SUSPICIONS OF TREACHERY.

AS early as January, 1842, Joseph, as lieutenant-general of the Legion, issued orders for a general military parade and review of the Legion to take place on the seventh of May following. A subsequent order, issued in April, marking out the programme for the day's exercises, contained the following clause:

At three o'clock p. m. the cohorts will separate and form in line of battle, the brigadiers assume their respective commands, and General Law's command [cavalry] will make a descent upon that of General Rich's [cohort C, infantry] in order of sham battle.

The lieutenant-general had invited the consolidated staff of the Legion to partake of a repast militaire on the occasion, at his house.

On the morning of the day appointed for the drill and review two thousand troops were in the field; and an immense concourse of spectators, both of Saints and strangers. Such was the interests taken in the movement of the people of Nauvoo, that a number of the prominent men of the State within reach of the city attended the review. Judge Stephen A. Douglass adjourned the circuit court, then in session at the county seat, Carthage, in order to attend. As soon as the lieutenant-general heard of the presence of Judge Douglass, he sent him an invitation to attend the military dinner given at his house, which the judge accepted.

It was a glorious day, passing off without noise or disorder; and even the strangers expressed themselves as highly satisfied with what they had witnessed. But even during the brightest days clouds will sometimes drift across the sun's disc: so in the moments of man's supreme happiness, it often occurs that shadows arise to alarm his fears, and remind him how fleeting are the joys of this life—

Some drops of joy with draughts of ill between;
Some gleams of sunshine 'mid renewing storms,

are all that he may hope for. So was it with the principal founder of Nauvoo on the day of the sham battle. When the respective cohorts were drawn up in line of battle, facing each other, Major-General John C. Bennett rode up to General Smith and asked him to lead the charge of the first cohort, but Joseph declined. He next asked him to take a position in the rear of the cavalry without his staff during the engagement, but against this Captain A. P. Rockwood, the commander of Joseph's life guard, objected, and Joseph with his staff chose his own position.

Of this incident—and it is for this reason that I have referred to this parade and sham battle—Joseph remarks:

If General Bennett's true feelings towards me are not made manifest to the world in a very short time then it may be possible that the gentle breathings of that Spirit which whispered to me on parade that there was mischief in that sham battle, were false; a short time will determine the point. Let John C. Bennett answer at the day of judgment, Why did you request me to command one of the cohorts, and also to take my position without my staff, during the sham battle on the seventh of May, 1842, where my life might have been forfeited and no man have known who did the deed?

This is about the first intimation that we have in any of The Church records of John C. Bennett's disaffection towards Joseph or The Church. Two years before he had come to Nauvoo—then Commerce—filled with that fiery zeal "for the holy faith" which is only known to the newly-made convert. He was a man of considerable learning and ability, and devoted himself assiduously to bring to pass the prosperity of Nauvoo. He was of great service to Joseph as a lieutenant, and the Prophet was wont to say of him that he was about the first man he had about him who could do exactly what he wanted done, the way it should be done, and who would do it at once. In training the Legion and assisting in the drafting of the Nauvoo and other charters, he had rendered invaluable service; and had he possessed qualities of heart equal to those of his mind, he was calculated to have been a valuable acquisition to the city of Nauvoo. Nor am I willing to believe that his motives in uniting himself with The Church were altogether evil, notwithstanding his life previous to his joining The Church was immoral. I am quite willing to believe that when he came to the Saints it was his determination to reform and win for himself an honorable standing among his fellow-men; but the evil habits he had contracted were too strong for his will, and he sought the gratification of his lusts which led to his fall.

Soon after he settled at Nauvoo, he paid his addresses to a respectable young lady of the city, and she, believing him to be an honorable man, accepted them, and he promised to marry her. In the meantime, however, Joseph had received information from the vicinity of Bennett's former residence to the effect that the doctor was a wicked man, and that he had a wife and several children in McConnellsville, Morgan County, Ohio—a thing the doctor had kept concealed. Learning this, Joseph persuaded him to discontinue his attentions to the young lady; but he soon renewed them; whereupon Joseph threatened to expose him if he did not desist, which, to all appearances, had the desired effect.

Being foiled in his advances toward this young lady, and finding that Joseph stood like a lion in his path to prevent the accomplishment of his evil designs and protect the unsuspecting, he drew around him a covering of hypocrisy, carefully concealed his movements from the Prophet, and proceeded to teach some women, who only knew him as an honorable man, that promiscuous intercourse of the sexes was a doctrine believed in by the Latter-day Saints, and that there was no harm in it. In his first efforts he was unsuccessful; but in his subsequent advice, in the same line, he told them that Joseph and others of The Church authorities both sanctioned and practiced this wickedness, saying that the Prophet only denounced such things so vehemently in public, because of the prejudice of the people and the trouble it might create in his own house. In this manner he succeeded in overcoming the scruples of some of his dupes, and seduced several females. Nor did the evil end here. Bennett induced other men to adopt his evil practices; among them Francis M. and Chauncy L. Higbee. These men repeated the assertions made by the doctor, and thus the evil spread, and the reputation of the Prophet was being undermined.

