Francis Gladden Bishop was a minor leader in the Latter Day Saint movement after the 1844 succession crisis.
20 Facts About Gladden Bishop
1.
2.
Bishop claimed to be the rightful successor to Joseph Smith; from the 1850s until his death, Bishop led a succession of small groups of Latter Day Saints and converts.
3.
Gladden Bishop's followings have been identified informally by later writers as the Gladdenites and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, though the name of a late following is formally The Church of Jesus Christ of the New Jerusalem.
4.
Gladden Bishop was born in Livonia, Livingston County, New York, the third of nine children born to devout Methodists Isaac Gates Gladden Bishop and Mary Hyde.
5.
Gladden Bishop was identified in various contemporary documents as a silversmith and as a pocket watch repairer.
6.
In July 1832, Gladden Bishop was baptized by Latter Day Saint missionaries at Olean, New York and became a member of the Church of Christ, which had been founded two years earlier by Joseph Smith.
7.
Gladden Bishop became an elder of the church and for a brief period of time in 1833 was president of the congregation of Latter Day Saints at Westfield, New York.
8.
At some point Gladden Bishop was ordained to the priesthood office of seventy.
9.
In 1838 and 1839 Gladden Bishop was a missionary for the church in North Carolina, Virginia, Maryland, New York, Massachusetts, and Upper Canada.
10.
However, one contemporary commentator stated that "Gladden Bishop gave Joseph [Smith] much trouble; was cut off from the church and taken back and rebaptized nine times".
11.
Well before the death of Joseph Smith in 1844, Gladden Bishop began to inform others that he had been chosen by God as Smith's rightful successor.
12.
Gladden Bishop claimed that although Smith had originally been chosen by God, he had become a "fallen prophet" due to his immorality and other sins.
13.
The seven items Gladden Bishop claimed to be in possession of were:.
14.
Gladden Bishop claimed to have in his possession the first 116 pages of English manuscript of the Book of Mormon which had been translated by Joseph Smith but lost by Martin Harris.
15.
Shortly thereafter, Bishop received a revelation from God that his followers should go to Utah, where the Gladdenites would wrest control of the LDS Church from Young by leading an uprising of the members of the LDS Church against polygamy.
16.
Gladden Bishop was disfellowshipped, and received on his professions of repentance, so often, that the church at length refused to admit him any more as a member.
17.
In June or July 1864, Gladden Bishop travelled to Salt Lake City with the intention of meeting with Brigham Young, allowing the Mormons access to the seven sacred objects he claimed to hold, and ushering in the reign of the Ancient of Days.
18.
Gladden Bishop lived quietly in Salt Lake City with his sister for several months and died there during a scarlet fever outbreak in late November 1864.
19.
Gladden Bishop was to be buried in his sister's family plot but was interred in the wrong grave.
20.
Zion's Messenger was a periodical written and edited by Gladden Bishop and published in Council Bluffs, Iowa.