Lost Witness of the Restoration: The Lewis Family
Read the Introduction to the Lost Witnesses of the Restoration here.
Nathaniel Lewis was named after his father, a Connecticut military man who had already seen combat in the French & Indian War. He was born in 1769, not long after his sister, Elizabeth. Before either of them had turned ten, Thomas Paine was publishing Common Sense, stoking the American colonies desire for independence. The publication heralded Nathaniel’s father’s return to war, this time as a Sergeant for the colonial Revolution. The war did not take his father far from home though. Instead, the war came to the Lewises. In 1776, possibly to remove his family from the nucleus of the Revolution, Nathaniel Sr relocated his family from the Connecticut coast to inland Vermont. From this small distance, the family would have witnessed the casualties and grief that followed the nearby battles without being in direct danger.
Young Nathaniel
While their father fought, the rest of the Lewis family was likely participating in the softer side of the war: the homespun movement. They fought for the colonies by boycotting British goods. They made blankets, clothing, and other goods at home through spinning, quilting, or weaving. Young Nathaniel and his big sister Elizabeth, likely helped their mother make soaps, bandages, preserves, and medicines not only for their family but also for the soldiers nearby, if they could. However, with their father gone and the children of the house so young, their surplus was limited. By the neighbors, they were considered the “poorest family in town.”1
What the Lewis family lacked in money, however, they made up for with time. Despite the busyness of war and home goods production, the Lewises cultivated education and religion. Lewis children were literate adults and two of the children, including young Nathaniel became Methodist reverends. In 1780, when Methodist preachers began coming to town, 11-year-old Nathaniel and his father both became interested in preaching.2 Later, two younger brothers in the family would also develop a passion for Methodism. The theology focused on purity and personal practice. It also emphasized personal and sincere prayer to God, particularly in the privacy of the woods.3 All of the Lewis children for two generations would carry their Methodist beliefs into adulthood, which shows extraordinary consistency for an area in which new spiritual sects were “burning” through the area repeatedly.
In addition to embracing Methodism, the Lewises drew boundaries on what they did not believe. In Wells, Vermont, the most important theological boundary was towards the “Rodsmen” faith. This group used hazel rods to divine revelations from God, find treasure, and even planned to found a city of believers.4 Though young Nathaniel Lewis didn’t know it at the time, this folk-magic style of revelation would later affect his adult life more personally. But, as a young man, Nathaniel was occupied with the Bible, personal perfection, and the American experiment. To him, as it was for most American colonialists at the time, it was probably all bundled together. He was part of a generation that was merging the causes of political independence and spiritual autonomy.
In 1790, the Lewises were living in Vermont as Nathaniel married a local girl named Sarah Cole. Later that year, his sister Elizabeth married a handsome hunter named Isaac Hale. They probably had some kind of betrothal from the days when Isaac day lived nearby with his grandfather. Isaac had found land and space to grow a frontier family in Pennsylvania. Nathaniel and Sarah decided to join them. The four moved together to make a rugged home in the unsettled mountains.
Read more of Isaac Hale’s and Elizabeth Lewis’ backstory here.
Children of the Wilderness
The 18th century Pennsylvania wilderness was gorgeous and treacherous. Harsh winters, wild animals, and the remote location made survival for the Lewises and Hales a prime concern. Isaac knew the area and was a skilled hunter. And the Lewises (and presumably Nathaniel’s wife Sarah) were hardy homespinning child-veterans of the Revolution. They knew how to make life happen from scratch. Between the four of them, they met all of their needs and provided for a growing brood of children too.
Nathaniel and Sarah had children more slowly than Isaac and Elizabeth. Their first child arrived when Elizabeth was pregnant with a second. Their second child was born one year after Elizabeth’s third. The Hales would go on to have nine children total and the Lewises would have eleven. In the green hills of Pennsylvania, these twenty children grew up together: running, canoeing, hunting, reading the Bible, conversing about Thomas Paine, eating apples left behind by decimated Native American settlements, foraging for berries, finding arrowheads, telling stories, singing hymns, salting the meats of deer, grinding their corn meal by hand, and surviving the bitter, unpredictable winters. The difficulties were real but so was the bond between them. Their love for each other ran so deep that even as adults, when complicated property and tax issues pushed them out of Pennsylvania and the Civil War sliced the American experiment in two, most of the Hale and Lewis children ended up living and dying near one another in Amboy, Illinois.
Almost exactly in the middle of this group was Emma Hale. She grew up strong and active, like her siblings and cousins and from the Lewis perspective, at least, she was the darling of her family. She had every advantage her parents could give her, genetically and financially. She was pretty, tall, strong, educated, musical, well-spoken, and devout. Her parents had come from difficulty, but they prepared a bright future for Emma. Her parents had gone from being poor dependents in Vermont to solidly colonial middle class in Pennsylvania. Their family was growing and their work was paying off. Emma received the best of all of it. She had a bit of a dowry and Isaac had already been working for years to establish his sons and sons-in-law with stable, prosperous properties of their own. All of this affirms that Elizabeth and Isaac’s expectations for how their daughter would be able to elevate their community with her talents and her marriage. In this, their hearts were broken. Though Emma received properties, money, and notoriety from her future community of Mormons, her choice of partner and loyalties to him never reflected the integrity and hope of her parents.
Treasures Lost
The Lewis children, like the children of the Hales, were extraordinarily healthy. With a stunning success rate, compared to the statistics of the country, all 19 children grew to maturity and many of them were noted for their vitality and for how rarely they got sick, even in old age. They were also extraordinarily well-respected. No one who knew them personally reproached their character and the members of both families consistently drew admiration from their communities for their good judgment, fair reasoning, and practical skill. The Hale family home was used to host evening prayers, community socials, and other events, and the Lewis family was often preaching or leading such events.5 Only in later years would Mormon strangers pass judgment on the Lewises for being dishonest or un-credible.6
Despite their religious commitment, we might guess that the popular tales of the Scottish pirate Captain Kidd and his hordes of hidden treasure were likely as evocative for the Hale and Lewis children as they were for Joseph Smith jr. and his friends in New York. The tales were not exactly new: Captain Kidd had been executed nearly a century before the Hales and Lewises had settled in Pennsylvania, but rumors of free treasure die hard and money-diggers were still hopeful about finding the lost riches.7 There were rumors that some of the treasure might be buried inland, maybe even in Pennsylvania.
