Grit and Grace

The Faith of Porter Rockwell

The snow was still red in the morning.

In the canyon just outside Draper, a posse found him crouched beside a dying fire, polishing the barrel of his rifle. A wanted man had tried to ambush him the night before. Now the man lay several yards downhill, unmoving. When asked what happened, Orrin Porter Rockwell simply said, “He shouldn’t have drawn.”

They say he rode alone most of the time — not because he didn’t have friends, but because he didn’t need backup. When he came to town, bartenders poured without asking, and outlaws took sudden interest in the horizon. He wore his hair long, uncut since the day Joseph Smith gave him a prophecy: As long as you never cut your hair, no bullet or blade will ever harm you. Rockwell believed it. He wore that promise like armor.

To the Saints, he was a protector — bodyguard to the Prophet, marshal in Zion, a man whose hands did the work that polite men couldn’t. To everyone else, he was something between a folk hero and a menace.

He was loyal to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints until his final breath. But he lived like no typical Latter-day Saint. He drank whiskey. He swore. He was quick to violence. He kept company with gunslingers and criminals and killed more than one man in the name of justice — depending on how you define justice.

That’s what makes Porter Rockwell so fascinating.

He wasn’t soft. He wasn’t clean-cut. He didn’t fit the mold. But he believed with his whole soul that the gospel was true, that Joseph Smith was a prophet, and that God had called him to protect the Saints — even if that meant doing it with a rifle in one hand and a bottle in the other.

What do you do with a man like that?

This is the story of a rough-edged disciple. It’s a look at loyalty, violence, redemption, and contradiction. From his childhood friendship with Joseph Smith to the rumors of assassination and the bloody trails he followed across the West, Porter Rockwell’s life forces us to wrestle with an uncomfortable but necessary question:

Can someone be both deeply flawed and fiercely faithful — and still be used by God?

A Boyhood Bound to the Prophet

Before Porter Rockwell became the man who rode alone through winter canyons with a rifle across his lap, he was just a barefoot kid chasing frogs along the Erie Canal.

Born June 28, 1813, in Belchertown, Massachusetts, Orrin Porter Rockwell moved with his family to western New York while still young. The Rockwells settled in Manchester — just a short walk from the Smith family farm. It didn’t take long before young Porter became inseparable from the Smith boys, especially Joseph.

They fished together. Worked the same fields. Swapped chores and stories and dreams. Porter was five years younger than Joseph, but the age gap never seemed to matter. What grew between them wasn’t just friendship — it was loyalty in its rawest form, forged by shared labor, long walks, and the kind of bond that only builds over years of quiet trust.

When Joseph claimed to have seen God the Father and Jesus Christ in a grove of trees, Porter didn’t mock him like others did. He believed him. When the golden plates came into Joseph’s possession, Porter helped guard the family from would-be thieves. Later, he reportedly carried some of those plates in a sack of beans to divert attention — proof that even then, Porter was willing to risk his safety for his friend’s calling.

He was baptized at just sixteen years old in 1830, likely one of the first — and youngest — official members of the newly organized Church of Christ. While others wrestled with doubts or pushed back against persecution, Porter’s conviction seemed simple and steady. If Joseph said it was true, that was enough. His faith didn’t come dressed in flowery language or theological debate. It came in fists and footsteps. If Joseph was called of God, Porter would follow him — and fight for him, if need be.

By his late teens, Porter was already involved in Church missions and movements. He traveled. He preached. He helped build Zion with calloused hands and silent strength. When mobs came after the Saints in Ohio and Missouri, Porter didn’t flinch. He sharpened his knife and stood watch at night.

His loyalty was not born of naivety. It wasn’t blind. It was rooted in a boyhood witness — he had known Joseph Smith when he was just Joe from the farm. He’d seen the shift from farmhand to prophet and believed in it, not just because of visions, but because of the man he’d known before the mantle.

That’s why when the world started closing in — when guns were raised and warrants were issued — Joseph didn’t call for scholars or scribes. He called for Porter.

