|
Sacred
Stone: City for Sale
by
Heidi S. Swinton
“The
roof of the temple is now about ready for the shingles. But Joseph
and Hyrum are not here.” —Zina Huntington Jacobs
Click
to enlarge
Efforts not
directed at completing the temple were focused on the trek west.
Fifteen hundred wagons had been finished and another eighteen hundred
were in process. Earlier that summer, Orson Hyde had traveled east
to purchase canvas for a tabernacle structure near the temple. He
had no funds but was able to raise $1,100 among the members of the
Church. When the four thousand yards of Russian duck canvas arrived,
it was redirected for wagon covers and tents for the pilgrimage.
So was the $125 worth of hemp bought specially to be used for the
cords for the tabernacle.
The town throbbed
with activity and anticipation. “Men were thick as blackbirds
busily engaged upon the various portions [of the temple], all intent
upon its completion although we were being in constant expectation
of a mob,” wrote Wandle Mace. “We labored while the wicked
raged, the mobs howled, but they could not stop the work on the
temple until it was so far completed that it was accepted of the
Lord.”
By late November
1845, the temple was nearly finished. The Saints in celebration
enjoyed “a little season recreation” in the temple. Musicians
produced violins, flutes, and even a hornpipe and played several
very good dancing tunes. The festivities in the temple were enjoyed
but a short time. “I will not have division and contention,
and I mean that there shall not be a fiddle in this Church but what
has Holiness to the Lord upon it, nor a flute, nor a trumpet, nor
any other instrument of music.” President Young insisted “they
refrain from dancing in the sacred building lest the spirit of levity
creep into their solemn meetings and mar the sanctity of the Lord’s
house.
Sitting atop
the temple’s sculpted limestone was the frame attic, which
was divided into two sections. A large boxlike structure with a
relatively flat roof faced west; a rectangular hall stretched to
the east, sheltered by small offices on each side. This floor was
accessed by circular staircases in the northwest and southwest corners
and lit by skylights in the gabled roof. A semi-circular window
described as “truly magnificent” drew in light from the
east in its twenty-foot span. It was here that the Saints would
cluster to participate in sacred rites of worship.
Click
to enlarge
With the financial
pressures to prepare for an exodus west, furnishings and decorations
for the temple were borrowed from the Saints’ homes rather
than purchased. Women endowed earlier by the Prophet Joseph readied
the top floor of the temple for ceremonies, while Heber C. Kimball
and his son hauled wagonloads of potted plants up the hillside and
arranged them in attic rooms created with canvas partitions. Members
stripped their home of furniture, paintings, mirrors, maps, and
rugs to decorate the building and set the stage for the long-anticipated
blessed ceremonies.
“One of
the functions of a temple was certainly to help people who had built
the temple and were in the community that used this building to
…feel close to their God, and feel that their God could help
them. And they did that in many ways. One of those ways was by providing
for God the best that they had to offer in terms of the furnishings
that they provided for the building,” Dr. Carol Meyers notes.
Click
to enlarge
On November
30, Brigham Young in the company of fellow Church leaders, dedicated
the attic for sacred services, and called down help for those busily
engaged getting ready for their departure, including wheelwrights,
carpenters, cabinetmakers, wagon makers, mechanics, and blacksmiths.
He recorded the prayer in his journal: “We trust in God, we
praise him that we have been thus far able to prepare his Temple
for the ordinances of the priesthood, and we feel full of confidence
that he will hear our prayers and deliver his unoffending people
from the power of their enemies where we can enjoy peace for a season.”
On December
10, the temple opened for sacred work. Early that morning, prior
to the beginning of temple work, two Catholic officials toured the
temple with, the Mormons hoped, the intent to purchase the structure.
Later that afternoon, invitations were extended only to those who
could produce receipts for their payment of tithes in full.
Thirty people
attended the first session, which lasted until 3:30 the next morning.
As group after group entered the temple, “it seemed the whole
house was filled with angels.” That first group included well-known
Church figures: Brigham Young and wife, Mary Ann; Heber C. Kimball
and wife, Vilate: Orson Hyde and wife, Nancy Marinda; Parley P.
Pratt and wife, Mary Ann; John Taylor and wife Lenora; George A.
Smith and wife Bathsheba. Hyrum Smith’s widow Mary also joined
the group as did the widow of Don Carlos Smith. For the next six
weeks, Brigham Young and members of the Twelve and their wives administered
the endowments to thousands of Saints.
“It is
ironic that the Saints spent five years building the temple and
then just six weeks receiving their endowments and blessing and
then walked away from it. But they did it willingly because they
had received those blessings, and Brigham Young promised them that
they would build even a grander temple out there in the wilderness
when they got there to the new gathering place,” said Dr. Glen
M. Leonard.
Before leaving
in the advance party, Brigham Young and members of the Quorum of
the Twelve quietly presented the temple to the Lord. He later recorded
that they knelt, “and dedicated the building to the Most High.
We asked His blessing upon our intended move to the west; also we
asked Him to enable us some day to finish the Temple, and dedicate
it to Him, and we would leave it in His hands to do as He pleased;
and to preserve the building as a monument to Joseph Smith. We asked
the Lord to accept the labors of His servants in this land.”
Brigham had
intended to lead the train into Iowa. But at the temple, a throng
of Saints were waiting, hoping to receive entry. At this point,
Brigham promised temple blessings when they reached their new home
but as he strode away, he turned. “Looking upon the multitude
and knowing their anxiety, as they were thirsting and hungering
for the word, we continued at work diligently in the House of the
Lord.” he returned to the temple and another 600 received their
rites in those last hours.
Records show
that nearly 6,000 people received their endowments in the Nauvoo
Temple. “They were both prepared for death, which they were
taught could be sweet unto them,” explains Dr. Madsen, “and
they were prepared for life and the arduous pattern that they had
to undertake.”
“If it
had not been for the faith and knowledge that was bestowed upon
us in that temple by the influence and help of the spirit of the
Lord, our journey would have been like one taking a leap in the
dark,” said Sarah Rich, “and in our state of poverty,
it would seem like walking into the jaws of death.”
Nauvoo, once
a boomtown, now was still. The temple, which a St. Louis newspaper
had described as “the most extraordinary building on the American
continent,” stood vacant—its glory short-lived.
The work of
an arsonist, October 9, 1848 brought down the grand structure. On
“a beautiful night, [at] about three o’clock in the morning
fire was discovered in the cupola. It…spread rapidly, and in
a very short period, the lofty spire was a mass of flame, shooting
high in the air, and illuminating a wide extent of country…citizens
gathered around, but nothing could be done to save the structure…In
two hours, and before the sun dawned upon the earth, the proud structure,
reared at so much cost—and a monument of religious zeal—stood
with blackened and smoldering walls.”
Two years later,
a tornado toppled all but one wall of the remaining structure. Curiosity
seekers, enterprising contractors, and scavengers sold or carted
off the manicured stone for use in walls and foundations in all
parts of the country. Said the Carthage Republican, “The last
remaining vestige of what the famous Mormon temple was in its former
glory has disappeared, and nothing now remains to mark its site
but heaps of broken stone and rubbish.”
The pride of
Nauvoo was gone.
©
Covenant Communications, 2002
Click
here to sign up for Meridian's FREE email updates.
© 2002Meridian
Magazine. All Rights Reserved.
|
