Alleged Sexual Impropriety between Joseph Smith and

Eliza Winters

Source:

According to available evidence, the earliest accusation against Joseph Smith regards an attempted seduction, not an actual sexual relationship. The alleged behavior reportedly occurred between October of 1825 and June of 1829, involving a woman named Eliza Winters. Testimony of the described incident was not recorded until 1834 and was not from Eliza, but instead from Emma Hale Smith’s cousin, Levi Lewis. Apparently Lewis swore an affidavit sometime prior to March 20, 1834.[1] A few weeks later on May 1, 1834, portions of his statement were published in the Susquehanna Register and Northern Pennsylvanian.

Accusation:

Levi Lewis states, that he has “been acquainted with Joseph Smith Jr. and Martin Harris, and that he has heard them both say, adultery was no crime. Harris said he did not blame Smith for his (Smith’s) attempt to seduce Eliza Winters &c.;”… “With regard to the plates, Smith said God had deceived him – which was the reason he (Smith) did not show them.” [2]

Discussion:

Although Lewis’ recollection is not an accusation of illicit sexual activity, but a second-hand report of an “attempted” seduction, it is included here. This statement is sometimes misquoted as saying the Levi Lewis accused Joseph Smith of trying to seduce Eliza Winters, rather than Lewis quoting Martin Harris.[3]

Unfortunately, the original Levi Lewis affidavit is lost, but it is obvious that the part of the quotation that he “did not show” the golden plates to others, is false, raising suspicions regarding the accuracy of the remaining charges.[4]

The described impropriety would have occurred at least five years earlier than the published report. Regardless, we know nothing more of Levi Lewis’ alleged interactions with Joseph and Martin that purportedly allowed him to witness the two men making declarations that they would later contradict on numerous other occasions throughout their lives. Neither is anything known about the circumstances through which Martin might have become privy to sensitive information regarding Joseph Smith’s alleged immoral behavior with Eliza.

Levi’s recollection might have disappeared from history all together had publisher E. D. Howe not lifted the statement from the Susquehanna Register article and included it in his 1834 book, Mormonism Unveiled. Howe’s book is antagonistic and was likely the first anti-Mormon publication. David J. Whitaker acknowledged: “Howe's naturalistic explanation of Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon became the cornerstone of anti-Mormon writing.”[7]

Levi, the son of Emma’s uncle Nathaniel Lewis, a Methodist minister, was generally friendly to Joseph Smith. However, his brothers were not very kind to him. Historian Mark Nelson has researched the event and reports:

“In 1828 Joseph and Emma placed their names on the rolls of the local Methodist congregation. When Levi's brothers discovered this addition to the congregation they insisted that Joseph either remove his name from the rolls or publicly denounce all of his super-natural claims. Joseph would eventually remove his name.”[8]

It is difficult to pinpoint the time and place where this reported seduction attempt might have occurred. Joseph Smith first visited the area to work for Josiah Stowell for two months in October and November of 1825. He returned again for three months between November of 1826 and January 18, 1827, when he wed Emma. The couple then left for the Smith home in Manchester, New York, staying for eleven months. They made a brief visit to Harmony to be reconciled with Emma’s family in August, and in December of 1828 moved back to Harmony to be close to the Hale family. This stay lasted until June of 1829, which represents that last month the described seduction attempt could have taken place.

Born in Delaware in 1812, Eliza Winters apparently moved to Harmony prior to 1829. I have found no evidence that she interacted with Joseph Smith or his family there, although, one late recollection states that she was a friend of Emma Smith in Harmony, Pennsylvania.[9] The exact location of Eliza Winters during this period is unknown. Mark Nelson provides this history:

Eliza Winters was born in Delaware in 1812 and was married in 1837 in Susquehanna County. I have found no evidence when her family moved to the area but her older sister was married in Harmony in 1829 so it was obviously before then. I have found no evidence that Joseph and Eliza ever interacted although it is probable that they knew each other. Eliza would have been 13 when Joseph first came to Harmony (assuming she lived there in 1825) and 18 when Joseph and Emma moved. Her name first shows up with her encounter with Martin [Harris]… in late 1832.[10]

Concerning the Martin Harris interaction, Mark B. Nelson and Steven C. Harper wrote:

