Item Detail
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27204
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0
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0
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English
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"The Goliath of Their Cause" : The B. H. Roberts and William Jarman Debates in England, 1887-1888
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Journal of Mormon History
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January 2017
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43
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1
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Champaign, IL
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University of Illinois Press; Mormon History Association
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87-110
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In July 1887, B. H. Roberts found himself on a speaking platform
at Hoyland Common in Yorkshire, England, thousands of miles from
his Utah home. He rose to challenge the assertions of one of Mormonism’s
fiercest critics, an apostate named William Jarman, who
had been making attacks against the Saints for many years accusing
them of murder, blasphemy, and immorality. The local newspaper
said that Roberts had accepted an invitation to debate after there had been several attempts to interest “the Mormon elders, who have
been constantly visiting the neighborhood for the past few months”
to take on their critic. As a result of his willingness to accept the
challenge, the paper labeled him the “Goliath of their cause.”1 This
effort in Yorkshire represents the beginning of a campaign against
Jarman that would take Roberts throughout England and Wales over
the next eighteen months. These forays were widely read in Utah
through reports in the Deseret Evening News and the Millennial Star.
In this article, I will explore Jarman’s assertions, Roberts’s response
to them, and, in the process, shed light on a crucial period in the
history of Mormonism in Victorian England and on the career of
B. H. Roberts as well.