Prisoner for Polygamy: The Memoirs and Letters of Rudger Clawson at the Utah Territorial Penitentiary, 1884-87

This collection of the prison memoirs and letters of the first Mormon convicted of violating the Edmunds Law, which prohibited polygamy, provides a unique perspective on this period of Utah history. Rudger Clawson (1857-1943) was a prominent member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, serving as missionary, stake president, apostle, president of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, and counselor in the First Presidency. 

 

His memoirs of three years as a "cohab" in the Utah Territorial Penitentiary are published here for the first time. They reflect the pride Mormon polygamists felt at being "prisoners for conscience sake,"    and they include discussions of Mormon doctrines, accounts of daring prison escapes, details of prison life, and the sense of a husband's frustration at being separated from his plural wife.