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150 years ago
Oliver Cowdery, who stood by Joseph Smith during the early days of the Restoration and was sustained as the "Second Elder" of the Church on the day it was organized, passed away and was buried in early March 1850, at Richmond, Ray County, Missouri.
Excommunicated in 1838 and rebaptized in 1848, Oliver Cowdery died on March 3, 1850.
In Joseph Fielding Smith's Essentials in Church History, p. 387, it says he rejoined the Church after appearing before the high council in Kanesville, Iowa, with Elder Orson Hyde presiding.
The history relates: "It was a sad occasion, yet a time of rejoicing to see the former 'Second Elder' of the Church with a contrite spirit desiring fellowship in the Church, and the association of his former brethren. After his baptism he desired to go to the Salt Lake Valley and then take a mission to Great Britain. Before doing so he went to visit relatives in Missouri, and while there he was taken sick and died. . . . He died a happy man with the assurance that his sins had been forgiven him."
