David Whitmer

Son of the Fayette household where the translation was completed, one of the Three Witnesses, and one of the two men directed in 1829 to search out the Twelve.

David Whitmer (1805–1888) brought Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery to his father’s farm at Fayette in June 1829, where the translation was finished. Within the month he was one of the Three Witnesses, and a revelation had given him and Cowdery a task this site treats at length: to search out the Twelve.

Background

Born 7 January 1805 near Harrisburg, Dauphin County, Pennsylvania, to Peter Whitmer Sr. and Mary Musselman. The family moved to western New York shortly after his birth.

1829

Arranged for the translation to be completed at his father’s home in Fayette in June, and was baptized by Joseph Smith in Seneca Lake. One of the Three Witnesses, and named with Oliver Cowdery in the June 1829 revelation directing them to search out the Twelve.

1830

Among the six original members at the organization on 6 April, when he was ordained an elder.

1831

Married Julia Ann Jolly on 9 January, and moved from Fayette to Kirtland. Ordained a high priest by Oliver Cowdery at Orange, Ohio, on 25 October, and traveled to Jackson County, Missouri, with Harvey G. Whitlock.

1833

Driven from Jackson County with the other Saints in November, and settled in Clay County.

1834

Was living in Clay County when this site’s record ends in May.

Reading the record

Whitmer’s name connects the two foundations this site traces: the witnesses of 1829 and the organized church of 1830. The June 1829 charge to him and Cowdery to search out the Twelve tied the witnesses to the church’s future structure before the church itself existed.

After 1834

He was appointed president of the church in Missouri in July 1834, left the church in 1838, and died at Richmond, Missouri, in 1888. The Joseph Smith Papers biography covers the rest of his life.

Biographical details follow the biographical entry for David Whitmer in the Joseph Smith Papers, checked against the dated documents cited on this site’s chronology pages. This page links out to primary sources rather than reproducing them at length.