YouTube, subscribe to LEGENDS+ for ad-free episodes and bingeable seasons. Hit “JOIN” on the Infamous America YouTube homepage. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCm4V_wVD7N1gEB045t7-V0w/featured   For more details, please visit www.blackbarrelmedia.com. Our social media pages are: @blackbarrelmedia on Facebook and Instagram, and @bbarrelmedia on Twitter.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In October of 1869, Vice President Skyler Colfax gave a speech in Salt Lake City, Utah. Many of those who went to see him were members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints who wanted to hear him talk about the possibility of Utah statehood, a subject they cared about dearly. They had been run out of New York, Ohio, Missouri, and Illinois before venturing hundreds of miles to find a place where they would be free to practice their religion. Twenty years before Colfax's visit, they had petitioned the federal government to be admitted as the State of Deseret. But the Utah War, sometimes called the Mormon War of 1858 and the Civil War after it, had pushed thoughts of Utah statehood aside.

Now, as Colfax addressed the crowd, he told them that the last major hurdle standing between them and statehood was the practice of polygamy. Colfax pointed out the page and passage in the Book of Mormon that mandated monogamy, and further said it was Congress that made the laws that governed the nation, and no one's religious practice could put them above the law. According to some who were there that night, the crowd grew restless. Colfax then brought up accusations that President Ulysses S. Grant was a drunk. Colfax said the accusations had been made by the president of the church, Brigham Young. Now, members of the audience yelled back that Young had never made those accusations. Colfax repeated that the members of the church, who typically referred to themselves as saints,

couldn't hold themselves above the law, as they had been harboring a man whom Colfax referred to as that murderer, Porter Rockwell. The crowd grew quiet, and some turned to look as a man in the back of the audience rose to his feet. He was 56 years old, but looked older, with long gray hair and a bushy gray beard. His name was Oren Porter Rockwell, but his friends called him Old Port. His enemies called him the Destro destroying angel of Mormondom. He pointed a short finger at the vice president, and in a high-pitched voice, he responded,

I never killed a man that didn't need to be killed. From Black Barrel Media, this is Legends of the Old West. I'm your host, Chris Wimmer, and this season we're telling the story of controversial figure Orrin Porter Rockwell, the rise of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and the infamous Mountain Meadows Massacre. This is Episode 1, Faith and Fervor. Orrin Porter Rockwell's life began in Massachusetts in June of 1813. America was experiencing an unprecedented era of tumultuous change and religious zeal. Porter's parents, Orrin and Sarah Rockwell, found themselves in the throes of the Second Great Awakening, a period of religious reawakening that rolled like a crashing wave

over the eastern United States. It was a time marked by camp meetings that lasted days, impassioned sermons that echoed through hills and valleys, and a populace hungry for spiritual nourishment. The Rockwells, like so many others, were caught up in a divine whirlwind that promised a more direct and profound connection with the Almighty. When Porter was four years old, his parents decided to leave Massachusetts with their nine children, drawn by the promise and opportunities of the Western Frontier, a place where the soil was as ripe for planting new religious ideologies as it was for new crops. They settled on a farm near Manchester in western New York, an area that would become known as the Burned-Over District.

The district earned its name from being so thoroughly burned, in quotation marks, by the revivals sweeping through it that there were hardly any souls left untouched by the evangelical fire. The burned-over district became a hotbed for intense spiritual activism and was fertile ground for the firebrands of Christian revivalism. It witnessed the establishment of new denominations and sects, including the Millerites, the Shakers, and, most notably, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, commonly known as the Mormon Church. Those movements often emphasized direct religious experience, personal revelation,

and a widespread belief in the imminent second coming of Christ. The burned-over district was also a reflection of the broader cultural and social changes happening in America at the time. The Erie Canal had been completed in the region just a few years earlier, bringing a surge of economic activity and a mix of different people, ideologies, and ideas. This confluence of social upheaval, economic opportunity, and religious excitement created a unique environment where radical ideas could take root and flourish. The religious movements born in this area would go on to have a significant impact on American religious life and culture. There, in that spiritual crucible,

