Hiram Kimball and Lorenzo Wasson: The Last Messengers to Joseph Smith Before the Martyrdom

Hiram S. Kimball (1806–1863) was a Nauvoo businessman and later member of the Church whose wife, Sarah Granger Kimball, was a founding figure of the Relief Society. Though Hiram was not yet a baptized member at the time of the martyrdom events, he played a pivotal role in one of the most sacred and sorrowful moments of Church history.

Lorenzo D. Wasson (1819–1857) was the eldest son of Emma Smith's sister, Elizabeth Hale Wasson. He was baptized on March 20, 1842, making him one of the first of Emma's extended family to join the Church. He lived for a time with Joseph and Emma Smith in Nauvoo.

In late June 1844, when Joseph Smith had crossed the Mississippi River to Iowa to consider fleeing to the West rather than surrendering at Carthage, Emma Smith sent Hiram Kimball and her nephew Lorenzo Wasson to find him and urge him to return. They carried a letter from Emma, and Reynolds Cahoon accompanied them. The messengers found Joseph across the river and delivered Emma's plea.

Reynolds Cahoon also reminded Joseph of a prophecy Joseph himself had made: that any man who took his life in his hands and started west would be considered a coward. Faced with this reminder and with Emma's appeal through Hiram Kimball and Lorenzo Wasson, Joseph turned back. He said: 'If my life is of no value to my friends, it is of none to myself.'

This mission by Kimball and Wasson was among the last human interactions Joseph Smith had before he rode toward Carthage. Within days, he was dead. Their errand, intended to save him, led him to the martyrdom that sealed his testimony with his blood — making their act one of the most consequential and bittersweet errands in all of Church history.