The Bodyguard and the Prophecy

By the time Joseph Smith was regularly receiving revelations, preaching to crowds, and drawing the ire of local officials, Porter Rockwell had become more than just a friend — he was the muscle standing between the Prophet and harm. While others were called to the pulpit, Porter stood at the door. Quiet. Watchful. Armed.

He wasn’t officially assigned to protect Joseph. No keys were laid on his head. No calling was read over the pulpit. But there wasn’t a man in Nauvoo — or Kirtland or Far West, for that matter — who didn’t know that if you wanted to get to the Prophet, you had to go through Porter first.

He carried pistols under his coat and a knife in his boot, but it wasn’t just steel that made him dangerous. It was his absolute commitment. He believed Joseph was called of God, and to threaten him was, in Porter’s eyes, to threaten the work of the Lord Himself.

There’s a story — half history, half folklore — that Joseph once made Porter a remarkable promise. The Prophet, knowing the constant threats on his life and on those close to him, reportedly told Porter: “I prophesy, in the name of the Lord, that so long as you remain faithful and never cut your hair, no bullet or blade can harm you.” It’s the kind of line that makes skeptics scoff and believers sit up straight. But Porter believed it. And he never cut his hair again.

He wore it long for the rest of his life — thick, tangled, and down to his shoulders. It became part of his myth. Men who swore at preachers and scoffed at prayers would lower their voices when they saw the long-haired man step into a room.

But the prophecy was more than superstition for him. It was armor. Not against death, but against doubt. In Porter’s mind, it was proof that God saw him — that his loyalty mattered.

There were times when Joseph went into hiding — mob threats, false arrests, swirling rumors. But Porter never went far. He slept near the Prophet’s door. Rode beside him on midnight flights. Waited outside when Joseph met with dangerous men. He was never the loudest in the room, but he was always the one people noticed.

Not everyone approved. There were whispers among some Church members about Porter’s temper. His coarseness. His fondness for whiskey and tendency to solve problems with the butt of a rifle. But Joseph trusted him implicitly. “Porter Rockwell,” he said, “was the best friend I ever had on this earth.”

You don’t earn a statement like that by flattery or flinching. You earn it by standing your ground, even when everyone else runs.

And when the storm clouds gathered in Nauvoo, and the Church’s enemies circled with warrants and powder, Joseph knew exactly where to place his trust. He placed it in a man who had stood beside him since boyhood. A man with a pistol under his coat. A man who had never cut his hair.

The Boggs Affair: Vengeance or Legend?

On the night of May 6, 1842, in Independence, Missouri, former governor Lilburn W. Boggs was sitting in his study. His children were nearby. The evening was quiet — until gunfire shattered the window and chaos erupted.

Boggs was shot multiple times, struck in the neck, head, and throat. Remarkably, he survived. Barely.

Who pulled the trigger? No one knew for sure. But among the Saints — and their enemies — everyone had a theory. And most of those theories pointed to one man: Orrin Porter Rockwell.

The motive was obvious. Boggs was the architect of the infamous 1838 Missouri “Extermination Order,” which declared that all Mormons must be “exterminated or driven from the state.” It was more than harsh language. It led to the Haun’s Mill Massacre and the brutal expulsion of Latter-day Saints from their homes. To many, Boggs was the face of their suffering.

Rockwell had reportedly traveled east a few weeks before the shooting. The timeline was thin. The details were fuzzy. But when word spread that Boggs had been gunned down in his own home, plenty of people began whispering the same name — and some weren’t whispering.

Joseph Smith, who was running for president at the time and still serving as mayor of Nauvoo, quickly came under fire. Rumors flew that he had sent Porter to avenge the Saints. Joseph flatly denied it. In the Times and Seasons newspaper, he called the accusation “false, malicious, and without foundation.” He even pointed out the absurdity of the claim: Rockwell hadn’t even been in Missouri at the time, he said.

But not everyone was satisfied. Missouri officials demanded Rockwell’s extradition. Joseph was arrested and later released. Porter, meanwhile, fled — but not for long. He was eventually captured, jailed in Missouri, and held for nearly a year without formal conviction.

They tried to pin the shooting on him. They couldn’t. There were no eyewitnesses. No weapon. No confession. In the end, they had to let him go.

