Joseph Smith (1805-1844), American religious leader, was the founder of a unique American sect, the Mormons, or the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.

On December 23, 1805, Joseph Smith was born in Vermont; in 1816 his family migrated to western New York. Among the more prominent features of the terrain were the Indian mounds containing the skeletons of long-dead warriors. Shortly after his marriage in 1827, Smith began to talk of some golden plates he had discovered in these mounds under an angel's guidance, as well as magic spectacles that enabled him to decipher the tablets' hieroglyphics. Moving to Pennsylvania, he worked on the translation, which turned out, he said, to be a history by Mormon, an American prophet and historian of the 4th century, telling of two Jewish peoples who had migrated to North America and whom Jesus visited after his ascension. In 1830 the Book of Mormon appeared...