On April 6, 1830,
Joseph Smith,
Oliver Cowdery, and a group of approximately 30 believers met with the intention of formally organizing the Church of Christ into a legal institution. It is uncertain whether this occurred in the home of
Peter Whitmer Sr. in
Fayette, New York, or whether it occurred in the log home of
Joseph Smith Sr. near their property in
Manchester, New York. Soon after this formal organization, small
branches were formally established in Manchester,
Fayette, and
Colesville. Although the purpose was to effect a legal organization, it may have had no legal effect since no records of incorporation have been found in either the Manchester–Palmyra area, the Fayette area, or in several other counties around this time period, as required by state law at the time: the church evidently did not follow the required legal formalities.
Location of the organization Prior to 1834, all church publications and documents stated that the church was organized in the Smith log home in
Manchester, New York. The first Smith log home was located on the Samuel Jennings property in Palmyra, just north of the town's southern border and subsequent the Smith Manchester property. The Smiths may have constructed a second log home on their own property. Beginning in 1834, several church publications began to give the location of the organizational meeting as Fayette, at the home of
Peter Whitmer Sr. The Whitmer home had been the site of many other meetings near the same time period. After 1834, several official church accounts said the meeting was in Manchester and several eyewitnesses said the event took place in Manchester. Independent researcher
H. Michael Marquardt argues that the evidence suggests the organization occurred in Manchester, and that the confusion was likely due to the effect of memory tending to conflate memories of several meetings in Manchester and Fayette years earlier. Critics suggest that the location of the organization was intentionally changed in 1834 around the same time the church's name was changed to the "Church of the Latter Day Saints", in order to make it seem like the new church organization was different from the "Church of Christ", as a tactic to frustrate the church's creditors and avoid payment of debts. There is also evidence pointing to Fayette as the place of organization. For example, a headnote to the earliest known version of chapter XXII of the
Book of Commandments says that the revelation was dictated in Fayette on April 6, 1830, after the church was organized. This was changed to "Manchester" when the book was published in 1833. Officially, the major denominations of the Latter Day Saint movement claim Fayette as the birthplace of the religion, and Smith's official history, begun in 1838, listed Fayette as the founding place. In 1887, one other eye-witness,
David Whitmer, recollected that the event occurred in his father's home in Fayette; Marquardt argues that the event described by Whitmer in 1887 bears more resemblance to Fayette meetings such as the founding of the church's Fayette branch five days later on April 11, 1830. The largest successor organization to the Church of Christ, the LDS Church, accepts Fayette as the official location of the organizing meeting.
Events at the organization By later accounts, the April 6 organizational meeting was a
charismatic event, in which members of the congregation had visions,
prophesied,
spoke in tongues, ecstatically shouted praises to the Lord, and fainted. At this meeting, the church formally ordained a lay ministry, with the priesthood offices of
deacon,
teacher,
priest, and
elder. Smith and Cowdery, according to their 1831 account, were each ordained as "an apostle of Jesus Christ, an elder of the church". This account was edited in 1835 to state that Smith was ordained the "First Elder", and Oliver Cowdery was ordained the "Second Elder".
First members of the church According to the LDS Church, the first six members of the Church of Christ were: {{multiple image|total_width=600 •
Oliver Cowdery •
Joseph Smith •
Hyrum Smith •
Peter Whitmer Jr. •
Samuel H. Smith •
David Whitmer Early membership also included the
Three Witnesses and the
Eight Witnesses to the Book of Mormon and members of the extended Whitmer and
Smith families. Other early members included friends and acquaintances of the Smith and Whitmer families, such as
Porter Rockwell. ==The name of the church==