the Rockwell family connected with other seekers, other families who had been drawn to the area by the same magnetic pull of faith and fervor. Among those families were the Smiths, who arrived in Manchester two years after the Rockwells. Joseph Smith Sr. and his wife Lucy Mack Smith would become close friends of the Rockwells, and their son Joseph Jr. would become a central figure in one of the most significant new religious movements of the era, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Joseph Jr.'s visions and revelations were like sparks in the already charged atmosphere of the district. The Rockwells, living just a mile from the Smiths, found themselves at the heart of the burgeoning faith. It was within that vibrant and often contentious religious environment that Porter Rockwell grew up.

The air he breathed was dense with talk of prophecies, miracles, and wonders. Air he breathed was dense with talk of prophecies, miracles, and wonders. Revivalist preachers, itinerant ministers, and self-declared prophets crisscrossed the land, all carrying their own brands of salvation and eternal truth. The Rockwells were frequent guests in the Smith home, where young Porter Rockwell grew to admire Joseph Jr. In Joseph, who was eight years older than Porter, Porter saw a man who faced similar religious and physical challenges and who had earned the respect and dedication of those around him.

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Because businesses that grow, grow with Shopify. Sign up for a $1 per month trial period at shopify.com slash realm, all lowercase. period at shopify.com slash realm, all lowercase. Go to shopify.com slash r-e-a-l-m now to grow your business no matter what stage you're in. shopify.com slash realm. Porter Rockwell and Joseph Smith shared a distinctive common trait that served to deepen their bond over time, a pronounced limp. Smith's uneven stride came from a childhood surgery intended to treat a bone infection, an affliction his followers would come to see as a poignant prelude to the many challenges he would face as the founder of the Mormon faith. Rockwell's limp, on the other hand, was the result of an improperly set bone to mend a leg that was broken in a childhood accident. The result was that one of Porter's legs was two inches shorter

than the other. During the same period that western New York was ablaze with the religious revivals and the Second Great Awakening, the region was also gripped by a treasure-hunting craze. This desperate hunt for hidden wealth was entwined with the spiritual quests of the time, as many Americans saw the burgeoning nation as a land filled with both worldly and heavenly promise. In the burned-over district, there was a palpable sense that riches, both spiritual and material, lay just beneath the surface. Local lore was rife with tales of buried loot left by pirates like Captain Kidd, ancient civilizations, and the French and Indian War. The stories ignited imaginations and spurred nighttime expeditions with divining rods and seer stones.

These mythical tools, along with incantations and rituals, were employed with the hope of unlocking the Earth's hidden wealth. The treasure-hunting mania, set against the backdrop of the spiritual seeking of the era, created a unique cultural movement where the quest for divine truth and earthly riches were deeply entangled. Porter was 16 when he first heard Joseph Smith relate to his parents and others the story of his discovery of golden plates under a large rock on a nearby hill. The discovery of the tablets and the information Smith claimed was written on them in hieroglyphics of the, quote, reformed Egyptian language, would provide the cornerstone of the LDS church.

The event was steeped in the traditions of what were called cunning folk or folk magic, a blend of folklore, magic, and divination that was common in rural American culture at the time. Smith was immersed in that world. He had a reputation as a treasure seeker who used seer stones, objects believed to be endowed with the power to reveal hidden truths and treasures. According to Smith, it was through such a stone that he was directed to the location of the tablets, which were buried in a hill near his home in upstate New York. Smith's account of finding the golden tablets by such supernatural means did not seem wildly out of place at the time, and folk traditions provided a context that made Smith's extraordinary

claim more plausible. Smith told his followers that he was able to find the tablets through the guidance of the angel Moroni, and he could translate the hieroglyphics by using a set of spectacles that were buried with the tablets. Teenage Porter Rockwell was an immediate believer. When Joseph Smith began collecting money to print his translation of the words inscribed on the golden tablets, Porter gave all his money to the prophet, inscribed on the golden tablets, Porter gave all his money to the prophet

and found work picking berries by moonlight after his farm chores were done to fund the effort. As the seasons changed and the berries grew sparse, Porter transitioned to cutting firewood and taking it to town to earn money, all of which was donated to the cause of translating and publishing what would become the Book of Mormon. Reaction to Smith's publication of the Book of Mormon was swift and savage.

