Appendix 3 — Extract from a letter written by Stephen Burnett to Lyman E. Johnson, regarding the testimony of Martin Harris viewing the Book of Mormon Plates¹

Orange Township, Geauga Co., Ohio
15th April 1838

Br[other]. [Lyman E.] Johnson — Dear Sir I have with pleasure just received your favor post marked 26th ult and now you see I take a large sheet that I may have ample room to write — my heart is sickened within me when I reflect upon the manner in which we with many of this Church have been led & the losses which we have sustained all by means of two men in whom we placed implicit confidence, that Joseph Smith & Sidney Rigdon are notorious liars I do not hesitate to affirm, & can prove by a cloud of witnesses & this is not all, Joseph [Smith] has prophecied [prophesied] in a public congregation lies in the name of the Lord & by undue religious influence he has filched the monies of the Church from their pockets and brought them nigh unto distruction [destruction], leaving helpless innocence [innocents] destitute of a confortable [comfortable] support while he has squandered the hard earnings of these to whom it justly belonged.

I have reflected long and deliberately upon the history of this church & weighed the evidence for & against it — loth to give it up — but when I came to hear Martin Harris state in a public congregation that he never saw the plates with his natural eyes only in vision or imagination, neither Oliver [Cowdery] nor David [Whitmer] & also that the eight witnesses never saw them & hesitated to sign that instrument² for that reason, but were persuaded to do it, the last pedestal gave way, in my view our foundations was sapped & the entire superstructure fell a heap of ruins, I therefore three week[s] since in the Stone Chapel³ gave a full history of the church since I became acquainted with it, the false preaching & prophecying [prophesying] of Joseph [Smith] together with the reasons why I took the course which I was resolved to do, and renounced the Book of Mormon with the whole scene of lying and deception practiced by J[oseph]. S[mith] & S[idney]. R[igdon] in this church, believing as I verily do, that it is all a wicked deception palmed upon us unawares.

I was followed by W[arren]. Par[r]ish[,] Luke Johnson & John Boynton all of who concurred with me, after we were done speaking M[artin] Harris arose & said he was sorry for any man who rejected the Book of Mormon for he knew it was true, he said he had hefted the plates repeatedly in a box with only a tablecloth or a handkerchief over them, but he never saw them only as he saw a city through a mountain. And said that he never should have told that the testimony of the eight [witnesses] was false, if it had not been picked out of [h]im but should have let it passed as it was — Now br[other] Johnson if you have any thing to say in favour [favor] of the Book of Mormon I should be glad to hear it.

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there are in Kirtland Esqrs [Cyrus] Smalling, [Joseph] Coe, [Martin] Harris and others who still believe the Book of Mormon &c but discard Joseph [Smith] & Mr [Joseph] Coe proposed an investigation of the subject, and [Warren] Par[r]ish took up on the negative, but I have not heard how they got along with it, I am well satisfied for myself that if the witnesses whose names are attached to the Book of Mormon never saw the plates as Martin [Harris] admits that there can be nothing brought to prove that any such thing ever existed for it is said on the 171 page of the book of covenants⁴ that the three [witnesses] should testify that they had seen the plates even as J[oseph] S[mith] Jr & if they saw them spiritually or in vision with their eyes shut - J[oseph] S[mith] Jr never saw them any other light  way & if so the plates were only visionary and I am well satisfied that the 29 & 37 Chap[ter]s of Isai[a]h & Ezekiel together with others in which we depended to prove the truth of the book of Mormon have no bearing when correctly understood but are entirely irrelevant - but if any man differs from me I can adopt the language of Josephus, he is at liberty to enjoy his opinions without any blame from me - we are all well in usual health, my respects to your family & all our old friends, I am with respect yours &c

S[tephen] Burnett
 

Notes

1. Letter of Stephen Burnett to Lyman E. Johnson, 15 April 1838. On 24 May 1838 a copy of the original letter was made. This copy was then recopied in 1839 into a letterbook. The above extract is from the 1839 copy, located in Joseph Smith Letterbook 2:64-66, LDS archives. This letterbook contains copies of letters from 20 April 1837 to 8 Feb. 1843 with a few letters of other years.

2. Their testimony.

3. Meeting held on 25 March 1838 in the Kirtland Temple.

4. 1835 Doctrine and Covenants, section 42, Kirtland, Ohio; cf. LDS D&C 17; RLDS D&C 15.