1880: Emma, Exposed

Emma left the US in late 1880, arriving in London in February of 1881, and her address by June of that year is 31 Derby Terrace, Upper Moss Bank, Cheetham Hill, Manchester. She's come to rest where, roughly, she'll remain until her death, except for a return to the US for the camp meeting season in 1884 (to promote Nineteenth Century Miracles I suspect).

Why did she leave the US when she did? Because she was publicly exposed, at the end of a lecture, in August of 1880. I've written about this before, based on what vague hints I could glean from the contemporary coverage, but having found The Salt Lake City Herald coverage of the event (in the August 17, 1880 issue), I'll let the contemporary piece speak for itself.

Exposure of a trance medium, given their generic metier, is an uncommon phenomenon, and in this case, it's pretty clear that Emma was not speaking in a trance state, but, ne'ertheless, to have her theorizing blown apart by Tanner in front of her audience must have given her more than pause for thought about her future career and the risks she was running.

And it isn't surprising to find this coverage on the other side of the United States, so soon after its airing in the East Coast press. Given Emma's consorting with the freethinker community in SLC, it isn't surprising that one of the LDS church organs gave the story front-page prominence.