The Joseph Smith Papers: Histories: Volume 2: Assigned Histories, 1831-1847

Volume 2 of the Histories series, published in 2012, presents four histories written by church historians by assignment from Joseph Smith. The volume includes works by two men, John Whitmer and John Corrill, who both distanced themselves from the church before finishing their histories. Also found in volume 2 are two histories published in Latter-day Saint newspapers, William W. Phelps’s “Rise and Progress of the Church of Christ” and the Times and Seasonsseries “A History, of the Persecution, of the Church of Jesus Christ, of Latter Day Saints, in Missouri.” Together these histories provide a rich, multifaceted view of the early years of the Latter-day Saint movement, particularly the “Mormon War” of 1838.