1900-07-Improvement Era-The Only Surviving Son of Sidney Rigdon

Improvement Era, July 1900, pp. 696-698

The Only Surviving Son of Sidney Rigdon

Among the recent visitors to Salt Lake City, not one has attracted more interest, from early members of The Church, than John W. Rigdon of New York City, the only surviving son of Sidney Rigdon who was one of the early workers in the cause of God, and once the first counselor to the Prophet Joseph. Patriarch John Smith and John W. Rigdon were school companions in Nauvoo, and Mr. Rigdon also knew President Lorenzo Snow. His object in coming to Utah was to call upon some of his old-time friends. On Saturday, May 19, he visited with President Lorenzo Snow, and spent some time in the President's office. Mr. Rigdon is a pleasant gentleman, well on in years, having been born in Mentor, Ohio, in 1830. His hair and mustache are white. He has a thin face, a round, full voice, bright eyes, and a nervous, sensitive nature. In manner, he is very affable; in conversation, ready and intelligent. He stands erect, and his rather tall but thin form lends him a dignified bearing. He carried as a souvenir a cane which had been taken from the oaken boxes in which the bodies of Joseph and Hyrum were brought from Carthage to Nauvoo, after the martyrdom.

That Mr. Rigdon is by profession a lawyer was evidenced by his ready logic, and the ease in which he gave expression to his sentiments. In speaking of old scenes in and about Nauvoo, he was several times affected to tears, especially was this the case when the later lonely and brooding life of his father was referred to, and when he spoke of his own early days in Nauvoo: "In Nauvoo were the happiest days of my life," he said. "When I went to Pennsylvania, I was a stranger, and I became very homesick for Nauvoo. I think the people ought never to have left Nauvoo; but then, it was, perhaps, for the best."

On entering the President's office, President Snow introduced Mr. Rigdon to several who were present, and in so doing called him Brother Rigdon, which apparently intentional slip he partly corrected by remarking, "Mr. Rigdon says he is a half 'Mormon.' " To this the visitor, quickly awakening as if his whole nervous force were called upon in the effort, replied: "I am a 'Mormon' this far: I believe in the early 'Mormonism.' I believe Joseph Smith found the plates of that Book of Mormon, when, where and in the manner he claimed he did. I know my father never wrote the book. He never varied in telling the story of how Joseph obtained it. He always related it in the same way, and I believe he told the truth. At one time," he continued, "I had doubts about this, but I have come to know these facts, although I might not be able to prove them as I could prove some other things. When I went to father just before his death, and told him that if he knew anything regarding the coming forth of the Book of Mormon, that had not been told, he owed it as a duty to himself and his family, to tell it, he reiterated that he had but one story to tell, and that was the story told him by the Prophet Joseph Smith, that the records from which the book was taken were engraved on gold plates. Father then testified to me that Joseph was a prophet of God, and that an angel had handed him the plates from which was taken the Book of Mormon. I believe this testimony, although for a long time I was skeptical about it. So far, I am a 'Mormon,' and my heart is with your people. So was my father's; he never permitted any man in his presence to speak disrespectfully of The Church."

Speaking of his baptism he seemed proud of having been baptized by Hyrum Smith, the patriarch, in the presence of his own father and the Prophet Joseph. "I was sick, he said, "and I remember well how father, who was one of those positive men, came in one morning and said, 'Well boys, you are to be baptized today.' Sick as I was, I knew it was no use resisting, and so was taken and baptized in the river. I quickly recovered thereafter." He related other interesting experiences incident to his boyhood life in The Church which were corroborated by Patriarch Smith and deeply enjoyed by the other listeners.

Mr. Rigdon has been in Utah once before, having crossed the plains with an ox team in 1863. He then called on President Young, who urged him to ask his father to come and reside in Salt Lake. He wrote his father to this effect, but the invitation was never accepted. Mr. Rigdon has a wife, two daughters and a son. His son, who resides in California, has visited Salt Lake City, on other occasions.

Speaking of his father, Mr. Rigdon, in a later interview affirmed that the two points on which his father hung out were polygamy and the accession of Brigham Young to the leadership of The Church, and although he never recovered from the humiliation, and spent the remainder of his days in silence, whenever The Church was assailed, the old fire would kindle in his eyes, he would become animated, and the assailant would soon retire a thoroughly whipped man.