On November 1, 1832, he [Martin Harris] preached to a group of townsfolk, including a single woman named Eliza Ann Winters. She later told the court that Martin loudly denounced her. Picking Winters out of the crowd, Martin allegedly said: “She has had a bastard child.” Whatever the truth of the matter, Winters sued Martin Harris for slander. In her complaint to the court she testified that Martin’s claim of fornication was intended to “render her infamous and scandalous,” soiling her “good name.” She sued for restoration of her reputation and punitive damages of a thousand dollars… Martin left an affidavit with the court. Apparently his absence did not hinder his defense. Judgment was “entered against the plaintiff.” Winters, it appears, was either ‘infamous and scandalous’ before Martin denounced her, or could not convince the court that his words were legally slanderous.[11]

Steven Harper acknowledges that “Joseph was accused of misconduct with Eliza Winters and Harris charged an Eliza Winters with adultery.” But then Harper concludes:

“Given subsequent events and the anti-Mormonism of the area, it seems likely to me that anything substantive with which Joseph could have been branded as adulterous would have been shouted from the housetops. The fact that there is only the Lewis statement suggests to me that there is nothing there. It’s very common... for them to claim knowledge beyond what they themselves know.”[12]

Mark Nelson similarly assessed:

I have concluded that Levi mixed his rumors. Eager to find some pejorative information about Joseph, Levi grabbed onto this mixed rumor and ran with it. Noteworthy is that no other person made this same claim, including Levi's wife, although they all lived in the same neighborhood and were subject to the same slanderous innuendo. Clearly those Harmony individuals quoted by Howe wanted to distance themselves from Joseph and demonstrated their disdain for the prophet, yet none other asserted the claim that Joseph tried to seduce young Eliza Winters. Likewise, neither Eliza nor Benjamin Comfort [her representative in the above-mentioned lawsuit], or any of their family were asked to provide affidavits or statements. If one's goal is to slander Mormonism and its prophet, surely Eliza's testimony of impropriety would have been valuable. Significantly, no statements were gathered from her or any of her family.[13]

Importantly, nearly fifty years later, the seventy-year-old Eliza Winters was interviewed by newspaperman Frederick G. Mather who visited Susquehanna County, Pennsylvania to gather information from Joseph Smith’s former acquaintances. His primary purpose was to obtain derogatory statements regarding the Smith family for publication in an article that was printed weeks later in the Binghamton Republican. [14] In the interview, Mather recorded Eliza saying “Joe Smith never made a convert at Susquehanna, and also that his father-in-law became so incensed by his conduct that he threatened to shoot him if he ever returned.”[15]

Notwithstanding her negative recollections, she failed to make any accusations regarding Joseph Smith’s personal conduct toward her. Mather had created the perfect opportunity for Winters to share any “dirt” she might have remembered, but she said nothing concerning an alleged seduction attempt. Her apparent reticence to incriminate the Prophet on that occasion is puzzling if the Lewis allegation was true.[16] Available evidence regarding Eliza Winters demonstrates she did not easily tolerate abuse, such as Martin Harris’ reported statement that she was the mother of a “bastard child.” Notwithstanding, she apparently had nothing to say to corroborate the Levi Lewis’ accusation either in the 1820s, 1832, or more importantly, in 1880 during an interview designed specifically to air such grievances.

Regarding the charge that Joseph Smith tried to seduce Eliza fifty years earlier, Dan Vogel characterized her apparent silence on the topic as “an accusation she neither confirmed nor denied.”[20] However, if Winters had denied the accusation, Mathers probably would not have included mentioned it in his article, since it did not suit his purposes of disparaging Joseph Smith. The allegation had been reprinted several times so it seems likely that the topic was raised during the interview and Eliza simply refused to validate the statement. It appears that Vogel's assessment goes beyond the evidence.

Summary

The alleged interaction between Joseph Smith and Eliza Winters suffers from numerous problems and weaknesses. The secondhand account is included in a paragraph with blatant falsehoods and itself manifests significant implausibilities.

Even though the Levi Lewis accusation was printed in 1834, successive periodicals and books written during the next decade seldom, if ever, repeated it as evidence against Joseph Smith’s moral character.[17] These two sentences, somewhat hidden at the back of E. D. Howe’s book, were generally neglected for many years by dozens of writers whose obvious goal was to belittle the Prophet.[18] Neither did Levi Lewis repeat it later in his life even though his brothers would recall his statement.[19]

Eliza Winters had two important opportunities to corroborate the allegation, one in 1834 and another in the 1880s and yet available accounts fail to mention it.

