History of Oakland County Michigan a narrative account of its historic progress, its people, its principal interests / compiled from the official records of the county, the newspapers and data of personal interviews, under the editorial supervision of Thaddeus D. Seeley.

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HISTORY OF OAKLAND COUNTY

father became possessed with a copy of the Book of Mormon, and was
deeply interested in it. Two Mormon missionaries came into the neighborhood to expound the doctrines. The spread of the new faith seemed
to be a contagion; neighborhood meetings were held every day, and
new converts announced. Some of the converts claimed to have received
a new inspiration and to speak in unknown tongues. My father became an early convert and was received into the church. My mother,
either from a feeling of sympathy with my father's action, or yielding
to the importunity of the preachers who visited us, was also baptized.
I remember the occasion very well. As my-mother sat in the chimney
corner arranging a change of habit that she could use after her immersion, by the light that shone down the chimney, the Mormon elder
was the chief spokesman, as if eager to add mother to the sacrifice,
and impatient at the necessary delay, repeated the question several
times, "Are you going to join this Gospel?" The preparations being
at length completed, the procession, including my father and mother
and the two Mormon elders, started for Watkins lake, about a mile
distant. It was a cold day in winter. About a quarter of the distance
on the route to the lake was a small pond or cathole. Upon reaching
this, the shepherds of souls concluded that it was as good a place to
make a new saint as the lake would be, and accordingly a hole was cut
in the ice and the sacrifice made there. I was of course too young to
realize the shocking inhumanity of the act, or to feel the just sense of
indignation that I have since felt in reflecting upon it. It may be asked
why my father permitted or stood sponsor at such an outrage. The
answer can only be found when we discover the mystery that underlies
and inspires fanaticism, those phenomenal epochs in the moral world
when the best of men do unwise things. Neither my father or mother
maintained a connection with this movement for any considerable time,
but quietly withdrew from it by leaving it out of their thoughts and
actions.
It may be wondered why new ideas and new theories sometimes seem
to take root and flourish in isolated neighborhoods, affording a moral
analogy to the phenomena of wild shrubs that occupy given areas.
Probably at the time of which I am speaking, people thought more deeply
and intensely on religious subjects than now. The people of the county
were directly descended from localities and times in which religious
thought was paramount. Isolated in their cabins in the forests, their
religious feeling was rather elemental and one of sentiment, than systematic. It was not crystalized in church connections, but was ready to be
moulded into form, and to center around the light that first appeared,
even though the light might be a false one. Living substantially in the
woods, each family by itself, seldom seeing any other persons except
their immediate neighbors, every new voice was to them a charm, and
every new face a revelation. These Mormon emissaries coming among
and mingling with these people, pretending to bring a religion not opposed to, but in fulfillment of what they already believed; coming in
this guise and under these circumstances, it is not strange that they
found ready credence and willing proselytes. And it should be noted
also that the Mormon agitation was then but just begun, and had given