Where his followers saw a prophet who had been led by a vision to obtain a holy message, outsiders saw a man who used common rocks to convince the gullible to fund his treasure hunts. In 1830, as the voices uniting against him grew louder, Joseph Smith, two of his brothers, and three other men formally organized what he called the Church of Christ. At a subsequent meeting of his followers, Smith invited people to join the new church. At a subsequent meeting of his followers, Smith invited people to join the new church. Several persons became convinced of the truth and came forward shortly after and were received into the church, Smith recorded. Among the rest, my own father and mother were baptized, to my great joy and consolations, and about the same time, Oren Porter Rockwell. At 16 years old, Porter was the youngest member of the new church.

His mother followed his lead and was baptized that day. Within the week, one of his brothers and two of his sisters joined the church. The next year, 1831, the family joined Lucy Mack Smith in following her son Joseph West down Lake Erie to Kirtland, Ohio, just over 20 miles from Cleveland. It was the first migration of many for the new congregation. Their time in Kirtland was short-lived. The young church hadn't moved far enough from Manchester, New York to escape the resistance and trouble they faced there, and by the fall of 1831, the Rockwells were again headed west to join their prophet in the northeast corner of Jackson County, Missouri, between Independence and Kansas City.

There, Smith told the Rockwells, along with the other families who had followed him, the church would build the holy city of Zion, the New Jerusalem. The church purchased land for its temple, farm acreage, and a newspaper printing press. Of note among the people who moved to Jackson County right before the Mormon community, there were Henry Younger and his wife, Bersheba. They eventually had 14 children, and they named their seventh child Thomas Coleman Younger, whom everyone called Cole. He and his three younger brothers would go on to form the core of the legendary James Younger gang. Thirteen years before Cole was born, Porter Rockwell settled in Jackson County. It was too late in the season to plant crops,

in Jackson County. It was too late in the season to plant crops, so Porter saw to the building of a cabin. Early the next year, he married Luana Beebe in the first Mormon wedding held in Jackson County, Missouri. Porter and his father opened a ferry crossing on the Big Blue River. The location of his new home made the Rockwell cabin a central meeting place for the church's elders and high priests, and his position as ferrymaster made Porter a well-known and important part of the new community. Joseph Smith was dividing his time between his New Zion in Missouri and the followers he had gained in Kirtland, Ohio. But almost 900 church members had rushed to buy land and build homes in Missouri, feeding a land speculation boom. Saints flocked to the New Zion, bought up the land, and proclaimed that God had ordained

the area as theirs. They also proclaimed that it would soon be free of Gentiles, as they called non-believers. That proclamation didn't win the group many friends in Missouri. Within months of Porter's marriage, Missourians were throwing rocks at his house and others in the church. Soon, the violence progressed to burning down a haystack the saints used to feed their livestock and then shooting at Mormon homes. Then, in July of 1833, the editor of the Mormon newspaper in the area penned an article called Free People of Color. The article cited Missouri's laws prohibiting black people, who weren't already citizens of another state, from moving to Missouri. In layman's terms, the law said escaped slaves could not settle in Missouri.

The article reminded saints that their church had no special rules disallowing people of color. The editor, named Phelps, told his readers that all people were in the hands of a merciful God and that they should shun every appearance of evil. Though Phelps later reprinted a retraction and denied that his words were intended to instruct slaves on how to join the church or to urge church members in assisting escaping slaves, the die was cast. Missourians rushed to silence Phelps and his paper. In late July 1833, a mob of 500 Missourians gathered at the courthouse in Jackson County and told the Mormons that they would allow no future settlements by the church and they expected every Mormon man to give his word in writing that he would pack his belongings and leave the county.

