The gun belonging to Joseph Smith Jr., the Mormon prophet.

This is a fowling gun, or shot gun, with double barrels. It is muzzle-loaded using either gun shot or ball (bullet) and a charge of gun powder rammed into the barrel along with a wad or plug. The gun is then fired with double triggers and percussion caps (stored in the stock). Either barrel can be fired first, by pulling the appropriate trigger. This allowed the user, if he chose, to put gun shot in one barrel (smooth barrel) and a ball in the other (rifled barrel), and shoot either a game bird or a deer as the opportunity was found. The gun is made of "fine steel twist" by an independent gunsmith named Perkins. The technology and style indicate that the gun was manufactured circa 1830-40. The gun is engraved with embellishments including quail and pheasants, and inlaid with fine silver in an artistic scene of a hunter taking aim at a buck deer in the trees, with two doe deer beyond; and inlaid with silver sighting guides. The gun disassembles into the two pieces of stock and barrel, plus the ramrod, and is stored in a wooden presentation box. The wood is an exotic softwood similar to pine but with a more twisted grain like cypress.

 

 

PROVENANCE OF OWNERSHIP

Celebrity guns have become valuable and collectible. This hunting rifle was used by Joseph Smith, the founder and president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. Family tradition and written history indicates that Joseph enjoyed both hunting and fishing, as well as dogs, horses, sleighing, wrestling, boating, and other outdoor sports. This gun was an expensive piece when new, and was probably given to Joseph as a gift by one of his many well-wishers. When an expedition was formed in February 1844 to explore the Rocky Mountains and the West in search of a homeland for the Mormons, Joseph Smith recommended just such a rifle to the explorers (Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, p. 333):

Send twenty-five men: let them preach the Gospel wherever they go. Let that man go that can raise $500, a good horse and mule, a double-barrel gun, one barrel rifled and the other smooth bore, saddle and bridle, a pair of revolving pistols, bowie-knife, and a good sabre. Appoint a leader, and let them beat up for volunteers. I want every man that goes to be a King and a Priest. When he gets on the mountains, he may want to talk with his God, and with the savage nations have power to govern, etc.

This gun belonging to Joseph Smith was preserved by his son Alexander Hale Smith, who carried on seven missions from the Midwest to Utah while a member of the Quorum of Twelve in the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. One occasion, the family recalls, an Indian in the West demanded the gun in trade for an Indian coat. Alexander refused, the gun having sentimental value from his father, and offered instead a Mackinaw fur coat for the Indian's coat. The trade was accepted, and the family still has the Indian coat.

* * *

Mary Audentia Smith Anderson, Ancestry and Posterity of Joseph Smith and Emma Hale, (Independence: Herald Publishing House, 1929).

Inez Smith Davis, The Story of the Church: A History of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, and of its Legal Successor, the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, (Independence: Herald Publishing House, 1934).

Joseph Smith III and Heman C. Smith, History of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, (Lamoni, Ia.: Published by the Board of Publication of the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, 1897-1903). 8 Vols.