Still, the story stuck.

To this day, there’s no hard evidence linking Rockwell to the shooting of Lilburn Boggs. Historians are divided. Some believe he did it. Some think it was a rival political faction, possibly related to tensions surrounding the upcoming presidential race. Others think Rockwell was just an easy target — convenient, intimidating, and already infamous enough to wear the blame.

But something about the story endures. Maybe because it fits the myth so well. The rough-edged avenger riding east to settle the score. The Saint who believed in justice more than politics. The bodyguard who carried out vengeance not for glory, but for loyalty.

Even among Latter-day Saints, reactions were mixed. Some were uncomfortable with the implication that one of their own might have pulled the trigger. Others nodded quietly, even approvingly. One apostle is said to have remarked, “It’s a shame he missed.”

For Porter, the accusation didn’t seem to faze him. When asked later if he’d shot Boggs, he reportedly smiled and said, “I shot at him? I’ve never shot at anyone… if I shoot, they get shot. He’s still alive, isn’t he?”

Fact or folklore, the Boggs affair cemented Porter Rockwell’s place in the imagination of the frontier. From that moment on, he wasn’t just the Prophet’s bodyguard.

He was the Church’s avenging angel.

A Note on Violence and the Frontier

Before going further, it’s important to say something plainly: violence meant something different in Porter Rockwell’s world.

Today, a man getting shot over stealing a cow would make headlines and spark outrage. But on the 19th-century American frontier, it wasn’t just possible — it was common. And to many, it made sense.

A cow wasn’t just livestock. It was food, trade, survival. In a hard winter, one cow could be the difference between life and death for a family. There were no grocery stores down the road. No safety nets. Stealing a cow wasn’t like stealing a car — it was more like burning down someone’s pantry, kitchen, and bank account all at once.

So yes, a man could lose his life over stealing a cow. Or trespassing. Or making a threat. The law was spread thin across the territory, and in many cases, justice had to be carried out by the nearest man willing to act. That didn’t always make it right — but it made it real.

Porter Rockwell lived in a world where guns were tools, not symbols. Where justice came fast, often without paperwork. If we judge him by today’s standards, we miss the world he actually lived in — and the way he saw his duty within it.

It doesn’t excuse any action. But it does explain a few things.

Life After the Martyrdom

When Joseph and Hyrum Smith were murdered in Carthage Jail on June 27, 1844, something in Porter Rockwell died too. For years, he had stood between Joseph and danger, had ridden beside him, guarded him, believed in him. And now Joseph was gone — cut down by a mob, betrayed by the very men sworn to protect him.

Porter wasn’t there that day. That fact haunted him.

By some accounts, he was in Nauvoo, recovering from wounds or assignments elsewhere. By others, he’d been sidelined — too dangerous to the Church’s public image in a time when they needed diplomacy more than defense. Either way, the one job he had sworn to do — protect the Prophet — had ended in failure.

But if Porter grieved, he didn’t break. He doubled down. In the chaos that followed the martyrdom, as leaders vied for control and mobs circled the grieving Saints, Porter remained steady. He threw his support behind Brigham Young and the Quorum of the Twelve. Where the Church went, he would go.

When the Saints began their westward exodus, fleeing persecution and poverty in search of Zion, Porter was at the front of the pack. Not just as a pioneer, but as a defender. His gun, once pointed at mobs and assassins, now helped carve a path through the Rocky Mountains. He hunted game. Fought off threats. Protected wagons and women and children from whatever lay ahead.

By the time the Saints reached the Salt Lake Valley in 1847, Rockwell had become more than a bodyguard — he was a symbol. Of survival. Of rough justice. Of faith that didn’t always look pretty but ran deep as bedrock.

Brigham Young saw Porter’s value immediately. The frontier still demanded strength, and the Church needed someone to carry out the law when the courts were too slow — or too corrupt — to do so.

Porter became a lawman.

He served as a deputy marshal, a scout, a tracker, and later a U.S. Marshal in Utah Territory. His reputation followed him like a shadow. Criminals fled at the mention of his name. Outlaws who tangled with Rockwell rarely got a second chance.

