Why Do We Keep Claiming the Hill in New York is the Hill Cumorah of the Book of Mormon? – Part I

In a recent 2012 article published by Phil Michel, under the title: “Archaeological and Historical evidence of the Hill Cumorah in the State of New York,” the following was the lead paragraph, claiming to quote Joseph Smith: “This hill located "convenient to the village of Manchester, Ontario county, New York" and is now called in our day "The Hill Cumorah" (Joseph Smith-History 1:51).
    Note that the author claims Joseph Smith said of the New York Hill “and is now called in our day “the Hill Cumorah,” and then provided the reference of the History 1:51, as though to evidence Joseph called the hill in New York the Hill Cumorah. However, it should be noted that no such reference is made by Joseph in his history.
    In the actual written History of Joseph Smith, first published under the title History of the Church, and nicknamed Documentary History of the Church or DHC, which was largely written during Joseph Smith’s lifetime and composed of Joseph’s writings and interpolations and editorial comments, beginning in 1839. In section 1:51, which the author of the article referenced to this comment, the actual statement is:

The hill in Manchester, New York is large in comparison to the few other low-lying hills in the area, but is not actually very large

“Convenient to the village of Manchester, Ontario county, New York, stands a hill of considerable size, and the most elevated of any in the neighborhood. On the west side of this hill, not far from the top, under a stone of considerable size, lay the plates, deposited in a stone box. This stone was thick and rounding in the middle on the upper side, and thinner towards the edges, so that the middle part of it was visible above the ground, but the edge all around was covered with earth” (emphasis added).
    Note there is no mention of the word “Cumorah,” let alone the words “and is now called in our day…” Yet, “the hill” is mentioned twice—surely, if Joseph thought of it having a name, that name would have properly been inserted to reference the hill itself. But no name was given by Joseph in his writing, though the author of the article claimed he had.
    Such is the misleading writing of people who want to make a point and feel they can fudge on the facts of the matter, and give a real reference to back up their claim. After all, most authors know that few people check the references they write down. In our book “Inaccuracies of Mesoamerican and Other Theorists,” we list and detail in several hundred pages the inaccurate statements attributed to scriptural references in the Book of Mormon by John L. Sorenson, the past BYU Archaeology Department head and guru of Book of Mormon Land of Promise archaeology, as well as several other writers of Book of Mormon geography. The point is, claiming a reference to support an article that does not say what is being claimed is not only erroneous and very poor scholarship, it is downright misleading, deceptive and spurious.
    In addition to the lack of reference to a hill Cumorah by Joseph Smith, he also stated in the preceding paragraph: “I obeyed; I returned to my father in the field, and rehearsed the whole matter to him. He replied to me that it was of God, and told me to go and do as commanded by the messenger. I left the field, and went to the place where the messenger had told me the plates were deposited; and owing to the distinctness of the vision which I had had concerning it, I knew the place the instant that I arrived there” (Hisotry 1:50, emphasis added).
    Again, there were two more incidents where Joseph could have, and appropriately so, inserted the words “hill Cumorah” for specific referencing, but did not. It would seem from these two paragraphs of his History, that the word “Cumorah” was either not known to him at the time, or he did not associated such a name to the hill in New York.

In addition, Joseph wrote two additional instances where he could have appropriately used the name “hill Cumorah,” but did not: “The messenger…told me that I should come to that place precisely in one year from that time, and that he would there meet with me, and that I should continue to do so until the time should come for obtaining the plates.
    Accordingly, as I had been commanded, I went at the end of each year, and at each time I found the same messenger there, and received instruction and intelligence from him at each of our interviews, respecting what the Lord was going to do, and how and in what manner his kingdom was to be conducted in the last days” (History 1:53–54).
    It seems really strange that Joseph did not place a name on the hill, calling it “that place” and “there,” when a name would have been far more clear. And in another instance above, did not even refer to the hill at all saying only “I went at the end of each year.” It would also appear from this, that Moroni did not call the hill “Cumorah,” but simply “that” or “this place.”
    Again, in another instance and the final reference to the hill, Joseph wrote: “At length the time arrived for obtaining the plates, the Urim and Thummim, and the breastplate. On the twenty-second day of September, one thousand eight hundred and twenty-seven, having gone as usual at the end of another year to the place where they were deposited, the same heavenly messenger delivered them up to me with this charge: that I should be responsible for them; that if I should let them go carelessly, or through any neglect of mine, I should be cut off; but that if I would use all my endeavors to preserve them, until he, the messenger, should call for them, they should be protected” (History 1:59).
    Since this information was written in 1839 or later, 16 years after the initial meeting with Moroni, and several years after Oliver Cowdery first used the term “hill Cumorah” and other members began calling it the “hill Cumorah,” Joseph still did not refer to it as such, calling it only “the hill,” “the place,” “that hill,” etc.

The entire area around the hill in New York has been searched for artifacts, except for the (red circle) parking area and Visitor’s Center and seating area for the Pageant—no artifacts have been found

As for the hill itself, which Oliver Cowdery claimed was where the final battle that resulted in around 300,000 deaths took place in the valley in New York at the foot of the hill now called Hill Cumorah, it should be of interest that no authenticated artifacts have ever been found there. In fact, the entire archaeological record of New York does not support the idea the Book of Mormon peoples lived in that region or that the hill was the scene of the final battles between the Nephites and the Lamanites.
    In fact, according to the Vermont Archaeology Heritage Center at Barre, in central Vermont, which serves as the central repository for the artifacts and archives of Vermont’s unwritten past, there are over 800 known archaeological sites, with compliance reports, artifacts, and associated material available for study to qualified researchers, with more collections being accessioned regularly. A researcher of artifacts in New Haven, Vermont, named Landon Smith, who had investigated most every site in the New England area, including the fields surrounding the Hill Cumorah, near Palmyra in New York, wrote to BYU in 2005, regarding an article John E. Clark, professor of anthropology at BYU wrote entitled “Archaeology and Cumorah Questions,” in 2004.
    Landon Smith stated in his letter by way of introduction that he had been searching for native American sites in Vermont for several years, and “By myself I have found over 378 new Native American sites, obtaining Vermont State site numbers for all of them. I have made out all the required survey forms and sent the relevant information to the state offices. At this time, I have close to 5,000 arrowheads with all the other tools—bifaces, preforms, knives, scrapers, and so on. Altogether I have 17,000 pieces. Each piece has been traced, with the site number and catalog numbers painted on. Maps are made of each site with X marks locating where each piece was found.”
    Landon went on in his letter to talk about working with the State and having access to items, maps, etc., stating: “I get to see things that I'm probably not supposed to see—like a New York State site map. Around Syracuse and the areas in eastern New York State there are many sites recorded, as there are around and south of Rochester in western New York. But around the Hill Cumorah area, the closest site numbers are about 60 miles away.”
(See the nest post, “Why Do We Keep Claiming the Hill in New York is the Hill Cumorah of the Book of Mormon? – Part II,” regarding the effort of artifact hunters and official records of the area in Western New York in determining what has been found around the New York hill Cumorah)