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Source: Church History Vol. 4 Chapter 32 Page: 578 (~1888)

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578 in this capacity he was ordered by his superior officer, Major General Samuel D. Lucas, to take Joseph Smith and others into the public square of Far West, Missouri, and shoot them, to which order he returned the reply, "It is cold-blooded murder. I will not obey your order. My brigade shall march for Liberty to-morrow morning, at eight o'clock; and if you execute those men, I will hold you responsible before an earthly tribunal, so help me God!" This so disconcerted General Lucas and others that the order was never carried out.

When in after years General Doniphan was visited by President Joseph Smith and his brother Alexander, and asked, "How came you to do so brave a thing?" he answered: "I did not think anything about whether it was brave or not. I came of a long-lived stock and was young, and thought that I could not afford to go through what might be a long life with my hands stained with the blood of my fellew [fellow] men." In 1846 he was selected colonel of the First Missouri Mounted Volunteers, and served in the Mexican War with great gallantry. At the battle of Sacramento, Colonel Doniphan with nine hundred twenty-four men, met, fought and vanquished a force of four thousand Mexicans under General Heredria, inflicting upon the enemy a loss of three hundred, taking forty prisoners, and capturing all the artillery and baggage of the enemy. The American loss was one killed and eight wounded. In 1850 he refused a seat in the United States Senate, because one of the stipulations in the offer was a demand that he pledge himself to sustain that which he could not conscientiously indorse [endorse]. In 1854 when the legislators were balloting for over sixty times for United States senator, he was told that if he would pledge himself to vote either for or against the extinction of slavery in the Territories, he could be elected. But he declined to pledge his vote either way. His reply was that he would esteem it a great honor to go to the Senate; but he would not creep in by indirect methods. If elected he must be free.

In 1861 he was a member of the peace conference which figured in attempting to settle the existing difficulty between the North and South.

(page 578)

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