He was said to be able to track a man across frozen ground, ride for days without rest, and shoot with uncanny precision. One account claimed he rode solo into a saloon where a gang of rustlers were holed up, gave them a chance to surrender, and left with only one man still breathing.

Stories? Maybe. But even if they were half true, they were enough to make Porter Rockwell both feared and respected from Ogden to Arizona.

Still, his methods weren’t universally admired. Even among Saints, some wondered if Rockwell had taken too much upon himself — if his justice had begun to bleed into vengeance. He was known to drink, to brawl, to frequent saloons when not on assignment. He didn’t look like a Sunday School teacher. He looked like a storm.

But Brigham Young never questioned his place. “Porter Rockwell,” he said, “was a man I never had to worry about. He did what he was asked to do. And he did it well.”

In a territory where survival was never guaranteed, there was a certain holiness in that kind of dependability.

Porter may have traded the Prophet’s shadow for the mountains, but he never stopped serving. His loyalty had simply shifted from protecting one man to protecting an entire people.

Was It Porter? The Death of Frank Worrell

If Porter Rockwell was already a shadowy figure after the Boggs shooting, the death of Frank Worrell only deepened the legend.

Worrell had been an officer in the Carthage Greys, the militia assigned to protect Joseph and Hyrum Smith while they were imprisoned in Carthage Jail. But protect them, he did not. When the mob stormed the jail on June 27, 1844, the Carthage Greys did nothing to stop it. Some said they even cleared the way. The Prophet and his brother were murdered — shot in cold blood. Many Saints viewed Worrell as complicit in their deaths.

Months later, Worrell was killed near Warsaw, Illinois.

According to multiple sources, including a letter from Apostle John Taylor, Worrell was acting as an armed guard when he was shot and killed by a man escorting a load of powder wagons for the Church. The identity of the shooter wasn’t officially confirmed, but everyone had a name on their lips: Porter Rockwell.

Some accounts say Worrell was preparing to ambush the wagon train. Others say he made a threatening move, and the man escorting the load simply acted in defense. Still others claim it was retribution, plain and simple — another shadowy act of vengeance carried out by the same hand that may have fired into Boggs’s study.

Was it Porter?

Like much in Rockwell’s life, the story lives in half-light. No charges were filed. No trial was held. But among the Saints, a sense of justice hung in the air like smoke after gunfire.

Even John Taylor seemed to confirm the act, writing that Worrell’s death had been “a righteous judgment.” The message was clear: the Saints may be long-suffering, but they remembered.

As for Porter, he never publicly claimed the act. He didn’t need to. His silence became its own kind of answer. In time, the legend did the rest.

To outsiders, these stories painted Rockwell as dangerous, even unhinged — a man who answered Church persecution with vigilante violence. But to many Saints, especially in the wake of the Prophet’s murder, Porter wasn’t just avenging Joseph. He was reminding the world that the Saints were not helpless, not anymore.

He was long hair and long memory. And justice — at least in the Old West — often rode on horseback.

The Contradiction of a Consecrated Gunslinger

Try to draw a straight line through Porter Rockwell’s life and it’ll buckle under the weight of contradiction.

He never held high office in the Church. He didn’t serve as bishop, stake president, or apostle. He wasn’t known for preaching sermons, composing hymns, or giving eloquent testimonies. But ask the early Saints who they trusted when things went bad, and they’d point to the man with the long hair and the steady hand.

Porter believed in the restored gospel with unshakable certainty. He defended the Prophet Joseph Smith to his dying day. He served Brigham Young without hesitation. He carried out his duties not just as a lawman, but as someone who truly believed he was helping establish Zion — even when that meant cleaning up Zion’s rougher edges with a shotgun and a stare.

But he was no saint, at least not in the polished sense.

He drank. Not often, but enough to raise eyebrows — especially in later years, as the Church began to define itself more clearly against worldly vices. He frequented saloons and gambling halls, mostly to gather information or assert presence, but not always. He brawled when insulted. He swore when angry. He killed men when they drew first — and sometimes when they didn’t.

