in Warsaw on a missionary assignment to found and supervise a settlement of church members there. Richards organized the medical services in Nauvoo, training midwife trainers and providing sanitation advice for the issues of malaria and cholera in particular. Richards was a member of the Nauvoo City Council from 1841 to 1843. He also was a member of the Masonic lodge at Nauvoo. In 1843 he was made recorder of the Nauvoo Municipal Court. He became Joseph Smith's private secretary in December 1841, when he was also made recorder of the Nauvoo Temple. In December 1842, Richards was called to be the Church Historian and Recorder, a position he held until his death. In these two capacities, Richards maintained Smith's schedule and recorded most of his activities. As church historian, he subsequently wrote a total of 1,884 pages on the history of Smith. This work was later incorporated into The History of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, edited by B. H. Roberts. In July 1842, Richards went on a short mission to New England. In 1844, Richards was made the recorder of the Council of 50. On May 4, 1842, Richards was one of nine men to whom Smith presented the endowment. Richards was incarcerated in Carthage Jail with Joseph Smith, Hyrum Smith, and John Taylor on June 27, 1844, when the jail was attacked by a mob and the Smiths were murdered. Taylor was shot four times and severely injured, but survived the attack. Richards was unhurt and so supervised the removal of the bodies of Taylor and the Smiths. Over a year prior to the attack, Joseph Smith had told Richards that "the time would come that the balls would fly around him like hail, and he should see his friends fall on the right and on the left, but that there should not be a hole in his garment." His first-hand account of the event was published in the Times and Seasons. Richards, his cousin Brigham Young, and other church elders left Nauvoo in February 1846, spending the remainder of the year at Winter Quarters, Nebraska. This first group entered into the Salt Lake Valley on July 24, 1847. They then went back to Winter Quarters, arriving on August 21, 1847, to gather the families for the Mormon Exodus of 1848, and deal with malaria and cholera. First Presidency Richards was called as Second