There were also speculations that New England had ancient silver mines like those that the Spanish had found in Peru. For newly-minted American citizens, the prospect of changing their fortunes through a sudden discovery of silver was a compelling fantasy. Land rights were not yet firm, the woodlands still appeared pristine, and high society in America was more about wealth than lineage or titles. So, the possibilities for changing one’s fortune, acquiring unimaginable wealth, and becoming instantly respectable were vast.
Fueling citizen excitement, there were also regular discoveries of gold and silver ornaments being unearthed by Pennsylvania farmers who were disturbing the remains of previous Native American burials. The “trinkets” were always small– nose rings, ear disks, rings and other unique ornaments–but for families living at the edge of survival, these souvenirs provided evocative fuel for the imagination.8 Though Nathaniel Lewis kept his family apart from such endeavors, even the reserved Isaac Hale and his son, Alva may have participated briefly in a dig too.9 In addition to silver and gold, salt was another buried treasure worth finding. As a key commodity for preserving a kill in the wild, the Pennsylvania hunters were constantly trying to suss out the guarded Onondaga secrets about where an inland salt mine might be found. The local Congregationalist preacher and friend of Isaac Hale’s had almost found it by following some Onondaga men to the source, but had lost their trail before they arrived.
Thus, when the stone peeper Joseph Smith arrived in the Stowell money-digging company of 1825, it seemed almost certain that the company would turn up something. Based on the frequent discoveries of gold and silver trinkets, the known existence of salt mines, the rumors of Kidd’s treasure buried near the Susquehanna River, and the promises of success from the mystic Joseph, Josiah Stowell had hired a large company of diggers and was determined to discover anything that could be found. In an extraordinary twist though, they found nothing: no trinkets, no salt, no mine. Despite sacrificing an unfortunate white dog, money for boarding the many men, and plenty of hard days of digging, the company “found no trace of the chest of money,” that Joseph claimed to see in his stone.
The company moved and dug in several places and each time it ended the same way. The observing Lewises described it like this: Joseph “would peep again and weep like a child, and tell them that the enchantment had removed it on account of some sin or thoughtless word, and finally the enchantment became so strong that he could not see, and the business was finally abandoned.” Watching this drama unfold repeatedly, the Lewises also commented wryly that Joseph could “weep and shed tears any time he chose to.”
The company disbanded as winter set in, but they returned the following year too, perhaps under Joseph’s urging.10 That year, they also found nothing.
Treasures Found
Despite the failures to find treasure, Joseph had succeeded in a different prize: the attention of the Lewises’ pretty cousin Emma Hale. At the time that Joseph was ingratiating himself with Emma, her older siblings were all married and her younger sister soon would be. Her older cousins, including Levi were married too, as were most of the men close to Emma’s age. Many of her sisters-in-law had been courted as teenagers by her brothers. All of her married relatives were already building families. She was only 22, but the threat of spinster-hood may have already been hovering in her mind. As Louisa May Alcott noted later in the century:
“One of the trials of woman-kind is the fear of being an old maid. To escape this dreadful doom, young girls rush into matrimony with a recklessness which astonishes the beholder; never pausing to remember that the loss of liberty, happiness, and self-respect is poorly repaid by the barren honor of being called “Mrs.” instead of “Miss.”11
In Emma’s mountain home and surrounded by relatives, there were not many marrying options for a bright educated girl.12 And no matter how excellent the few eligible bachelors might have been, Emma probably felt a bit confined. While we don’t know if she relished flirting in the Harmony Tavern because of the novelty, the thrill of Joseph’s storytelling, the feeling of being chosen, the forbiddenness of him being a glass-looker, or all of the above, her flirtations with the New York Peeper were opening the door for larger doses of all those feelings.
Emma’s cousin Levi Lewis may have had some sympathy for this. He had married a newcomer to the community from New York named Sophia Banker. Perhaps he empathized with the appeal of a new person. Still, he had not involved himself with the money-diggers and as a committed Methodist, he almost certainly shared his father Nathaniel’s disdain for Rodsmen, diviners, and peepers. But though he, his uncle Isaac and his father Nathaniel undoubtedly saw the sparks between Joseph and Emma, they did little to obstruct Joseph except to refuse consent when he asked to marry her. The men probably felt no need. It probably seemed impossible that this weepy stranger could dupe a girl so devout, intelligent, and well-protected by family as Emma.
Breaking the Sabbath
Emma’s elopement in January 1827 was a shock. In that devoted mountain community, even Reverend Nathaniel Lewis was criticized for breaking the Sabbath when he picked up his gun on Sunday to shoot a deer that had wandered into the clearing near his home.13 Alva and Isaac had both faced the same accusation for hunting on Sunday.14 For an outsider like Joseph Smith to drive into town and run away with the respectable Hale family’s daughter on a Sunday, while her parents were at Church,15 must have seemed a heavy crime.
We have no explicit records from the Hales about how Emma’s parents learned what happened. Did someone run to the Sunday Service burst in to declare that Emma had run away with the glass-looker? Were Isaac and Elizabeth met on the way home, where they were given the news before reaching their empty house? Or were they left to return home and assume some excuse about Emma’s whereabouts before eventually searching the rooms, and then making inquiries about where their daughter might be? The only account of the misery that came to the Hales from this event comes from their nephew, Hiel Lewis, who would have been ten years old at the time. Though he was probably not privy to every detail in “the reconciliation,” his memory of the emotional tone of the event is poignant. He recalled:
“The Hale family was greatly exasperated, and perhaps it would not have been safe for Smith to have shown himself at his father-in-law’s house. Emma was or had been the idol or favorite of the family, and they all still felt a strong attachment for her, and the permission to return and reconciliation was effected and accomplished by her and perhaps her sister, Mrs. Wasson, who lived near Bainbridge, N.Y. The permission for Smith to return all came from the other side, not from Mr. Isaac Hale or his family in Harmony, Pa.”
