A key figure who accelerated the historical crisis for both the Tanners (who left the group in 1962) and Pauline’s church was Wes Walters, a Presbyterian minister from Marissa, Illinois.
Walters was asked to write an article on Mormons for Christianity Today. His detailed research focused on testing Joseph Smith’s claims against tangible historical records, particularly those surrounding the First Vision. Walters reasoned that while you couldn’t prove whether Smith spoke to God, you could prove whether he was standing in a given place on a given day.
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Walters used his expertise in church history (specifically Baptist, Methodist, and Presbyterian records in the New York area) to investigate Joseph Smith’s claim that the First Vision was prompted by an intense local revival where ministers were fighting over converts.
Walters’ findings: the great revival and the subsequent fighting over converts among the denominations did not happen in 1820. Instead, significant church growth (hundreds of converts) occurred between 1823, 1824, and 1825. This discovery forced a complete recalibration of the chronology, as it meant the First Vision and the subsequent Moroni visits leading up to the plates could not logically fit the existing timeline.
Walters’ small pamphlet, New Light on Mormon Origins, caused such a disruption that it “threw the Mormon Church into a tizzy,” forcing LDS historians to travel back East to conduct their own major studies. Walters is credited by Sandra Tanner as being a key factor in pushing the LDS Church into serious historical scholarship.
Magic Connection: A Bridge Too Far
While Walters’ dating research was shocking, his discovery of the 1826 trial documents cemented the crisis.
Pauline’s group, following David Whitmer, already accepted the story that Joseph Smith used a “rock” in his “hat” to translate the Book of Mormon, aligning with the “seer stone” narrative. However, the 1826 trial confirmed Joseph Smith’s involvement in money digging, associating the seer stone with divination and magic practices—the occult that the Christians in Pauline’s group firmly rejected.
The group found this connection irreconcilable:
- They questioned why God would use an instrument associated with magic.
- They noted that Joseph Smith seemed to bypass the instruments God allegedly supplied (the plates) and continued using the same rock used in divination.
- The transition from seeking treasure (magic) to seeking revelation (religion) looked too “fishy,” suggesting it was merely a “switching of what you’re using this stone for”.
- The fact that the same individuals involved in drawing magic circles and searching for treasure were the same first converts to Mormonism was deeply troubling.
Pauline Hancock’s Church Voted to Disband
The Church of Christ (Bible Book of Mormon), founded and led by Pauline Hancock, emerged as a unique splinter group focused on returning to what they believed was “1830 Mormonism”—a faith centered purely on the Bible and the Book of Mormon, devoid of later revelations (like the Doctrine and Covenants past 1830) and “Aaronic, Melchizedek Priesthood ideas”.
However, this small community, known for meeting in the “Basement church” in Independence, ultimately discovered that even their foundational scripture, the Book of Mormon, could not withstand intense historical scrutiny, leading to its dissolution years after Pauline Hancock’s death in 1962.
The Vote & Dissolution
Faced with this overwhelming historical evidence, the Church of Christ had to make a choice regarding their “litmus test”—the Book of Mormon.
In 1972, approximately a decade after Pauline’s death (she died in the summer of 1962), the church took a formal vote on whether to retain the Book of Mormon as scripture.
The majority voted no, choosing to jettison the Book of Mormon.
The consequences were immediate:
- Families who wanted to retain the Book of Mormon left and joined other smaller splinter groups, such as the Hedrickites.
- The remaining members decided they would continue to meet as Christians studying only the Bible.
- After a few more years, however, they concluded that since they were just Bible-believing Christians, they no longer had a purpose to stand independently from the rest of the Christian world. They decided to disband, sell the building, and disperse into various Christian churches.
The building, which had been the “Basement church,” was eventually purchased by another restoration group. Olive Wilcox, who led the group after Pauline, stated that she believed Pauline herself, had she lived to see the comprehensive research done by Walters, would also have chosen to give up the Book of Mormon.
What are your thoughts?
Don’t miss our other conversations with Sandra: https://gospeltangents.com/people/sandra-tanner
Copyright © 2025
Gospel Tangents
All Rights Reserved
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