Everything below the horizontal rule is taken from A Documentary History of the Book of Mormon, Section 1.12


1.12 Eli Bruce’s Diary Entry, November 5, 1830

Source Note

Rob Morris, The Masonic Martyr: The Biography of Eli Bruce, Sheriff of Niagara County, New York (Louisville, KY: Morris & Monsarrat, 1861): 266–67.

Editorial Note

Eli Bruce (1793–1852), writes Dan Vogel, was a Mason and the sheriff of Niagara County who was tried and found guilty of conspiracy in the kidnapping of William Morgan, a disaffected Mason, who disappeared in 1826—and was presumed murdered—after threatening to publish Masonic secrets. Bruce served a twenty-eight-month sentence in the Canandaigua jail and there met Joseph Smith Sr., incarcerated for thirty days for an unpaid debt.

Document Transcript

November 5th—Not so much pain in my head as yesterday. Had a long talk with the father of the Smith, (Joseph Smith,) who, according to the old man’s account, is the particular favorite of Heaven! To him Heaven has vouchsafed to reveal its mysteries; he is the herald of the latter-day glory. The old man avers that he is commissioned by God to baptize and preach the new doctrine. He says that our Bible is much abridged and deficient; that soon the Divine is to be made known to all, as written in the new Bible, or Book of Mormon.