Spectacles, Plates, Breastplates, and Bleeding Ghosts
Various Lewis cousins would later mention the elopement but the scandal of Emma’s running away was soon eclipsed by the vivid tales that Joseph brought back about the treasure he had found in New York. Many of the Lewis cousins remembered what is now known as Joseph’s “Bleeding Ghost” story. Modern apologists often confuse the Lewis accounts as claims that a Masonically-murdered Spaniard actually appeared to Joseph. They complain that the story’s details change between the different cousins’ recountings and that the sourcing is suspect, since it comes from the same family. However, this misses the point. The bleeding Ghost stories as told by the Lewises are not trying to prove that such a vision appeared, but to show what kind of stories Joseph was telling to his new family. He wanted to impress and he wanted a solid phalanx of credible men behind him to support his new book venture. He was morphing from treasure-digger to something else. And because he landed in the backyards of a educated family of devout methodists, the “something else” that he became was a preacher, a writer, and a theologian.
Unsurprisingly, the Book of Mormon that Joseph produced at this time is replete with sinking treasures and mystical directives that reflect his own storytelling mixed with doctrines and sermons that sound distinctly Methodist–and specifically, like Pensylvania or Vermont-style Methodism. And when Joseph reached back to craft a backstory for his own theological origins, he framed his First Vision to sound suspiciously similar to the earnest forest prayers that would have been credible to Susquehanna Methodists. In this crucial developmental period of turning from treasure-digger to author to preacher to Mormon prophet, the influence of the Lewis family on Joseph Smith and their witnessing of that transformation cannot be overstated.
The accounts of the Bleeding Ghosts from the Lewis family, when positioned next to the other accounts from Palmyra and Harmony from this time, show a consistent gradient of mythologizing that evolves from vengeful Pirate ghosts and ends with an Israelite-Indian angel named Nephi (later renamed Moroni). Their witnessing of these stories is an important contribution to the view of early Mormonism, not because the Bleeding Ghost was a real apparition, but because Joseph’s telling of such stories to illustrate the origins of the Plates shows us the gangly first draft of what would become his theology.
Modern believers have proposed that the Lewises must have embellished or perhaps fabricated these stories. However, it should be noted that the historicity of Joseph telling “Bleeding Ghost stories” is more widely affirmed with more contemporary witnesses, and supported with more consistency throughout the nineteenth century than any witness for Joseph’s plates, or indeed for any of the historical claims within the Book of Mormon.
In addition to the thrilling adventures of Joseph retrieving the ancient plates from Spanish ghosts, the Lewises witnessed other early claims from Joseph that bridged his treasure-digging with an emergent theology. In addition to plates, Joseph claimed he had been gifted a divine set of spectacles, a breastplate, and a sword. In relocating from New York, Alva Hale was told that a barrel of beans held the plates and spectacles, but no one involved in the relocation mentions the breastplate or sword at all. Given Joseph’s descriptions of size and shape, they would be difficult things to pack discreetly. Undeterred by such details though, Joseph arrived and immediately began telling his new extended family that all four pieces of ancient metalwork would soon be exhibited “to all the world” to prove what Joseph said as true.16 In the meantime, however, they were all hidden from view. The plates were supposed to be so sacred that no one could see them and live, but no one saw the sword, breastplate, or spectacles either. Instead, the family found him repeatedly burying his face in the same white hat with the same stone he had used for the Stowell treasure-digging expeditions. In addition to being a flagrant betrayal of the promise he had made to Isaac Hale about abandoning peeping, it was also a flagrant contradiction to Joseph’s own story. When questioned as to why he was not using the divinely-prepared spectacles that had been given for the purpose of translation, Joseph replied that “he must keep the spectacles concealed; but any and all persons were permitted to inspect the peep-stone; and that he could translate just as well with the stone.”
Though the Lewis family had been biased against glass-lookers long before Joseph arrived in Harmony, they gave Joseph a uniquely wide margin in which to prove himself after he became an official member of the family. For over a year, they listened, watched, asked questions, and waited for him to justify himself. While Emma was dusting carefully around the forbidden plates without ever looking at them, and Martin was fumbling the 116 pages, Nathaniel was leaning back, asking questions and offering to prove Joseph’s story immediately with a simple test. If Nathaniel could look through the spectacles and translate a few ancient characters from Adam Clarke’s Bible Commentary, then “I’ll be one of your disciples,” he told Joseph. Joseph never provided the spectacles for Nathaniel’s test.
Despite the signs of deception, the Lewises again opted not to interfere. They had seen treasure-diggers come and go, they had seen revivals flare and fizzle out. They were a mountain family that would outlast the fads and they probably didn’t worry too much about Joseph’s antics, absorbed as they were in their own lives.
They were not unaware of what was happening, however. And as 1828 turned to 1829, they watched the drama unfold: Joseph’s exhibition promises proved hollow. No one in either the Hale or Lewis families including Emma and Nathaniel, who were promised personal viewings of the plates, were ever shown the prop. Then, Martin Harris lost their work. Emma languished following the foreboding birth and death of the couple’s first child–a child Joseph had predicted would read the plates in his youth. Joseph swore that he was a savior equivalent to Jesus to Emma. Joseph snuck on to their Methodist class book without recanting his necromantic visions.
