Early This Spring We'll Leave Nauvoo

DESCRIPTION: "Early this spring we'll leave Nauvoo, And on our journey we'll pursue, We'll go and bid the mob farewell, And let them go to heaven or hell." They will head to California and avoid persecution from the likes of Sharp, Williams, and Governor Ford
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1956 (Fife/Fife-SaintsOfSageAndSaddle)
KEYWORDS: travel escape | Mormon
FOUND IN: US
REFERENCES (2 citations):
Fife/Fife-SaintsOfSageAndSaddle, pp. 317-318, "Early This Spring We'll Leave Nauvoo" (1 text)
Lingenfelter/Dwyer/Cohen-SongsOfAmericanWest, pp. 202-203, "Early This Spring We'll Leave Nauvoo" (1 text, 1 tune)
Roud #11012
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "Old Dan Tucker" (tune, according to Lingenfelter/Dwyer/Cohen-SongsOfAmericanWest)
NOTES [256 words]: Fife/Fife-SaintsOfSageAndSaddle says that this was found among papers which seemed to date from 1836. The song itself cannot be that early, though, since it refers to the Mormon migration west from Nauvoo. Thus it must date from between 1844, when Joseph Smith was killed and Brigham Young succeeded him, and 1847, when Brigham Young chooses the Great Salt Lake, not any version of "California," as the new home of the Mormons. A logical date would be some time between September 1845, when the Mormons agreed to leave the area, and February 1846, when the Mormons began to leave Nauvoo (Reeve/Parshall, p. 400).
Governor Ford is presumably Illinois governor Thomas Ford, who had promised protection to Joseph and Hyrum Smith when they turned themselves over to him in June 1847, five days before they were lynched (Reeve/Parshall, p. 400).
Sharp I imagine is Thomas Sharp, the anti-Mormon editor of the newspaper of Warsaw. Hancock County, Illinois (Brodie, p. 288).
Williams is surely Colonel Levi Williams of the Illinois militia, who ordered his men to shoot Joseph Smith (Brodie, p. 394).
Presumably the other persecutors could be identified, but I haven't tried; based on casual checking, I can't figure out "Backenstos" any better than the Fifes could, and I don't find anyone named "Warren" in the quick checks I made.
The "Second Refrain" of this makes me think it was sung to "Old Dan Tucker," but some of the other parts don't fit as well. Nonetheless that is the tune listed by Lingenfelter/Dwyer/Cohen-SongsOfAmericanWest. - RBW
Bibliography

Brodie: Fawn M. Brodie, No Man Knows My History: The Life of Joseph Smith, 1945, 1971 (I use the 1995 Vintage edition)
Reeve/Parshall: W. Paul Reeve and Ardis E. Parshall, editors, Mormonism: A Historical Encyclopedia, ABC-CLIO, LLC, 2010

Last updated in version 6.6
File: FSSS317

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