Richard L. Bushman summarized the event saying: “One of Emma’s cousins… Levi Lewis, said Martin Harris spoke of Joseph’s attempt to seduce Elizabeth Winters, a friend of Emma’s in Harmony. But the reports are tenuous. Harris said nothing of the event in his many descriptions of Joseph, nor did Winters herself when interviewed much later.”[21]

[1] Dan Vogel, Early Mormon Documents, Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 2002, 4:296.

[2] “Mormonism,” Susquehanna Register, and Northern Pennsylvanian, May 1, 1834 quoted in E. D. Howe, Mormonism Unveiled, Painesville: by the author, 1834, 268-69 and Dan Vogel, Early Mormon Documents, Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 2002, 4:296-97.

[3] See for example, Richard S. Van Wagoner, Mormon Polygamy: A History. Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 1989, 4; George D. Smith, Nauvoo Polygamy: “… but we called it celestial marriage”, Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 2008, 29; Dan Vogel, Early Mormon Documents, Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 2002, 4:296 and Joseph Smith: The Making of a Prophet, Salt Lake City: Signature Book, 2004, 178; Grant H. Palmer, “Sexual allegations against Joseph Smith, 1829-1835,” undated [after 1999], unpublished manuscript, Michael Marquardt Collection, Marriot Library Special Collections, University of Utah, photocopy in possession of the author, page one.

[4] See the “Testimony of the Three Witnesses” and “Testimony of the Eight Witnesses” in the front matter of current editions of the Book of Mormon. In the 1830 version, the testimonies were printed at the end of the book, on pages corresponding to 589-590.

[5] James H. Hunt, Mormonism: Embracing the Origin. Rise and Progress of the sect with an examination of the Book of Mormon, St. Louis: Ustick and Davies, 1844, 9.

[6] Eber D. Howe, Mormonism Unvailed. Painesville, OH: By the Author, 183.

[7] David J. Whitaker, “East of Nauvoo: Benjamin Winchester and the Early Mormon Church,” Journal of Mormon History 21 (Fall 1995) 2:43. [31-83]

[8] Email correspondence from Mark Nelson to the author dated October 17, 2007.

[9] Rhamanthus M. Stocker, Centennial History of Susquehanna County, Pennsylvania, Philadelphia: R. T. Peck and Company, 1887, 557; quoted in Dan Vogel, Early Mormon Documents, Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 2002, 4:346.

[10] Email correspondence from Mark Nelson to the author dated October 17, 2007.

[11] Mark B. Nelson and Steven C. Harper, “The Imprisonment of Martin Harris in 1833,” BYU Studies 45 (Fall 2006): 114–15. [113-19.]

[12] Email correspondence from Steven Harper to the author dated October 15, 2007.

[13] Email correspondence from Mark Nelson to the author dated October 22, 2007.

[14] Dan Vogel, Early Mormon Documents, Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 2002, 4:345.

[15] Quoted in Dan Vogel, Early Mormon Documents, Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 2002, 4:358, see also 314, 297fn3.

[16] Dan Vogel treats Lewis’s report as somewhat credible. See also Dan Vogel, Joseph Smith: The Making of a Prophet (Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 2004), 178, 619; Vogel, Early Mormon Documents, 4:296–97.

[17] The only repetition I have found is in Daniel P. Kidder’s 1842, Mormonism and the Mormons: A Historical View of the Rise and Progress of the Sect Self-Styled Latter-Day Saints. (New York: G. Lane & P. P. Sandford), 34-35. It appears to be the only allegation of sexual impropriety leveled at the Prophet within its 342 pages.

[18] Even John C. Bennett in his 1842 History of the Saints, which contained pages of quotes from E. D. Howe’s book did not repeat the Lewis statement. See John C. Bennett, The History of the Saints: Or an Exposé of Joe Smith and Mormonism. Boston: Leland & Whiting, 1842, 61-84, 115-22

[19] In 1879 a series of letters between Joseph and Hiel Lewis, Levi’s brothers, and RLDS elders in the Amboy Journal. The alleged seduction attempt is mentioned only after two long exchanges. See Dan Vogel, Early Mormon Documents, Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 2002, 4: 314-16 (299-316).

[20] Dan Vogel, Early Mormon Documents, Salt Lake City: Signature Books, 2002, 4:346.

[21] Richard Lyman Bushman, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2005), 323. Bushman continued: “One of Emma’s cousins by marriage, Levi Lewis, said Martin Harris spoke of Joseph’s attempt to seduce Elizabeth Winters, a friend of Emma’s in Harmony. But the reports are tenuous. Harris said nothing of the event in his many descriptions of Joseph, nor did Winters herself when interviewed much later.”