Mormon high priests told the mob's representatives that they had to confer with Joseph Smith and the authorities in Kirtland before they could make any such promises. The crowd took this as a refusal and dragged the editor Phelps from his home, broke his printing press, and destroyed his house. Then they tarred and feathered a bishop and another Mormon man who happened to be nearby. In the aftermath, Lieutenant Governor Lilburn Boggs walked through the remains of Phelps' home and told a colleague, in a voice loud enough to be overheard by nearby Mormons, now you know what our Jackson boys can do, and you must leave the country. Three days later, a large group of Missourians, brandishing rifles and carrying whips,

rode into the Mormon settlement near Independence, Missouri, the traditional starting point for travelers who wanted to journey to the expanding American West. The rider at the front of the group carried a blood-red banner, which the saints took as a symbol of the men's violent intentions. The riders threatened to burn crops, tear down homes, and flog any Mormon who refused to leave Jackson County. When church leaders signed an agreement promising that everyone who didn't own land would leave by January and everyone else would sell their land and be gone by April, the Vigilante Army left, promising that the agreement would end the

violence. But after a member of the church was sent to Ohio to consult with Joseph Smith and church leadership, Mormons in Independence were told not to sell their land or leave the area unless they had actually signed the agreement. Porter Rockwell and most of the men in the settlement signed a petition to the Missouri governor asking him to raise troops to help the saints defend themselves while they sued for damages, but the governor refused. He offered his sympathy, but suggested they take the matter up in court. News reached the people of Jackson County that the Mormons were not leaving. Instead, they were asking the governor to mobilize troops for their defense, and they were hiring attorneys to file

lawsuits. The people of Jackson County were furious. On Halloween night, October 31, 1833, another angry group of armed raiders descended upon the Mormon settlement on the Big Blue River, igniting an eight-day inferno of violence that shaped the descended upon the Mormon settlement on the Big Blue River, igniting an eight-day inferno of violence that shaped the future of the Mormon faith and the life of Porter Rockwell. Fifty armed men from Jackson County rode into the settlement on the Big Blue under the cover of darkness. Two dozen men surrounded the house of Rockwell's brother-in-law, George, demanding at gunpoint that he come out and talk to them. When he agreed, he was savagely whipped and beaten with the butts of rifles.

Another group of men did the same thing to one of Rockwell's neighbors. At a third house, the young wife of a Mormon settler was dragged from her home by her hair while the rest of the armed mob demolished the cabin. By the end of the evening, 13 homes had their roofs torn off and their contents either stolen or scattered. The next night, Parley Pratt, a high priest in the Mormon church, was surprised by two Missouri scouts as he posted guards to watch for further attacks. As the Missourians clubbed Pratt, he sounded an alarm, and his guards arrived in time to capture the pair. In independence, armed gangs destroyed the homes and businesses of Mormon settlers.

One man, caught in the act of looting a Mormon shop, was taken to the Justice of the Peace, who refused to issue a complaint and instead arrested the shop owner for false arrest. After that, the mobs went to the home of Porter Rockwell and his family. Porter was working at his ferry when a group of raiders surrounded a neighbor's home, his ferry when a group of raiders surrounded a neighbor's home, where they dragged a sick man from bed, tore the roof off his home, and shot him through the head before leaving him for dead. They moved on to the home of Porter's parents, demanding that Porter's father come out and talk to them. Porter's mother and sister responded that he wasn't there and that they were alone with the children. The raiders threw ropes over the eaves of the

log cabin and secured the other ends to their saddles. They kicked their mounts and the horses surged ahead. From her home nearby, Porter's wife could hear a jarring crack as the cabin was stripped of its roof. While the destruction still echoed, she could hear the sounds of the raiders lashing their ropes to her own roof, and the violent sound she had just heard was repeated. Seized by terror, she shrank into the shadows, hiding in a corner while the men ransacked her home. One of the men in the mob approached her. His face was hidden by war paint, and he held a knife in front of her face. The blade gleamed in the moonlight as he snarled, Get the hell from underfoot, or it's this across your throat.