As the tangible evidence of Joseph’s character added up, the Lewises began to press for real answers. “Why,” as Nathaniel asked, did Joseph not do as he had promised, show the plates, and “prove himself an honest man.” Why, asked the Lewis brothers, did he not break off his sins and “make public confession” if he truly wanted to be numbered among those of the Church? Why, they asked, if Joseph’s revelations came from God, were they failing? Joseph made excuses. He spent more time with Martin and Emma. He raged about the lost pages that he could not find and could not retranslate. He claimed the spectacles had been spirited away. He began grumbling that his questioners were hostile. He gave no real answers. And, as time went on, his foul language, his claims to be “equal to Jesus Christ,” and the transparency of his book as yet another money-digging operation finally wore out his familial welcome.
The Peeper and the Rodsman
If the Lewis family’s patience was declining in 1828, the arrival of Oliver Cowdery certainly didn’t help. Hailing from Nathaniel’s old hometown of Wells, Vermont, Oliver was Joseph’s cousin and, worse, a Rodsman. Rodsmen were notoriously mystical and wayward to the Methodist view and he filled in a crucial position as accomplice to Joseph, just as Emma’s family probably hoping the scheme was fizzling out. Oliver arrived just in time to rescue Joseph from another financial dip. He purchased property on a day Joseph would later canonize as Jesus’s birthday17 and the pair went to work. Their rate of production was impressive. Or at least, it is impressive to modern believers. But, as later noted by scholars, dictation speed is faster than writing speed and the Book of Mormon’s copious biblical quotes, paraphrasings, and filler phrases lubricated the “translation process” quite a bit.
The main impression of this effort on the Lewises and other surrounding Harmony neighbors seems to have been renewed exasperation. For the second year in row, Emma was pregnant, the mountains were flowering and Joseph was not planting, hunting, repenting, repaying his debts, or any of the things his neighbors expected of him. And with rumors about Eliza Winters and Joseph’s “no-crime adultery” filtering through the families, Joseph soon decided the environment was too hostile for his “work.”
In the Summer of 1829, Joseph and Oliver left pregnant Emma to the scrutiny of her family while they traveled back to New York to continue writing.
Affidavits for Mr. Howe
Later, after Emma and Joseph had left the county and set up a colony of believers in Ohio, a reporter named Eber Howe began to solicit affidavits from the Harmony community. He wanted to know about Joseph and the origins of Mormonism, since some of his own family had been swept up in the movement too. The Lewises were some of the first to offer details, names, and dates. Five of the Lewis family–spanning sons, sons-in-law, and the father, Nathaniel–offered formal affidavits in 1834. Their affidavits would be published locally in the Susquehanna Register and more broadly through the book Mormonism Unvailed. Another two Lewis sons and one of Nathaniel’s daughters were speaking out by the middle of the century too. The richness of their stories, the consistency of detail between them, and their willingness to repeatedly legally and publicly affirm their witness statements can only be dismissed at the expense of dismissing every faithful witness of Mormonism.
To put it another way: no group of witnesses to this early period of Mormonism is as well-established in terms of historicity, community, legal standing, and character as the Lewis family.
Everyone who knew them recognized their courage, frankness, and honesty and unlike Joseph Smith jr, they needed no position as Prophet or Mayor to solicit the recommendations of everyone around them. Their openness and precision about their experiences with Joseph has cornered Joseph’s believers for centuries into simply dismissing them as “Anti-Mormons.” However, it should be noted that if the Lewises had simply been trying to slander Joseph in any and all possible ways, they could have done so by collecting gossip and stories of his spiritual wifery from their later residence in Illinois. The fact that their stories only focus on the portion of time that they personally spent with Joseph in Pennsylvania indicates that they are speaking strictly from personal experience.
The Lewises began to filter out of Pennsylvania at the same time as the Hale cousins. When their children had all moved away, Nathaniel and Sarah followed. Almost all of the Lewises were buried near each other in Amboy, Illinois. A Methodist chronologist later described Nathaniel as “rough as a mountain crag, but deeply pious. He could read his Bible, and fathom the human heart, particularly its developments among backwoodsmen. He was fearless, shrewd, and often witty. His labors were incessant and widely extended.”18 It seems a fitting description for all of them.
Footnotes
- Mark L. Staker, “Isaac and Elizabeth Hale in Their Endless Mountain Home,” Joseph Smith Jr. and Emma Hale Smith Historical Society (reposted by Michael Kennedy, 2020), accessed December 30, 2025, https://josephsmithjr.org/issac-and-elizabeth-hale-in-their-endless-mountain-home/. ↩︎
- Ibid. ↩︎
- These grove-prayers would be extremely influential on Nathaniel’s niece, Emma Hale and would eventually be picked up by her husband Joseph to furnish a spiritual backstory. ↩︎
- Staker, “Isaac and Elizabeth Hale.” ↩︎
- These are important elements for modern persons interested in Mormonism to notice because traits like health, strength, and community standing are often drawn upon to credential the “faithful” witnesses of Joseph Smith’s theology. Mentioning these traits is important for illustrating the real people of the past and it is also a reminder that in this way, the playing field was relatively level. Many good, respectable, hard-working people were present on both sides of belief in Mormonism. ↩︎
- For an example of this, see the Mormon Dialogue board cited below. The believing author portrays Levi Lewis as a sensationalist, unintelligent, “Anti-Mormon.” Ironically, this author also misunderstands the affidavit and skips the relevance of this witness statement in his urgency to reaffirm testimony in Joseph Smith.
Lewis Vs. Lewis – Mormon Dialogue & Discussion Board, thread in “Miscellaneous” section, first posted May 17, 2011, accessed January 1, 2026, https://www.mormondialogue.org/topic/54341-lewis-vs-lewis/. ↩︎ - In 1824 Washington Irving published “the Devil and Tom Walker,” featuring a character finding Kidd’s treasure. ↩︎
- Staker, “Isaac and Elizabeth Hale.” ↩︎
- “It is thought that Mr. Hale was a little deluded at first, as well as others, in regard to Joe’s prophecy of the existence of precious minerals, when digging was progressing in the vicinity, under the latter’s direction and the party were boarding at Mr. Hale’s, but his common sense soon manifested itself and his disapproval of Joe was notorious.”
