| 270 pray, and practice his religion. These minutes were presented to me by Mr. Risse, who was an old acquaintance and a then office mate, having his lawyer's office in the same room and building occupied by me as a justice of the peace. Upon looking to see by whom they were signed, I discovered that there were no signatures; I then requested him as secretary to put the chairman's name and his own to them. This he declined to do, and I refused to accept them without signatures. The other minutes came by mail, hence I had no choice but to receive them.
"Simultaneously with these movements, as I was credibly informed at the time, two men prominently engaged in the crusade against the Mormons in 1845-46, prepared a letter notifying me to leave the country, or to remain at my peril. This letter they presented, so ran the story, to Judge Roosevelt, one of the most influential men of the county, living at Warsaw, asking him to sign it, that his influence might secure them the signatures of others to whom they designed to present it. His reply to them was, 'No, gentlemen, I shall not sign it. And my advice to you is to put that letter away. If you send it to Mr. Smith you will get into trouble.' It was stated that they also presented the letter to Thomas C. Sharp, who refused to sign it, stating that he had 'lived through one Mormon war,' and did not choose to get into another. Mr. Roosevelt sent word to me by a trustworthy messenger, that if a letter of the description stated was sent me, to present the men whose names were affixed to it, to the Grand Jury at its first sitting thereafter, and I would find a host of friends that I knew nothing about.
"What influence these meetings and the published minutes of them, had upon the immigration of Mormons to the county, I need not state. The letter referred to was never sent me. Friends in different parts of the county were prompt and positive in their denunciation of such measures; while some radical anti-Mormons took equally strong ground against my propagating Mormonism in the county, one interior township passing a resolution that 'no Mormon should be permitted to preach, or pray in the county.' The
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