Two days later, Jackson County raiders seized Rockwell's ferry. Porter heard one of the men boast, With ten fellows, I will wade to my knees in blood, but I will drive the Mormons from Jackson County. Heavily outnumbered, the Saints attempted a desperate defense, managing to momentarily repel the Missourians, but resulting in casualties on both sides. Lieutenant Governor Boggs convinced the governor to call for the militia to intervene. In a strategic misstep, Mormons surrendered their guns to the militia under promises of mutual disarmament. When the saints

gave up their weapons, the militia refused to do the same, and now the unarmed Mormons were left vulnerable to rampant looting and violent expulsion by the Jackson County settlers. looting, and violent expulsion by the Jackson County settlers. Nearly 1,200 saints fled Jackson County in a devastating exodus. Families were separated, sick and elderly people died before they could get away, and those who fled too slowly were beaten, flogged, or shot. The exodus from Jackson County would be etched deeply into the collective memory of the saints, shaping the future of the church, the faith, and the lives of the men and women who had been driven from their homes. By early November 1833, the banks of the Missouri River were lined with escaping saints who

waited for passage to Clay County, across the river to the north, the future home in ten years of the parents of Jesse James. Joseph Smith wrote to condemn the actions of the Missouri Raiders and what he believed as the treachery of the militia who were sent by Lieutenant Governor Lilburn Boggs. Smith wrote, It was the design and craft of Boggs to rob an innocent people of their arms and leave more than 1,000 defenseless men, women, and children to be driven from their homes among strangers in a strange land to seek shelter from the stormy blast of winter.

Smith went on to call Boggs a traitor, a butcher, and a murderer who deserved to be tried and hanged. As Porter Rockwell huddled with his wife on the banks of the Missouri River, he swore an oath of vengeance. He had stood by unarmed as raiders had seized his ferry, destroyed his home and that of his parents, beaten his brother-in-law, and threatened his wife. Rockwell now vowed that he would meet violence and threats of violence

toward his family and his faith with violence of his own. If the law of heaven required blood for blood, he would enact that law with all of his skill and power. That November, as the fleeing saints left their settlements near Independence, they received what many of them believed to be a message from God. Before dawn on November 13th, a meteor shower filled the sky with falling stars, convincing Rockwell and his fellow believers that, just as they had been removed from their homes, the stars in the heavens were being hurled from their course. It was viewed as a sure sign of the second coming. The meteor shower rekindled the faith and determination of the saints to endure, rebuild, and hold fast to their beliefs until they could someday return to lay claim to their promised land in Jackson County.

Against this backdrop of trial and hope, Oren Porter Rockwell crossed the Missouri River, ready to forge a new destiny in northern Missouri, carrying with him marks of persecution and the unwavering resolve to defend his family, his faith, and his people. Next time on Legends of the Old West, Porter Rockwell restarts his life with the Saints in Missouri, but he doesn't forget the vow of vengeance he made against Lieutenant Governor Lilburn Boggs. As he sets out to defend his prophet, Joseph Smith, Porter swears his life in service to a secretive fraternal group known as the Sons of Dan.

He does all that and more next week on Legends of the Old West. sons of Dan. He does all that and more next week on Legends of the Old West. Members of our Black Barrel Plus program don't have to wait week to week to receive new episodes. They receive the entire season to binge all at once with no commercials, and they also receive exclusive bonus episodes. Sign up now through the link in the show notes or on our website blackbarrelmedia.com. Memberships are just $5 per month. This series was researched and written by Matthew Kearns. Original music by Rob Valliere.

I'm your host and producer, Chris Wimmer. If you enjoyed the show, please leave us a rating and a review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you're listening. Check out the website, blackbarrelmedia..com for more details and join us on social media. We're at Old West Podcast on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. And all our episodes are on YouTube. Just search for Legends of the Old West Podcast. Thanks for listening.