Emily C. Blackman, History of Susquehanna County, Pennsylvania (Philadelphia: Claxton, Remsen & Haffelfinger, 1877), 102, https://archive.org/details/historyofsusqueh00blac/page/102/mode/2up. ↩︎ - In 1826, Josiah Stowell’s nephew brought Joseph to court for being a disturber of the Peace. Joseph confessed not to be seeing anything in his peeping stone and was found guilty. If Josiah Stowell had instigated both companies of treasure-diggers, it would seem unreasonable for these charges against him. It appears from this that Josiah Stowell organized the first company of treasure-diggers and solicited Joseph’s help, that Joseph fell in love with Emma Hale during this visit, and that Joseph urged Josiah to sponsor a second expedition the following year so that he could return and see her. This is speculation, but it does fit the facts of the expeditions and Joseph’s patterns of behavior. It also explains why a court case against Joseph as Peeper was justified. ↩︎
- Louisa May Alcott, “Happy Women,” Waltham Free Press, May 1, 1868. ↩︎
- “James [Comfort] was born in September 1805, he must have soon become one of the most eligible bachelors in the valley. He was the only young man in the valley Emma’s age that was not a “stranger” and yet also met all the education and business expectations of Isaac Hale.”
Staker, “Isaac and Elizabeth Hale.” ↩︎ - George Peck, Early Methodism within the Bounds of the Old Genesee Conference from 1788 to 1828; or, The First Forty Years of Wesleyan Evangelism in Northern Pennsylvania, Central and Western New York, and Canada (New York: Carlton & Porter, 1860), page 331-332, Google Books, https://books.google.com/books?id=OzxeWPEizTwC&printsec=frontcover. ↩︎
- Staker, “Isaac and Elizabeth Hale.” ↩︎
- The Hales’ neighbor reported that ““Jo stole his wife, Sunday, while [Isaac] Hale was at church. My wife and I saw him on an old horse with Emma on behind as they passed our house on their way to Bainbridge, N.Y., where they were married.”
W. R. Hines, statement, in Arthur B. Deming, Naked Truths About Mormonism (Oakland, CA: Deming & Co., 1888), “‘Mormon’ Materials in the California State Library,” accessed December 31, 2025, http://www.sidneyrigdon.com/dbroadhu/CA/natruths.htm#010088-2e3. ↩︎ - To Nathaniel, Joseph said the timeline was eighteen months. Joshua McKune and Nathaniel Lewis followed up with Joseph about this when that timeline had passed and at that time, Joseph had a new excuse for each of them about why public exhibition would be impossible. ↩︎
- April 6, 1829 ↩︎
- George Peck, “Early Methodism.” ↩︎
The Witnesses of the Lewis Family
Nathaniel Lewis Affidavit
As originally published in The Susquehanna Register and then Mormonism Unvailed (sic) by Eber D. Howe, 1834.
I have been acquainted with Joseph Smith Jr. for some time: being a relation of his wife, and residing near him, I have had frequent opportunities of conversation with him, and of knowing his opinions and pursuits. From my standing in the Methodist Episcopal Church, I suppose he was careful how he conducted or expressed himself before me. At one time, however, he came to my house, and asked my advice, whether he should proceed to translate the Book of Plates (referred to by Mr. Hale) or not. He said that God had commanded him to translate it, but he was afraid of the people: he remarked, that he was to exhibit the plates to the world, at a certain time, which was then about eighteen months distant. I told him I was not qualified to give advice in such cases. Smith frequently said to me that I should see the plates at the time appointed. After the time stipulated, had passed away, Smith being at my house was asked why he did not fulfil his promise, show the Golden Plates and prove himself an honest man?
He replied that he, himself was deceived, but that I should see them if I were where they were. I reminded him then, that I stated at the time he made the promise, I was fearful “the enchantment would be so powerful” as to remove the Plates, when the time came in which they were to be revealed. These circumstances and many others of a similar tenor, embolden me to say that Joseph Smith Jr. is not a man of truth and veracity ; and that his general character in this part of the country, is that of an impostor, hypocrite and liar.
NATHANIEL C. LEWIS.”
Affirmed and subscribed, before me, March •20th, 1834.
CHARLES DIMON, J. Peace
Joshua McKune Affidavit
Editorial Note: Joshua McKune was son-in-law to Nathaniel Lewis through daughter Esther Lewis
As originally published in Mormonism Unvailed (sic) by Eber D. Howe, 1834.
Joshua McKune states, that he “was acquainted with Joseph Smith Jr. and Martin Harris, during their residence in Harmony, Pa. , and knew them to be artful seducers;”—That they informed him that “Smith had found a sword, breast-plate, and a pair of spectacles, at the time he found the gold plates”—that these were to be shewn to all the world as evidence of the truth of what was contained in those plates,” and that *’he (M’Kune) and others should see them at a specified time.” He also states that “the time for the exhibition of the Plates, etc has gone by, and he has not seen them.”
“Joseph Smith, Jr. told him that (Smith’s) first-born child was to translate the characters, and hieroglyphics, upon the Plates into our language at the age of three years; but this child was not permitted to live to verify the prediction.” He also states, that *’he has been intimately acquainted with Isaac Hale twenty-four years, and has always found him to be a man of truth, and good morals.”
Levi and Sophia Lewis Affidavits
Editorial Note: Sophia Lewis was Levi’s wife.
As originally published in Mormonism Unvailed (sic) by Eber D. Howe, 1834.
Levi Lewis states, that he has “been acquainted with Joseph Smith Jr. and Martin Harris, and that he has heard them both say, adultery was no crime. Harris said he did not blame Smith for his (Smith’s) attempt to seduce Eliza Winters &c.;”—Mr. Lewis says that he “knows Smith to be a liar;—that he saw him (Smith) intoxicated at three different times while he was composing the Book of Mormon, and also that he has heard Smith when driving oxen, use language of the greatest profanity. Mr. Lewis also testifies that he heard Smith say he (Smith) was as good as Jesus Christ;—that it was as bad to injure him as it was to injure Jesus Christ.”
