Orson Pratt, in a letter to the editor of The Missouri Republican (January 1, 1862), wrote the following:
. . . you have scarcely yet read the
preface of your national troubles. Many nations will be drawn into the American
Maelstrom that now whirls through the land; and after many days, when the demon
of war shall have exhausted his strength and madness upon American soil, by the
destruction of all that can court or provoke opposition excite cupidity,
inspire revenge, or feed ambition, he will remove his headquarter to the
bank of the Rhine. (Orson Pratt, "A Timely
Warning from an Apostle of Jesus Christ," The Missouri Republican
[February 3, 1863], repr., in The Latter-day Saints' Millennial Star 24,
no. 18 [May 3, 1862]: 274-75)
As
Alma Allred noted about this text and its relationship to the 19th-century
interpretation of D&C 87:
Thus the maelstrom was war itself,
rather than solely the American Civil War. Hyde pointed out that the strength
of this particular war in America would dissipate and cease, to be followed by
a new headquarters of war based in Germany. (Alma Allred, "Coin
of the Realm: Beware of Specious Specie," FARMS Review 12, no.
1 [2000], 167)
Further Reading:
Resources on Joseph Smith's Prophecies
