544 - 547
President's Office,
G. Salt Lake City,
April 1Oth, 1865.
President's Daniel H. Wells and Brigham Young, Jr.,
Dear Brethren:
I take pleasure in introducing to you Brother Anthony Godbe, a brother of Wm. S. Godbe, Esq., who intends visiting England on business.
Our Annual Conference, convened on Thursday, the 6th instant and adjourned yesterday (Sunday) afternoon. To-day we have held a convention for the regulation of the prices of produce-- the last Fall's Convention having adjourned until the day after this Spring Conference.
The prices which were adopted last Fall were sustained and adopted by motion by to-day's Convention. After this business was finished, the Convention was adjourned and was resolved into a Special Conference for the appointment of a number of Elders on Missions and the transaction of some business connected with the erection of a line of Telegraph from St Charles in the North (Bear Lake Valley,) to St George in the South. A motion was made to sustain this Measure, and, judging by the reports which have already reached here from some of the Wards, there will be but little difficulty in carrying it out.
Our Conference has been a splendid one, and has been highly enjoyed by all the Elders and Saints. Excellent instructions have been given, which cannot fail to be of benefit to the people. Reproofs and warnings have been dealt out under the influence of the Spirit with a power that will be, we trust, irresistibly convincing to all the honest. Merchants, lawyers, and speculators of every kind, have been reproved and warned with more than ordinary energy and plainness. The condition of many of these classes required something more than kind entreaties and soft speeches to properly awaken them to a sense of the imminency of their danger. These have been tried in vain, and the time had come for something stronger to be used. A Motion was made and carried that the City Council of this City and other Cities throughout the Territory abolish all liquor saloons, or places where liquor is sold, as fast as circumstances will permit, by ceasing to grant licenses for such <such> purposes.
A motion was also made, and carried with the usual unanimity, that we would do all in our power to push forward and complete the new Tabernacle. The importance of Home Manufactures was dwelt upon at some length and urged upon the people. An organization of the Sisters against purchasing goods at the stores was suggested, and advocated as a measure that would be fraught with great results. The preservation of our grain also received attention. Altogether, the time spent in Conference was well spent, and we had a joyful time.
In the teachings of this Conference there have been evidences afforded to the world of the divinity of this work which must be irresistible to the honest mind. Had such reproofs been given in the midst of any other people, as they have been given in the midst of the Saints, the community would have been split to pieces. No Gentile Community in the world would bear them. But here is calm and peaceful, and all, so far as we know, feel to appreciate the reproofs and are thankful to the Lord that he has bestowed His Holy Preisthood upon man by which he is enabled to warn and teach his fellow-man. Yet men say this people is a deluded people and their religion is an imposture! What folly! We are now beholding a spectacle of moral power exercised by the Preisthood of the living God such as the world has not witnessed since the days the Apostles. Here are men, called suddenly, at a moment's warning, to take Missions to the Nations of the earth to preach the Gospel, cheerfully accepting that call and stepping forward, not only without murmuring but joyfully, to respond to it, and closing up their business and preparing to take leave of their families for years to preach in strange lands the message of salvation which is despised by so many! Men may sneer, and they affect to despise the Saints, but there is a power and other qualities manifested by us which feel them with wonder when they behold them exhibited, and they feel a fear which makes them hate us. Glory be to God for the restoration of His Spirit and power again to the earth through which all these mighty works are wrought!
I expect you will be very joyful to read the accompanying names of Missionaries who have been selected to go to labor under your direction. In selecting them we have had in view the strengthening of your hands. You have a goodly number of young men in your field, we now send you principally men of experience. Besides these brethren selected for Europe we are sending twelve Elders to the Sandwich Islands. The names of the Missionaries appointed to Europe I send herewith.
Our Spring is very backward, and there has been but little ploughing done yet. We will, nevertheless, have good fruit and grain crops this season. I have been enabled to encourage the Saints by giving them a promise in the Name of the Lord that this will be the case
Your families are well, as are the people generally. With love to yourselves and your wives and the Elders with you, in which President Kimball and the Twelve who are here join, and praying God our Eternal Father, to bless and preserve you, to give you every qualification that you may need for the magnifying of your high callings and to bring you in safety home again, I remain,
as ever Your Brother,
Brigham Young
548
Names of Missionaries for Europe
Great Britain.
William Gibson
Francis A. Brown
W. B. Preston
Judson L. Stodard
Harvey Cluff
Wm. S. Warren
Leonard Rice
Aurelius Miner
Stephen H. Hale
Joseph S. Horne
Wm. R. Smith
William H. Hooper
Charles W. Penrose
John Hoagland
A. K. Thurber
William A. McMaster Sr.
Ezra James Clark
James McGaw
John Barker
Nathaniel H. Felt
Richard K. Birkbeck
Guernsey Brown
Wales
Abel Evans
John Parry
Richard J. Davis
Elias Morris
Barry Wride
Griffeth Roberts
Scandinavia
Fred. C. Anderson'
Niels Nielsen
Jens Hansen
Niels Wilhelmensen
Saamund Gudmansen
C. 0. Folkman
C. C. A. Christensen Hans Jensen
Lauritz Larsen
J. Fagerberg
E. Ludricksen
Lars P Edholm'
Gustav Olson
Christen Christensen Soren Iversen
Peter Hansen
Lars Hansen
C. D. Feildsted
O. C. Olsen
Martin Lund
Andrew Neilsen