At his father’s baptism

Joseph Smith’s sincerity appears in the incidental glimpses of him that we obtain from many of his contemporaries.  Here, for example, is the account given by Joseph’s mother, Lucy Mack Smith, of the baptism of her husband:

On the morning of the sixth day of [April], my husband and Martin Harris were baptized.

When Mr. Smith came out of the water, Joseph stood upon the shore, and taking his father by the hand, he exclaimed, with tears of joy, “Oh, my God! Have I lived to see my own father baptized into the true Church of Jesus Christ!” On the same day, April 6, 1830, the church was organized.

Manuscript variants of Lucy’s account mention that Joseph “covered his face” and “wept like [an] infant.” Joseph Knight, Sr., was also a witness to the emotion of the day:

There was one thing I will mention that evening that old Brother Smith and Martin Harris was Babtised. Joseph was fild with the Spirrit to a grate degree to see his Father and Mr. Harris that he had Bin with so much he Bast [burst?] out with greaf and Joy and seamed as tho the world Could not hold him. He went out into the Lot and appeard to want to git out of site of every Body and would sob and Crie and seamed to Be so full that he could not live. Oliver and I went after him and Came to him and after a while he Came in. But he was the most wrot upon that I ever saw any man. But his joy seemed to Be full. I think he saw the grate work he had Begun and was Desirus to Carry it out.

Posted from Liberty, Missouri