With regard to the plates, Smith said God had deceived him—which was the reason he
(Smith) did not show them,
Sophia Lewis, certifies that she *heard a conversation between Joseph Smith Jr., and the Rev.. James B. Roach, in which Smith called Mr. R. a damned fool. Smith also said in the same conversation that he (Smith) was as good as Jesus Christ ;” and that she “has frequently heard Smith use profane language. She states that she heard Smith say “the Book of Plates could not be opened under penalty of death by any other person but his (Smith’s) first-born, which was to be a male.” She says she “was present at the birth of this child, and that it was still-born, and very much deformed.”
Joseph Ellis Lewis Letter
Originally published in the Salt Lake Tribune compilation of “Smith family Members’ Testimonies” October 17, 1879.
The facts are these: I, with Joshua McKune, a local preacher at that time, I think in June, 1828, heard on Saturday, that Joe Smith had joined the church on Wednesday afternoon, (as it was customary in those days to have circuit preaching at my father’s house on week-days). We thought it was a disgrace to the church to have a practicing necromancer, a dealer in enchantments and bleeding ghosts, in it. So on Sunday we went to father’s, the place of meeting that day, and got there in season to see Smith and talked with him some time before the meeting; told him that his occupation, habits, and moral character were at variance with the discipline, that his name would be a disgrace to the Church, that there should have been recantation, confession and at least promised reformation; that he could that day publicly ask that his name be stricken from the class book, or stand an investigation. He chose the former, and did that very day make the request that his name be taken off the class-book; and if Mr. Morse was leader at that time, and Smith’s name remained on the class-book six months, the class leader neglected his duty.
This is of very great importance — as it must be borne in mind that the prophet Joseph had already “translated” a considerable portion of his sacred plates, and that the “Father and Son” had some time before appeared to him and told him that all the sects were “an abomination” and that he was on no account to unite himself with any of them.
Hezekiah McKune Statement
Editorial Note: Hezekiah McKune was son-in-law to Nathaniel Lewis through Elizabeth Lewis, 8th child of the Lewis family
As originally published in Mormonism Unvailed (sic) by Eber D. Howe, 1834.
Hezekiah McKune states, that “in conversation Joseph Smith Jr., he (Smith) said he was nearly equal to Jesus Christ; that he was a prophet sent by God to bring in the Jews, and that he was the greatest prophet that bad ever arisen.”
Hiel Lewis Letter with addition by Elizabeth Lewis McKune
Originally published in the Salt Lake Tribune compilation of “Smith family Members’ Testimonies” October 17, 1879.
I will give what I can from my own knowledge and memory and from what I heard at the time. When Emma Hale eloped with Joseph Smith, the Hale family was greatly exasperated, and perhaps it would not have been safe for Smith to have shown himself at his father-in-law’s house. Emma was, or had been, the idol, or favorite, of the family, and they still felt a strong attachment for her. Permission to return and reconciliation were effected and accomplished by her, and perhaps her sister, Mrs. Wasson, who lived near Bainbridge, New York. The persuasions for Smith to return all came from the other side, not from Mr. Isaac Hale or his family in Harmony, Pa.
The statement of Mr. Hale, made under oath before Esquire Dimon, was strictly true. * * * Reuben Hale is but little older than myself, was living with his father at the time of Smith’s money-digging, and wrote for Smith when he first began to translate, before Harris came to Harmony. It is true that Alva Hale went with his team to Palmyra, N. Y., one hundred miles or more, and moved Smith and wife to Harmony. It was stated by Alva Hale, at the time, that the “Gold Bible” was in a barrel of beans in his wagon, and that he (Hale) slept in his wagon to guard that barrel of beams and its treasure. I remember hearing my older brother Joseph tell Alva that if he, Joseph Lewis, had been in your place (Alva Hale’s) he would have known whether that barrel of beans contained any golden Bible or not, perfectly regardless of Smith’s statement that it would be certain death for any one to see the plates.
The Hales seemed, for a time, to be kept in awe by Smith’s statements, but that awe did not last long. Alva Hale is over eighty and his memory has failed much in a few years past. Some things he remembers distinctly, and some things I have been able to help him recall; for example, I asked him if he remembered the letter he wrote to Smith and Emma when they eloped. He said, no, and had no recollection of writing a letter to them. When told the contents of the letter; which was as follows — “My Creed! I believe in love-powder, in gun-powder and hell fire,” he replied, I recollect it as plain as if but yesterday. I asked Alva, on one of our late visits, if he remembered weighing the gold Bible; but he did not. My brother tried to refresh his memory, but in vain. Joseph [Ellis Lewis] remembers hearing it stated by Alva that he (Hale) was permitted to weigh the gold Bible in a pillow case, and, according to our memory, it weighed thirteen pounds! There were many persons in Harmony who had from Joe Smith positive promises that they should see the plates and the spectacles, but all say that they never saw them. Alva Hale says he never saw them. I presume he saw that old glass-box that Isaac Hale spoke of, said to contain the plates. Smith’s excuse for using his peepstone and hat to translate with, instead of those spectacles, was that he must keep the spectacles concealed; but any and all persons were permitted to inspect the peep-stone; and that he could translate just as well with the stone.
My sister, Mrs. Elizabeth Lewis McKune, says,
“I worked in the families of Joseph Smith and uncle Isaac Hale for about nine months, during which time Mrs. Emma Smith had a child which was still-born and much deformed. The dwellings of Mr. Hale and Joseph Smith, jr., were near each other. I saw Smith translating his book by the aid of the stone and hat. Reuben Hale, younger son of Isaac Hale, acted as scribe, writing down the words from Joseph Smith’s mouth, but after a short time Martin Harris did the writing. I heard Smith tell his wife Emma that he was nearly equal to Jesus Christ, and was as good to her as her Savior. The time when Smith told the story of the bleeding ghost was after the close of the money-digging, after Smith was married and had moved back to Harmony, and had commenced the translation of his book, I think either before or about the time that Mrs. Harris had abstracted the 130 pages of their manuscript. The date I cannot precisely recall. I have a distinct recollection about the bleeding ghost.”
