Joseph Smith was of humble birth. His parents and their progenitors were toilers; but their characters were godly and their names unstained.
In the year 1638, Robert Smith, a sturdy yeoman of England, emigrated to the New World, the land of promise. He settled in Essex County, Massachusetts, and afterwards married Mary French. The numerous descendants of these worthy people intermarried with many of the staunchest and most industrious families of New England. Samuel, the son of Robert and Mary, born January 26th, 1666, wedded Rebecca Curtis, January 25th, 1707. Their son, the second Samuel, was born January 26th, 1714; he married Priscilla Gould, and was the father of Asael, born March 7th, 1744. Asael Smith took to wife Mary Duty, and their son Joseph was born July 12th, 1771. On the 24th of January, 1796, Joseph married Lucy Mack, at Tunbridge, in the State of Vermont. She was born July 8th, 1776, and was the daughter of Solomon and Lydia Mack, and was the granddaughter of Ebenezer Mack.
The men of these two families, Smith and Mack, through several generations had been tillers of the soil. They were devout and generous, measurably prosperous in a worldly sense, and several of them were brave and steadfast soldiers through the early Colonial campaigns and the Revolutionary struggle.
After the marriage of Joseph Smith with Lucy Mack, they settled, respected and happy, upon their own farm at Tunbridge. Here they were successful, financially, for a few years, until the dishonesty of a trusted friend and agent robbed them of their surplus means and left them plunged in debt. They freely sacrificed all of money value which they possessed, even homestead and Lucy's treasured marriage portion, and paid every just claim which was held against them. Left thus in absolute poverty, they sought to retrieve their loss of home; and Tunbridge, where they were known and respected, offered for a time a prospect of success. Soon afterwards, however, they removed to Sharon, where Joseph rented a farm from his father-in-law. This field he diligently tilled through the summer, and during the winter taught the village school. Comfort was restored to them; but they were destined to be still tried and sanctified by the tribulations of life. Honest and industrious, pious and benevolent, yet Joseph and Lucy saw themselves and their children pursued by poverty, illness and the cold neglect of their fellow-mortals. They repined not at their chastenings, but they marveled.
God was teaching the parents the great lesson of personal humility; and they and their children were learning how fleeting is earthly wealth and how fallible is mere human friendship. For the choice seed which is to bring forth rich and perfect fruit, the Lord Almighty prepares the soil of His garden.
The paternal grandfather of the Prophet was Asael Smith, a man of the strongest religious convictions, and yet a man whose broad humanitarian views were repugnant to many of the sectarians of the day. Upon one occasion, before the Prophet's birth, Asael Smith had a premonition that one of his descendants should be a great teacher and leader of men. To quote his words, as they are remembered and recorded by one who knew and heard him speak: "It has been borne in upon my soul that one of my descendants will promulgate a work to revolutionize the world of religious faith."
It is not known if the young Joseph ever learned of this prophetic declaration, until after his own career had been made manifest. But Asael lived to see the dawn of the fulfillment of his words. Just before his death, the Book of Mormon, then recently printed, was presented to him. He accepted it, and with the light of inspiration which sometimes illumines the mind of man as the veil of eternity opens to his gaze, Asael solemnly warned his attendants to give heed to the Book, for it was true, and its coming forth heralded a renewal of the Gospel light.