Letter from Jacob W. Jenks, 31 December 1839
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Source Note
, Letter, , Westchester Co., NY, to JS, [], 31 Dec. 1839. Featured version copied [between Apr. and June 1840] in JS Letterbook 2, pp. 117–118; handwriting of ; JS Collection, CHL. For more complete source information, see the source note for JS Letterbook 2.
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Historical Introduction
On 31 December 1839, member wrote a letter inviting JS to eastern . Jenks wrote the letter from , New York, a town approximately thirty miles north of , and likely sent it to , unaware that JS had left the national capital for about ten days earlier. The letter encouraged the delegation in Washington in its efforts to obtain redress for losses church members earlier suffered in and also expressed the desire of the Saints in Sing Sing and New York City to have JS visit them. Aware of JS’s debts and lack of funds, Jenks warned JS regarding New York’s strict laws against debtors and poor transients and offered to pay JS’s travel expenses to Sing Sing and New York City.It is unknown whether the post office forwarded the letter to JS in or if JS received the letter upon returning to . If JS responded to , that letter has not been located. Jenks’s original letter is apparently not extant, but copied the letter into JS Letterbook 2 sometime between April and June 1840.
Footnotes
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1
JS arrived in Philadelphia by rail on 21 December 1839. (Orson Pratt to Sarah Marinda Bates Pratt, 6 Jan. 1840, in Times and Seasons, Feb. 1840, 1:61; Historian’s Office, JS History, Draft Notes, 21 Dec. 1839, 70.)
Times and Seasons. Commerce/Nauvoo, IL. Nov. 1839–Feb. 1846.
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2
The Sing Sing branch of the church was established in spring 1838 while Parley P. Pratt was a missionary in that area. (Pratt, Autobiography, 188; see also Letter from Parley P. Pratt, 22 Nov. 1839.)
Pratt, Parley P. The Autobiography of Parley Parker Pratt, One of the Twelve Apostles of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, Embracing His Life, Ministry and Travels, with Extracts, in Prose and Verse, from His Miscellaneous Writings. Edited by Parley P. Pratt Jr. New York: Russell Brothers, 1874.
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3
Some of the mail sent to JS while he was in Philadelphia was forwarded to him by the Washington DC post office, and some of it was retained in the capital awaiting his return. (See, for example, Letter from Emma Smith, 6 Dec. 1839; and Letter from Edward Partridge, 3 Jan. 1840.)
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4
Coray, Autobiographical Sketch, 17, 19.
Coray, Howard. Autobiographical Sketch, after 1883. Howard Coray, Papers, ca. 1840–1941. Photocopy. CHL. MS 2043, fd. 1.
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