A Bright Light Appears Between Joseph Smith and His Executioners — They Cannot Move to Shoot

Joseph Hovey was an eyewitness to the events surrounding the martyrdom, and he recorded a remarkable account of what happened at Carthage Jail on 27 June 1844.

After Joseph Smith fell from the window, the mob took his body and propped it up against the well curb. The ringleader commanded: 'Shoot him----, damn him.'

Hovey recorded:

'But those men could not obey the command for they could not stir a hand or foot to shoot. The witness states that at the time the command was given to shoot by the captain of the mob, he, the witness, saw a bright light pass between the Prophet Joseph and the perpetrators. It, therefore, gave them a shock sufficient to disable them to move. They were taken by the mob and put in their buggies and hurried off at great speed.'

Brother Willard Richards, the only member of the Twelve present and the only one uninjured, also recorded: 'it was by the power of God that he remained unharmed for the bullets flew in all directions.'