Hyrum's Devotion

Today marks 176 years since the death of Joseph and Hyrum in Carthage Jail. In his most recent general conference talk, President Ballard spoke in particular of Hyrum’s part in the martyrdom. He told how Hyrum had received a blessing in 1835 in which the Lord promised him, “Thou shalt have power to escape the hand of thine enemies. Thy life shall be sought with untiring zeal, but thou shalt escape. If it please thee, and thou desirest, thou shalt have the power voluntarily to lay down thy life to glorify God.” And it was indeed Hyrum’s choice to be there in Carthage with Joseph, for the week before Joseph had advised him to “to take his family on the next steamboat and go to Cincinnati.” But Hyrum, devoted to Joseph’s prophetic calling to the end, said, “Joseph, I can’t leave you.” He chose to stand by Joseph faithfully, and in so doing he gave up his life with Joseph’s. Like Joseph he “sealed his mission and his works with his own blood” (Doctrine and Covenants 135:3). President Ballard recounted how after the martyrdom when their mother wept in anguish over them, she “recalled them saying, ‘Mother, weep not for us; we have overcome the world by love.’” Indeed they did, and I honor them for their devotion to Jesus Christ and His great latter-day work.

               President Ballard reflected on the great difficulties that Joseph and Hyrum and their families suffered through in mortality. He said, “I have often wondered why Joseph and Hyrum and their families had to suffer so much. It may be that they came to know God through their suffering in ways that could not have happened without it. Through it, they reflected on Gethsemane and the cross of the Savior.” The story of their suffering in Liberty Jail is of course familiar to most members of the Church, but less well known is the story of how Hyrum lost his wife not long before. The first Saints book records how Hyrum left Jerusha in Kirtland to go to Far West in 1837 in response to a request by Joseph: “Hyrum accepted the mission, though it meant leaving his wife, Jerusha, when she was just weeks away from delivering their sixth child.” After arriving in Far West he anxiously awaited for Joseph’s arrival, hoping he would have news of his wife. Eventually he received a letter from his brother Samuel: Jerusha had delivered the baby but died a few days later. Hyrum became a widower with five children, and he hadn’t even been there with her when she died. He did remarry, but it was about a year later when he would undergo the ordeal at Liberty Jail and be separated from his family for many months. As it was for Joseph, his life was filled with sacrifices and trials because of his devotion to the gospel of Jesus Christ. Hyrum is mentioned multiple times in the Doctrine and Covenants—perhaps more than any other contemporary of Joseph—and we get a rare look into how the Lord saw him in this verse: “And again, verily I say unto you, blessed is my servant Hyrum Smith; for I, the Lord, love him because of the integrity of his heart, and because he loveth that which is right before me, saith the Lord” (Doctrine and Covenants 124:15). His life and integrity, his love for his brother and for the Lord, stand as powerful examples to us for how we should live as disciples of the Savior.