| 689 in business. But in the winter of 1858, Mr. Redington, the proprietor, failed, and we owed the men we had hired one hundred fifty dollars, which we had to pay the best we could. All we had made was in Mr. Redington's hands, who took the benefit of bankrupt law.
In November, 1858, I was married to Miss Maryette Griffith. We left Iowa and went to Missouri, and commenced keeping house in Etna, Scotland County, Missouri, and I worked at carpentering.
The spring of 1860 my wife's father, Duty Griffith, was living with us. His wife was dead, and he had been living with his son. Up to this date I had never made any profession of religion, though I had been raised by religious parents. Father and his folks were Methodists; and mother's people were of the Baptist faith. Mother was baptized in New York State when she was a young lady. But I never heard any system of religion that suited me, and never expected to do so. I did not know what kind of religion I wanted. But I knew what I had heard did not suit me. I had been so foolish as to say I expected to live and die dancing; it was good enough a religion for me. I was bound to have a good time in this life, and leave the result with the power that ruled the future.
In 1860, Duty Griffith, my father-in-law, received a copy of the True Latter Day Saints' Herald, containing an account of the conference at Amboy, Illinois, and that Joseph Smith had presented himself and been accepted as president of the church. He never knew who sent it, but supposed it was Bro. Sheen, the editor. When that was read by Bro. Griffith, he began to show what his religious belief was; and as I have since said, he was like a match when a coal of fire touches it, it would blaze. He said he knew it had been said that little Joseph would take his father's place, but when was the question.
Now came my peculiar experience. I awoke to the fact that I was living with a Mormon wife, and did not know it. The burned temple, the desolated city of Nauvoo, the people having been driven out, walking the water on a plank,
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