Hiram Page
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Hiram Page (1800–1852), was an early member of the Latter Day Saint movement and one of the Eight Witnesses to the Book of Mormon's Golden Plates.
On November 10, 1825, Page married Catherine Whitmer, daughter of Peter Whitmer, Sr. and Mary Musselman. The two had nine children together: John, Elizabeth, Philander, Mary, Peter, Nancy, Hiram, Oliver, and Kate.
Page became one of the Eight Witnesses during June of 1829. He and Catherine were baptized on April 11, 1830, by Oliver Cowdery. On June 9, he was ordained a teacher in the church, one of the first twelve officers.
While Page was living with the Whitmers in Fayette, New York, Joseph Smith, Jr. arrived in August of 1830 to discover Hiram using a "seerstone" to receive revelations for the church. The only available detail about the stone was that it was black. The revelations were regarding the organization and location of Zion. Oliver Cowdery and the Whitmer family (and probably others) believed the revelations Page had received were true. In response, Joseph Smith received a revelation during the conference in September of that year to have Oliver Cowdery go to Hiram and convince him that his revelations are of the devil (Doctrine and Covenants, Covenant 28:11). At the conference, there is considerable discussion on the topic. Hiram agreed to discard the stone and the revelations he received and join in following Joseph Smith as the sole revelator for the church. The members present confirmed this unanimously with a vote. Later, the stone was ground to powder and the revelations purportedly received through it were burned.
Page's use of a seerstone was not unusual in the early Latter-day Saint movement. Joseph Smith, Sr. was observed peering into a hat to locate treasure. Joseph Smith, Jr., the leader of the Mormons, not only used seerstones in the pursuit of treasures and lost objects, but he also translated much of the Book of Mormon with the aid of a seerstone. Oliver Cowdery used a short wooden rod, which Smith called 'the gift of Aaron,' to receive his own revelations.[1] Other members of the young church had been companions in Joseph's treasure digging enterprises. One noteworthy example is Luman Walters, a local physician and treasure seer who had received his advanced education in Europe. The confluence of seers and instruments of divination in the early Latter-day Saint movement is reminiscent of the prominence of rodsmen in the apocalyptic community led by Nathaniel Wood in Connecticut.
In May of 1831, Page moved his family to Thompson, Ohio, under Lucy Mack Smith's direction. He again moved his family to Jackson County, Missouri in 1832 and joined the Latter Day Saints gathering there. With the other Whitmers, they formed a cluster of ten or twelve homes called the "Whitmer Settlement". Hiram owned 120 acres (486,000 m²) of land in the area.
During the growing anti-Mormon hostilities in Jackson County, Page was severely beaten by a group of non-Mormon vigilantes on October 31, 1833. On July 31 and August 6, 1834 he testified to the facts of the beatings. By 1834 he and his family were expelled along with the other Latter Day Saints, and lived for a time in neighboring Clay County, before moving to Far West.
Page and other members of the Whitmer family were excommunicated from the Latter Day Saint church in 1838. He later bought a farm in Excelsior Springs, back in Clay County.
William E. M'Lellin baptized Hiram Page, David Whitmer, John Whitmer, and Jacob Whitmer on September 6, 1847 into his newly formed Church of Christ. William ordained Hiram a high priest in the church. Hiram participated in the subsequent ordinations of the others.
He died on his farm in Excelsior Springs on August 12, 1852, still affirming his testimony of the Book of Mormon. The cause of death was his wagon turning over, crushing him underneath.
A commemorative marker was placed April 27, 2002, on the rediscovered Hiram Page grave, near Excelsior Springs, Missouri.
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- ^ Doctrine & Covenants 8:6-7 refers to this "gift of Aaron"
