| 411 in that county through the winter, many of them were compelled to return to their homes in Jackson County or perish with hunger. But they had no sooner set foot upon the soil, which a few months before we had purchased of the United States, than they were again met by the citizens of Jackson County, and a renewal of savage barbarities inflicted upon these families by beating with clubs and sticks, presenting knives and firearms, and threatening with death if they did not flee from the county. These inhuman assaults upon a number of these families were repeated at two or three different times through the past winter, till they were compelled at last to abandon their possessions in Jackson County and flee with their mangled bodies into this county, here to mingle their tears and unite their supplications, with hundreds of their brethren, to our heavenly Father, and to the chief ruler of our nation.
"Between one and two thousand of the people called Mormons have been driven by force of arms from Jackson County, in this State, since the first of November last, being compelled to leave their highly cultivated fields, the greater part of which had been bought of the United States, and all this on account of our belief in direct revelation from God to the children of men, according to the Holy Scriptures. We know that such illegal violence has not been inflicted upon any sect or community of people by the citizens of the United States since the Declaration of Independence.
"That this is a religious persecution, is notorious throughout our county; for while the officers of the county, both civil and military, were accomplices in these unparalleled outrages, engaged in the destruction of the printing office, dwelling houses, etc., yet the records of the judicial tribunals of that county are not stained with a crime against our people. Our numbers being greatly inferior to the enemy, we were unable to stand up in self-defense; and our lives, at this day, are continually threatened by that infuriated people, so that our personal safety forbids one of our number going into that county on business.
"We beg leave to state that no impartial investigation into this criminal matter can be made, because the offenders must
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