“A little more misbehavior from the [Saints], and the torch which is now already lighted will be applied, the City may be reduced to ashes and extermination would inevitably follow; and it gave one great pain to think that there was danger of so many innocent women and children being exterminated..” — Thomas Ford¹

Thomas Ford was the governor of Illinois from 1842 to 1846.² He played a significant role in the events leading to the deaths of Joseph and Hyrum Smith in 1844. Ford promised to protect the Smith brothers from mob violence if they went to Carthage to await trial, but he disbanded most of the militia and only left the hostile Carthage Greys to guard them.³ This decision left the brothers vulnerable to the mob attack that ultimately claimed their lives. On the day of the martyrdom, Ford was in Nauvoo, where he criticized the Saints for their role in the destruction of the Nauvoo Expositor, blamed them for the escalating conflict, and threatened to hold them responsible.³ He died from tuberculosis six years after the events in Nauvoo.⁴ Ford's posthumous work, A History of Illinois, published in 1854, provides a detailed account of the state’s politics during his tenure, including his views on the events in Nauvoo.⁵

1. History, 1838–1856, volume F-1, 186, josephsmithpapers.org

2. “Ford, Thomas,” josephsmithpapers.org

3. Saints, Volume 1, Chapter 44, 544-548

4. Robert P. Howard, Mostly Good and Competent Men: Illinois Governors, 1818-1988., 87, archive.org

5. Thomas Ford, A History of Illinois, from Its Commencement as a State in 1818 to 1847, archive.org