Your idea that the first start of the book was a money speculation, not a new church, is perfectly correct. Your general idea of Smith’s plates is also correct. He had something which he would permit a select few to handle, as they were done up in a cloth, or in a box, but doubtless the plates were something prepared for the occasion. Among the first of Smith’s scribes was one Martin Harris, who operated in our immediate neighborhood. His residence was then, I think, in Palmyra, N.Y. He was a man of some property, and his wife was very strongly opposed to his spending his time and money in Smith’s speculation, and once, while Harris was writing for Smith, she came to Harmony township and got hold of the manuscript they were making and carried it off, or destroyed it, and caused them considerable trouble.
I am able to get near the exact date of Smith’s joining the Methodist Episcopal Church. My sister, Elizabeth L. McKune, says she was working in the family of Michael B. Morse the latter part of the winter and spring, and soon after that Joseph Smith, Jr., joined the Church, and while she was working for Mr. Morse he made her a chest and when he painted it put the date, 1828, in red paint on the inside of the chest. She has said chest and date now in her possession. Also my brother Joseph Lewis, from circumstances and business transactions, is able to fix the date to be Harmony, Susquehanna county, Pa., June __, 1828. The day of the month I am not able to ascertain. We have another witness to Smith’s joining the Church, in Elder Cadwell’s reply to my statement in the Amboy Journal.
Yours Truly,
HIEL LEWIS.
Hiel Lewis and Joseph Lewis Joint Letter and Affidavit
Portions of this Letter and Affidavit were originally published in the Salt Lake Tribune in October 1879, then in 1886 as part of a compilation by Wilhelm Wyl’s called Joseph Smith, the Prophet, His Family and His Friends: A Study Based on Facts and Documents, with Fourteen Illustrations.
Editorial Note: There was no known “William Hale” in Isaac Hale’s extended family, however there was a William Ward, a relative of Isaac Hale’s mother. They may have assumed the surname based on the connection to Isaac.
Joseph Ellis and Hiel Lewis Letter:
Some time previous to 1825, a man by the name of William Hale, a distant relative of uncle Isaac Hale, came to Isaac Hale and said that he had been informed by a woman by the name of Odle, who claimed to possess the power of seeing under ground (such persons were then commonly called peepers), that there were great treasures concealed in the hill northeast from Isaac Hale’s house, and by her directions, William hale commenced digging. But, being too lazy to work and too poor to hire, he obtained a partner by the name of Oliver Harper, of York State, who had the means to hire help. But after a short time operations were suspended, for a time, during which William Hale heard of PEEPER Joseph Smith, jr. and wrote to him and soon visited him, and found Smith’s representations were so flattering that Smith was either hired or became a partner with William Hale, Oliver Harper and a man by the name of Stowell, who had some property.
They hired men and dug in several places. The account given in the history of the Susquehanna county, p. 580 of a pure white dog to be used as a sacrificed to restrain the enchantment, and of the the anger of the Almighty at the attempt to palm off on Him a white sheep for a white dog, is a fair sample of Smith’s revelations, and of the God that inspired him. Their digging in several places was in compliance with ‘Peeper’ Smith’s revelations, who would attend with his peptone in his hat, and his hat drawn over his face, and tell them how deep they would have to go; and when they found no trace of the chest of money, he would peep again and weep like a child, and tell them that the enchantment had removed it on account of some sin or thoughtless word, and finally the enchantment became so strong that he could not see, and the business was finally abandoned. Smith could weep and shed tears at any time if he chose to.
But while he was engaged in looking through his peep-stone and old white hat, directing the digging for money, and boarding at uncle Isaac Hale’s, he formed an intimacy with Mr. Hale’s daughter and after the abandonment of the money digging speculation, he consummated the elopement and marriage to the said Emma Hale, and she became his accomplice in his humbug Golden Bible and Mormon religion.
The statement that the prophet Joseph Smith made in our hearing at the commencement of his translating his book in Harmony, as to the manner of his finding the plates, was as follows:
He said that by a dream he was informed that at such a place in a certain hill in an iron box, were some gold plates with curious engravings, which he must get and translate, and write a book: that the plates were to be kept concealed from every human being for a certain time, some two or three years; that he went to the place and dug till he came to the stone that covered the box, when he was knocked down; that he again attempted to remove the stone, and was again knocked down. This attempt was made the third time, and the third time he was knocked down.
Then he exclaimed: ‘Why can’t I get it?” Or words to that effect, and then he saw a man standing over the spot, who to him, appeared like a Spaniard (Oh, you great son of Lucy!), having a long beard down over his breast to about here (Smith putting his hand to the pit of his stomach), with his (the ghost’s) THROAT CUT FROM EAR TO EAR, and the BLOOD STREAMING DOWN, who told him that he could not get it alone; that another person whom he (Smith) would know at first sight must come with him and then he would get it; and when he saw Miss Emma Hale he knew that she was the person, and that after they were married she went with him to near the place and stood with her back towards him while he dug after the box, which he rolled up in his frock, and she helped carry it home; that in the same box with the plates were spectacles; the bows were of gold and eyes were stone, and by looking through these spectacles all the characters on the plates were translated into English.
In all this narrative there was not one word about visions of God or of angels or heavenly revelations; all his information was by the DREAM and that BLEEDING GHOST. The heavenly visions and messages of angels etc. contained in Mormon books were afterthoughts, revised to order.
