Chapter Eight

GATHERING TO OHIOThe Newel K. Whitney store, located at the fourcorners area in Kirtland, was built between 1826and 1827. Many important things took placethere, including the following:1. Joseph and Emma Smith lived therebeginning in the fall of 1832.2. The store became the headquarters of theChurch.3. Joseph Smith III was born there on6 November 1832.4. The School of the Prophets, whichcommenced on 24 January 1833 and endedsometime in April, was held there.5. Many revelations were given there to theProphet Joseph Smith, including Doctrine andCovenants 84, 87–89, 95, and 98.6. For a time the store was used as thebishops’ storehouse.7. Joseph Smith completed much of thetranslation of the Bible there.In 1979 the Church acquired the Newel K.Whitney store and soon after began to restore it.The building was dedicated 25 August 1984 byPresident Gordon B. Hinckley.amazed merchant that back in New York he had seen Newel in a visionpraying for him to come to Kirtland. 5 The Whitneys received Joseph andEmma Smith with kindness and invited them to live temporarily with them.During the next several weeks the Smiths “received every kindness andattention which could be expected, and especially from Sister Whitney.” 6Between the end of January and the middle of May 1831, most of theNew York Saints sold their possessions, packed their most precious materialgoods, and migrated to Kirtland and the adjacent areas. Joseph Smith and afew others went early and were followed by three separate companies—theColesville Saints, members from Fayette and surrounding locations inSeneca County, and those from Palmyra-Manchester. A few others camelater in the year.The Colesville branch was the first group to leave. They arrived in Buffaloon 1 May to find that bitter lake winds had blown ice into the Buffalo harbor,which delayed them for eleven dreary days. They finally arrived in Fairport,Ohio, on 14 May. Over two hundred people went to Ohio, some by sleigh andstage coach, but most by canal barges to Buffalo and then by steamboatsand schooners on Lake Erie.Meanwhile Church members in the Fayette vicinity also prepared formigration. With her older sons and husband already gone, Lucy Smith, anatural leader in her own right, organized a party of about fifty people (twentyadults and thirty children) to occupy a barge on the Cayuga and Seneca Canal.Another group of about thirty, organized by Thomas B. Marsh, took passage onan accompanying barge, and together the two boats traveled to Buffalo.En route, Lucy “called the brethren and sisters together, and remindedthem that we were traveling by the commandment of the Lord, as much asFather Lehi was, when he left Jerusalem; and, if faithful, we had the same91