“Joseph [Smith], Jr., could see, by placing a stone of singular appearance in his hat, in such a manner as to exclude all light; at which time they pretended he could see all things within and under the earth, – – that he could see within the above mentioned caves, large gold bars and silver plates – – that he could also discover the spirits in whose charge these treasures were, clothed in ancient dress.”

William Stafford Testimony – 8 December 1833 (neighbor of the Smith family), quoted in E.D. Howe’s Mormonism Unvailed (Painesville, OH: Self Published, 1834), 237-238.