On September 22, 1827, two young men living miles apart—who would later become neighbors and best friends—each saw an astonishing vision in the night sky. Their names were Brigham Young and Heber C. Kimball. Heber was living in Mendon, New York, near the Tomlinson Inn, and Brigham was 45 miles to the east in Port Byron.
It began, Heber said, in the eastern horizon—a white smoke rising toward the heavens with the sound of a mighty wind. The smoke moved across the sky, in the shape of a rainbow toward the western horizon. It grew wide, then bluish in color, and became completely transparent. As Heber watched with his family and several neighbors, a large, commanding army appeared, marching in platoons across the sky from east to west. “We could distinctly see the muskets, bayonets and knapsacks of the men,” Heber recorded, “and also saw their officers with their swords and equipage, and [heard] the clashing and jingling of their implements of war, and could discover the forms and features of the men. The most profound order existed throughout the entire army; when the foremost man stepped, every man stepped at the same time; I could hear the steps. When the front rank reached the western horizon a battle ensued, as we could distinctly hear the report of arms and the rush.
“No man could judge of my feelings when I beheld that army of men, as plainly as ever I saw armies of men in the flesh; it seemed as though every hair of my head was alive. This scenery we gazed upon for hours, until it began to disappear.”2
Brigham Young, who at that time was not acquainted with Heber, described what he had seen the same evening: “There was a great light in the East and it went to the West and it was very bright although [there was] no moon at that time.” As he gazed at it with his wife, Miriam, they saw “great armies” marching across the night sky. The vision was “perfectly clear,” and it remained for several hours.3
Heber and Brigham and their family members who witnessed the amazing scene felt it must have been a sign from God, but they did not know its meaning. Neither Heber nor Brigham knew the Prophet Joseph Smith or that he had received the gold plates containing the Book of Mormon that same day at the Hill Cumorah, just 20 miles to the east.
The following year, Brigham Young and Miriam moved to Mendon, New York, where Brigham’s father, stepmother, and several of his siblings were already living. Brigham built a home and mill shop on his father’s farm, less than a half mile northeast of where Heber Kimball and his wife, Vilate, lived. Brigham and Heber, just 13 days apart in age, and their wives, just 6 days apart, soon became close friends.
Brigham, with his father, John, his brother Joseph, and Heber Kimball, witnessed a second vision, this time in a grove of trees while gathering wood for Phineas. “We were pondering upon those things which had been told us by the Elders,” Heber recorded, “and upon the saints gathering to Zion, when the glory of God shone upon us, and we saw the gathering of the saints to Zion, and the glory that would rest upon them; and many more things connected with that great event. … These things caused such great joy to spring up in our bosoms that we were hardly able to contain ourselves, and we did shout aloud ‘Hosannah to God and the Lamb.’”11
Longing to mingle with the Saints, Heber C. Kimball hitched his horses to his sleigh in the bitter cold of January 1832, and he, Brigham and Miriam Young, and Phineas and Clarissa Young took a freezing, 125-mile sleigh ride to visit the branch in Columbia, Pennsylvania. Apparently, Vilate Kimball stayed at home and cared for all the children so the other wives could go.
Brigham later recalled, “We arrived at the place where there was a small Branch of the Church; we conversed with them, attended their meetings and heard them preach, and after staying about one week we returned home, being still more convinced of the truth of the work.”12
Brigham and Heber now understood the vision of the mighty army they had witnessed in the night sky four and a half years earlier. They realized it had appeared to them the very day the Prophet Joseph had received the gold plates from the angel named Moroni—September 22, 1827. Heber felt that it was a “foreshadowing … of the warfare to be waged between the powers of good and evil, from the time Truth sprang from earth and Righteousness looked down from heaven upon the boy Joseph, predestined to bring to light the buried records of the past.”13https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/stu ... y?lang=eng
As soon as I heard them I was convinced that they taught the truth, and that I had only received a part of the ordinances under the Baptist Church. I also saw and heard the gifts of the spirit manifested by the elders, for they spoke in tongues and interpreted, which tended to strengthen my faith. Brigham Young and myself were constrained, by the Spirit, to bear testimony of the truth, and when we did this, the power of God rested upon us.
On a certain occasion, while going to hear the elders, I passed the house of my brother, Solomon, and enquired of him if he had seen them, he answered he had, and had heard them pray, and prayed with them. I asked what he thought of them, he replied, "They are full of the Holy Ghost religion." I told him I was going to see them, he said, "Go."
Brother Brigham Young afterwards prophesied that my brother Solomon would yet believe the work and embrace it, and would lay hold of me, and wonder why I had come into possession of such great knowledge.
The family of John Young, Sen., of five sons, five daughters, and two sons-in-law, John P. Greene and Joel Sanford, had moved into Mendon a few years previously. They had the same principles in their breasts which I had in mine; truth was what we wanted and would have, and truth we did receive; for the Lord granted us testimony upon testimony of the truth of gospel.
...In about two weeks, my wife, Vilate [Kimball], was baptized by brother, Joseph Young, with several others in a small stream close to my house, and we numbered about thirty in that Branch.
Under the ordinances of baptism and laying on of hands, I received the Holy Ghost, as the disciples did in ancient days, which was like a consuming fire, and I was clothed in my right mind, although the people called me crazy. I continued in this way for many months, and it seemed as though my flesh would consume away. At the same time the scriptures were unfolded to my mind in such a wonderful manner it appeared to me, at times, as if I had formerly been familiar with them.
"Extract from the Journal of Heber C. Kimball[/color]," Times and Seasons 2 (1841); 6 (1845)
