Why Didn’t Emma Go West with the Saints?

Hey guys! A couple of years after the murder of Joseph Smith, most members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints traveled west. Some people might be surprised to hear that Joseph’s first wife, Emma, stayed behind — a decision that caused some drama over the years. So, why didn’t she go west? Let’s talk about it.

Among the myriad of reasons why Emma stayed in Nauvoo, there are a few that rise to the top of the list. In no particular order, she stayed behind because (1) traveling west would have been a huge sacrifice she wasn’t prepared to make. (2) She got married to a non-member. (3) She didn’t get along with Brigham Young. And (4) She emphatically disagreed with the Church’s practice of polygamy. Let’s run through these.

By mid-1844, at only 40 years old, “Emma had lost her husband, her mother and father, her father-in-law, three brothers-in-law and five children.” Making the journey west as a widow, with little money, and with her 5 surviving children would have been a formidable and potentially dangerous task. In an 1856 discussion with Edmund Briggs, she explained, “I have always avoided talking to my children about having anything to do in the church, for I have suffered so much I have dreaded to have them take any part in it.” In Nauvoo, she was established. She had a home, and she had relatives nearby. She told some visiting Latter-day Saints, “You may think I was not a very good Saint not to go West, but I had a home here and did not go because I did not know what I should have there.”

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