Predefinição:JohnStaffordOnRigdon

If young [Joseph] Smith [, Jr.] was as illiterate as you say, Doctor, how do you account for the Book of Mormon?

"Well, I can't; except that Sidney Rigdon was connected with them."

Was Rigdon ever around there before the Book of Mormon was published?

"No; not as we could ever find out. Sidney Rigdon was never there, that Hurlbut, or Howe, or Tucker could find out."

Well; you have been looking out for the facts a long time, have you not, Doctor?

"Yes; I have been thinking and hearing about it for the last fifty years, and lived right among all their old neighbors there more of the time."

And no one has ever been able to trace the acquaintance of Rigdon and Smith, until after the Book of Mormon was published, and Rigdon proselyted by [Parley P.] Pratt, in Ohio?

"Not that I know of."" (John Stafford, cited in William H. Kelly, "The Hill Cumorah, and the Book of Mormon," Saints' Herald 28 (1 June 1881): 167; cited in Dan Vogel (editor), Early Mormon Documents (Salt Lake City, Signature Books, 1996–2003), 5 vols, 2:123–124.)