Caleb Baldwin: A Liberty Jail Companion of Joseph Smith and Pioneer of 1848

Caleb Baldwin (born September 2, 1791, Nobletown, New York) was an early Latter-day Saint and a faithful friend of the Prophet Joseph Smith. After his baptism he served a mission to Illinois with Levi Jackman (1835), establishing a branch of the Church near Clear Creek. In the dark Missouri winter of 1838–39, Caleb Baldwin was one of the handful of Saints imprisoned with the Prophet in Liberty Jail—sharing that pit of suffering where Joseph Smith received the revelation now recorded as Doctrine and Covenants 121–122. Of his fellow prisoners the Prophet counted Brother Baldwin a 'noble friend.' After the Saints' expulsion from Missouri and from Nauvoo, Caleb crossed the plains as a pioneer of 1848. His life—from Clear Creek missionary, to Liberty Jail prisoner, to 1848 pioneer—is a faithful witness of a Saint who walked beside the Prophet in his darkest hour and still gathered to Zion.

Fuller account of this event (as retold in Within the Walls of Liberty Jail, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints):

On December 1, 1838, a Latter-day Saint named Caleb Baldwin was incarcerated in the lower level of Liberty Jail in Clay County, Missouri, on charges of “crimes of High Treason.” His prison companions included members of the First Presidency of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints: Joseph Smith, Hyrum Smith, and Sidney Rigdon, as well as Lyman Wight and Alexander McRae. The men had been arrested in the aftermath of the Mormon War in Missouri. After a preliminary hearing in Richmond, Missouri, Judge Austin A. King ordered the men to be taken to Liberty Jail, as the jails in the counties where the alleged crimes occurred were not large enough for so many prisoners. Baldwin’s two-page appeal evidenced his desperate desire to be reunited with his family, who had “been driven out of the State since his confinement without any means for their support.” In addition, Baldwin had learned that his son, also named Caleb, had been “beaten nearly to death by Missourians with hickory sticks.” Thus, having been separated from his family and suffering in the cramped, cold, and dark conditions of the jail, Baldwin remained a faithful companion to the Prophet Joseph Smith until his release on April 6, 1839.