Early Life of Joseph Smith - Work As A Treasure Hunter and Marriage To Emma Hale

Work As A Treasure Hunter and Marriage To Emma Hale

From about 1819, Smith regularly practiced scrying, a form of divination in which a "seer" looked into a seer stone to receive supernatural knowledge. Smith usually practiced crystal gazing by putting a stone at the bottom of a white stovepipe hat, putting his face over the hat to block the light, then divining information from the stone. Smith and his father achieved "something of a mysterious local reputation in the profession—mysterious because there is no record that they ever found anything despite the readiness of some local residents to pay for their efforts."

One Joseph Capron, who lived near the Smiths, said that Joseph had "discovered ghosts, infernal spirits, mountains of gold and silver, and many other invaluable treasures deposited in the earth. He would often tell his neighbors of his wonderful discoveries." Joseph's uncle, Jesse Smith, said that Joseph had told him he had "eyes to see things that are not" and that "the angel of the Lord" had put him "in possession of great wealth, gold & silver and precious stones." Smith told one Jonathan Thompson that he had discovered the two Indians who had buried a trunk of treasure and that one of them continued to guard it. A childhood friend, Lorenzo Saunders, said that while digging in a hill, Smith said he could "see a man sitting in a gold chair." W. R. Hine said Smith had told him that he had seen Captain Kidd sailing on the Susquehanna River at flood tide and that he also "saw writing cut on the rocks in an unknown language" telling where Kidd had buried his treasure.

In late 1825, Joseiah Stowell, a well-to-do farmer from South Bainbridge, Chenango County, New York, who had been searching for a lost Spanish mine near Harmony Township, Susquehanna County, Pennsylvania with another seer, traveled to Manchester to hire Smith "on account of having heard that he possessed certain keys, by which he could discern things invisible to the natural eye."

Smith agreed to take the job of assisting Stowell and Hale, and he and his father worked with the Stowell-Hale team for approximately one month, attempting, according to their contract, to locate "a valuable mine of either Gold or Silver and also...coined money and bars or ingots of Gold or Silver". Smith boarded with an Isaac Hale (a relative of William Hale), and fell in love with Isaac Hale's daughter Emma, a schoolteacher he would later marry in 1827. Isaac Hale, however, disapproved of their relationship and of Smith in general. According to an unsupported account by Hale, Smith attempted to locate the mine by burying his face in a hat containing the seer stone; however, as the treasure hunters got close to their objective, Smith said that an enchantment became so strong that Smith could no longer see it., The failed project disbanded on November 17, 1825; however, Smith continued to work for Stowell on other matters until 1826.

In 1826 Smith was arrested and tried in Bainbridge, New York, on the complaint of Stowell's nephew who accused Smith of being "a disorderly person and an imposter." Court records show that Smith, identified as "The Glass Looker," stood before the court on March 20, 1826, on a warrant for an unspecified misdemeanor charge, and that the judge issued a mittimus for Smith to be held, either during or after the proceedings. Although Smith's associate Oliver Cowdery (who had not met Smith as of 1826) later stated that Smith was "honorably acquitted," the result of the proceeding is unclear, with some eye-witnesses (including the court reporter) claiming he was found guilty, others claiming he was "condemned" but "designedly allowed to escape," and yet others claiming he was "discharged" for lack of evidence.

By November 1826, Josiah Stowell could no longer afford to continue searching for buried treasure; Smith traveled to Colesville, New York, for a few months to work for Joseph Knight, Sr., one of Stowell's friends. There are reports that Smith directed further excavations on Knight's property and at other locations around Colesville. Smith later commented on his working as a treasure hunter: "'Was not Joseph Smith a money digger?' Yes, but it was never a very profitable job for him, as he only got fourteen dollars a month for it."

Because Smith had been unable to gain Isaac Hale's approval, he and Emma Hale Smith eloped to South Bainbridge on January 18, 1827, after which Joseph and Emma went to live with Smith's parents in Manchester, New York.