1856-09-11-Independent-Mormons in New Jersey

Mormons in New Jersey

Independent, 11 September 1856, p. 291 c. 5

Mormons in New-Jersey.—A correspondent of the Mount Holly Mirror, N. J., writing from Hornerstown, Ocean county, of that State, says there is a large body of Mormons in that vicinity.

Meetings are held there every week in a Mormon church, and usually attended by about fifty persons—some twenty or thirty having emigrated a few months since to Salt Lake City. The shepherd of the flock was one Curtis, known as Elder Curtis—a tailor. He appeared to be well posted in the creed of his church, and professed to be a firm believer in the genuineness of the Prophet Joe Smith. He was one of the large number who left for Nauvoo during the first excitement produced by the advent and preaching of Mormonism. Returning, however, after the destruction of that city, he again settled in Hornerstown—where he continued to practice the duties of his eldership until November last, when he died suddenly.

The Saint upon whom the mantle of Elder Curtis seems to have fallen, is an Englishman by birth, named Richard Traceder, who emigrated to America after his conversion to the faith.

The society has embraced a number of respectable and wealthy farmers of this neighborhood; but now new converts are seldom made, and, with emigration and the constant falling from grace, the number is gradually dwindling down, and a few years will witness the entire extinction of Mormonism in the section of Monmouth and Ocean counties.