But evils of this character cannot long be practiced without coming to light, and Doctor Bennett, finding that his corruption was about to be uncovered, began to prepare for the shock. When confronted with positive evidence that it was known that he had a wife and family, and that his seductions were also known, he attempted suicide by taking poison, and resisted the administration of antidotes, but he was rescued from this fate in spite of himself.

Before his evil course was known, arrangements were made to run the doctor for representative from the district in which Nauvoo was included, to the State legislature. But one day Joseph met the doctor in the presence of Squire Wells, and addressed him in substance as follows: "Doctor, I can sustain you no longer. Hyrum is against you, the Twelve are against you, and if I do not come out against sin and iniquity I shall myself be trodden under foot as a Prophet of God." That sentence sounded the death knell to the standing of Dr. Bennett in Nauvoo. Joseph had clung to him in the hope of reforming him, but that could no longer be expected; and when the Prophet let go his hold upon him, there was nothing could avert his downfall.

On the nineteenth of May Bennett resigned his position as mayor and Joseph was elected to that office. On this occasion, and before the whole city council, Joseph asked Doctor Bennett if he had anything against him, to which the doctor replied:

I know what I am about, and the heads of The Church know what they are about, I expect; I have no difficulty with the heads of The Church. I publicly avow that if any one has said that I have stated that General Joseph Smith has given me authority to hold illicit intercourse with women he is a liar in the face of God. Those who have said it are damned liars; they are infernal liars. He never either in public or private gave me any such authority or license, and any person who states it is a scoundrel and a liar. * * * I intend to continue with you, and hope the time may come when I may be restored to full confidence and fellowship, and my former standing in The Church, and that my conduct may be such as to warrant my restoration, and should the time ever come that I may have the opportunity to test my faith, it will then be known whether I am a traitor or a true man.

Joseph—Will you please state definitely whether you know anything against my character, either in public or private.

Doctor Bennett—I do not. In all my intercourse with General Smith in public and in private he has been strictly virtuous.

In addition to this statement before the city council, Doctor Bennett made affidavit before Squire Wells to the same effect as the above.

On the twenty-sixth of May, the case of Bennett came up in the Masonic lodge, of which the doctor was a member, as were also nearly all the principal men of Nauvoo. In the presence of one hundred of the fraternity, he confessed his licentious practices, and acknowledged that he was worthy of the severest chastisement, yet he pleaded for mercy, and especially that he might not be published in the papers. So deep, apparently, was his sorrow, that Joseph pleaded for mercy in his behalf, and he was forgiven as a Mason; but previous to this, the First Presidency of The Church, the Twelve and the Bishop had sent a formal notice to him that they could not fellowship him as a member of The Church, but they withheld the matter from publication, at his earnest solicitation, because of his mother.

John C. Bennett, however, had fallen too far to recover from the effects of his deep transgression. He suddenly left Nauvoo, and soon afterward was found plotting with the enemies of the Saints for the destruction of The Church. By this time the Masonic lodge found that he was an expelled Mason, and had palmed himself off on the Nauvoo lodge as a Mason in regular standing, consequently he was disfellowshiped from the Nauvoo lodge, and was also cashiered by the court-martial of the Nauvoo Legion; and thus plucked of all his glory, he was left to wander as a vagabond and an outcast among men.

After he so suddenly left Nauvoo, he again said that the Prophet Joseph had authorized and encouraged sexual wickedness, and when confronted with his own affidavit, which declared Joseph to be a virtuous man, and a teacher of righteousness, and upright both in his public and private character, he claimed that he was under duress when he made that affidavit. But Squire Wells, before whom he had qualified to make his sworn statement, went before a justice of the peace, and made affidavit that during the time that this development of his wickedness was going on, and he making statements favorable to Joseph and The Church, that—

During all this time, if he (Doctor Bennett) was under duress or fear, he must have had a good faculty of concealing it; for he was at liberty to go and come when and where he pleased, so far as I am capable of judging.

Squire Wells further testifies in the same statement:

I was always personally friendly with him, after I became acquainted with him. I never heard him say anything derogatory to the character of Joseph Smith, until after he had been exposed by said Smith on the public stand in Nauvoo.

So soon as it was learned that the doctor had left Nauvoo, and was operating for the destruction of The Church, the whole case was published in the Nauvoo papers, and his corruption made known to the world. Those whom he had involved in his vile snares, both men and women, were brought before the proper tribunals of The Church; some of them were disfellowshiped, and others who sincerely repented were forgiven.

The only description I have seen of Doctor Bennett is given in the Essex County Washingtonian, published in Salem, Massachusetts, and that is contained in the issue of the fifteenth of September, 1842. According to that description he was a man five feet nine inches high, well formed, black hair sprinkled with grey, dark complexion, a rather thin face, and black, restless eyes.

The fall of Doctor Bennett added another evidence to the fact that neither natural nor acquired attainments, however brilliant they may be, can secure one a safe standing in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, when not accompanied with righteousness of life. Moreover, experience has proven that to brilliancy of intellect highly cultivated, may be added inspired dreams, visions, the revelations of God, and the visitation of angels—and yet, if the daily life and conversation runs not hand in hand with righteousness, these things furnish at best but an insecure foundation on which to stand.