While Smith was in Harmony he made the above statements in our presence to Reverend Nathaniel Lewis. It was here also, that he joined the Methodist Episcopal Church. He presented himself in a very serious and humble manner, and the minister, not suspecting evil, put his name on the class-book in the absence of some of the official members, among whom was the undersigned, Joseph Lewis, who when he learned what was done, took with him Joshua McKune and had a talk with Smith. We told him plainly that such a character as he was a disgrace to the Church; that he could not be a member of it unless he broke off his sins by repentance, made public confession, renounced his fraudulent and hypocritical practices, and gave some evidence that he intended to reform and conduct himself somewhat nearer like a Christian than he had done. We gave him his choice, to go before the class and publicly ask to have his name stricken from the class-book, or stand a disciplinary investigation; he chose the former, and immediately withdrew his name. So his name was a member of the class was on the book only three days. It was the general opinion that his only object in joining the church was to bolster up his reputation and gain the sympathy and help of Christians; that is, putting on the cloak of religion to serve the Devil in.”
We will add one more sample of his prophetic power and practice. One of the neighbors, whom Smith was owing, had a piece of corn on a rather wet and backward piece of ground, and as Smith was owing him, he wanted Smith to help hoe corn. Smith came on, but to get clear of the work and debt said: ‘If I kneel down and pray in your corn, it will grow just as well as if hoed.’ So he prayed in the corn and insured its maturity without cultivation, and that the frost would not hurt it. But the corn was a failure in growth and killed by the frost. This sample of prophetic power was related to us by those present, and no one questioned its truth.
[Mr. Hiel Lewis affirmed separately that Joseph joining Methodism was in June 1828.]
Joseph Ellis and Hiel Lewis Affidavit of the above letter: April 23, 1879
First, we would add our testimony to the truthfulness of the statements of our uncle Isaac Hale, father of Mrs. Emma Smith Bidamon, Alva Hale, her brother, Rev. Nathaniel Lewis, our father, Levi Lewis, our brother, and Sophia Lewis, his wife, and Joshua McKune, husband of Elizabeth McKune, our sister. These, with the exception of Alva Hale and Elizabeth McKune, are dead. They were all living in Susquehanna county, Pa., at the time of Joe Smith’s exploits, and their statements in the book, “Mormonism exposed by John C. Bennett,” are perfectly reliable in every respect.
The statement that the prophet Joseph Smith, Jr., made in our hearing, at the commencement of his translating his book, in Harmony, Pa., as to the manner of his finding the plates, was as follows: Our recollection of the precise language may be faulty, but as to the substance, the following is correct:
He said that by a dream he was informed that at such a place in a certain hill, in an iron box, were some gold plates with curious engravings, which he must get and translate, and write a book; that the plates were to be kept concealed from every human being for a certain time — some two or three years; that he went to the place and dug till he came to the stone that covered the box, when he was knocked down; that he again attempted to remove the stone, and was again knocked down; this attempt was made the third time, and the third time he was knocked down. Then he exclaimed, “Why can’t I get it?” or words to that effect; and then he saw a man standing over the spot, who to him appeared like a Spaniard, having a long beard coming down over his breast to about here, (Smith putting his hand to the pit of his stomach) with his (the ghost’s) throat cut from ear to ear, and the blood streaming down, who told him that he could not get it alone; that another person whom he (Smith) would know at first sight, must come with him, and then he could get it; and when he saw Miss Emma Hale, he knew that she was the person, and that after they were married, she went with him to near the place, and stood with her back towards him while he dug up the box, which he rolled up in his frock and she helped carry it home; that in the same box with the plates were spectacles, with bows of gold and the eyes of stone, and by looking through these spectacles all the characters on the plates were translated into English.
In all this narrative, there was not one word about visions of God, or of angels, or heavenly revelations; all his information was by that dream and bleeding ghost. The heavenly visions and messages of angels, etc., contained in Mormon books, were after-thoughts revised to order.
(Signed)
JOSEPH LEWIS,
HIEL LEWIS.
STATE OF ILLINOIS,
Lee County. Ss.
Testimony of the Character of Joseph and Hiel Lewis by the Justice of the Peace
“I, Everett E. Chase, a Justice of the Peace in and for the County of Lee, State aforesaid, do hereby certify that the above named Joseph Lewis and Hiel Lewis, personally known to me to be respectable, truthful, and honorable men, came before me and in my presence signed the above statement, and each of them before me made affidavit to each and all of the allegations therein set forth according to their best memory.”
EVERETT E. CHASE, J. P.
AMBOY, LEE COUNTY, ILLINOIS, }
April 23d, 1879. }
Testimony of the Character of Joseph and Hiel Lewis by Community Members
“We the undersigned hereby certify that we are personally acquainted with Joseph Lewis and Hiel Lewis, that we know them to be in every way worthy of confidence, that they are truthful, honorable Christian gentlemen, and their statements entitled to the fullest credence.”
J. B. Felker, M. D., Mayor of Amboy.
W. H. Haskell, Ed. and Pub. Amboy Journal.
R. H. Mellen, Post Master.
A. H. Merrifield, Druggist and Bookseller.
Wm. B. Andruss, J. P. and Alderman.
Alfred Tooker, Attorney at Law,
J. S. Briggs, Druggist and Grocer.
Has. A. Church, Jeweler.
Josiah Little, Banker.
Anecdote of “Uncle Nat Lewis and Joe Smith”
As published by George Peck in Early Methodism within the Bounds of the Old Genesee Conference from 1788 to 1828; or, The First Forty Years of Wesleyan Evangelism in Northern Pennsylvania, Central and Western New York, and Canada.
“Joe Smith, the Mormon Prophet, married a niece of Mr. Lewis. After the story of the golden Bible and the miracle-working spectacles had come out, Joe undertook to make a convert of “Uncle Nat.” The old gentleman heard his tale with due gravity, and then proceeded: “Joseph, can anybody else translate strange languages by the help of them spectacles?”
“O yes!” was the answer.
“Well now,” said Mr. Lewis, “I’ve got Clarke’s Commentary, and it contains a great many strange languages; now, if you will let me try the spectacles, and if by looking through them I can translate these strange tongues into English, then I’ll be one of your disciples.”
This was a poser, and the only way Joe had to escape from Uncle Nat’s net was to get away and run.”
Available for Download: Witnesses of the Lewis Family
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