And yet, those closest to the heart of the Church never turned their backs on him.

Brigham Young defended him publicly and privately, even when the rumors piled up. Other leaders saw him as essential. Not perfect. Not refined. But necessary. He was the man who could go where others wouldn’t, and do what others couldn’t.

He was, in many ways, a Latter-day Samson — set apart, divinely preserved, unpolished and deeply human. His hair was part of the myth, but so was his heart. When asked once why he lived the way he did, Porter replied simply: “I never killed anyone who didn’t need killing.” In his world, that was morality.

And for all his contradictions, he never turned away from the Church. He never renounced the faith of his youth. He never apologized for his loyalty. While some early followers left when things got hard — or when doctrines got uncomfortable — Porter stayed. He rode west. He bled. He believed.

It’s easy to judge him by the standards of today. It’s harder to see him for what he was: a disciple in boots and dust, trying to defend a cause he never doubted.

He didn’t fit the mold of a Latter-day Saint. But then again, maybe the mold wasn’t fully formed yet. And maybe Porter Rockwell helped shape it — by proving that even flawed men can be instruments in the hands of God.

Legends, Truth, and Tall Tales

By the time Porter Rockwell was in his fifties, it was hard to separate the man from the myth. He was both more than human and somehow more real — gritty, vivid, and impossible to ignore.

He didn’t just live in history. He lived in stories.

If you walked into a saloon in the Utah Territory and said you knew Porter Rockwell, you’d have the room’s attention. If you said he owed you money, you’d better be packing iron. If you said you’d seen him draw and shoot before another man could blink, nobody would question you. Because they’d all heard a version of that story too.

Some tales were likely true, or at least rooted in fact. Like the time he tracked down an outlaw for hundreds of miles through frozen wilderness, surviving on snowmelt and shoe leather. When he brought the man in — alive, barely — the sheriff asked how he’d done it. Porter just grinned and said, “He made it easier by bleeding.”

Or the time he stood off a band of would-be assassins in a dark canyon, alone, outnumbered, outgunned — but not outmaneuvered. Shots rang out. Horses panicked. When the dust settled, Porter rode into town, casually leading a second horse with a wounded man slung over the saddle.

Some stories are harder to prove. They exist in the space between what happened and what could have happened.

There’s one about Porter drinking a whiskey in a mining town bar when a young braggart started talking tough. The kid didn’t recognize the older man with the tangled beard and dusty coat. He went on about how he could beat any man in the room, including “that long-haired geezer.” Porter listened, sipped, and waited. When the man finally made a move, Rockwell was up and on him like lightning. No bloodshed. Just bruises — and a whispered word in the kid’s ear that made his face go pale. He left town that night.

Another tale says that when a bounty was placed on Rockwell’s head by outlaws in Nevada, a group of hired killers were sent to ambush him. Porter found out, tracked them down first, and had a polite conversation with them — over their own campfire. He gave them two choices: turn around or be buried where they sat. They turned.

His reputation wasn’t just about violence. It was about presence. He had that strange, electric quality — the ability to make the room tilt when he walked in. He didn’t bark orders. He didn’t grandstand. But men listened when he spoke. They stepped aside when he passed. He was the embodiment of that old Western phrase: “Speak softly, and carry a big gun.”

Of course, the legends grew in the telling.

In the dime novels of the late 19th century, Rockwell was painted as part lawman, part outlaw, part ghost. A man who couldn’t be killed. A gunslinger with divine protection. Some said he never missed a shot. Others said he could ride for days without rest, or that he once held off a dozen men by himself with two revolvers and a knife.

He became a frontier archetype — the Avenging Angel, the Wild Saint, the holy terror.

But if you strip away the stories, the portraits painted in exaggeration and fear, what remains is somehow more impressive. A man who never disavowed his faith. Who never turned on the Church, even when others fell away. Who stayed loyal to the men he believed were called of God. Who wasn’t afraid of blood, or death, or being misunderstood.

He didn’t ask for sainthood. He didn’t write defenses of himself. He didn’t sermonize. He just showed up, again and again, in the hardest places, doing the hardest things.

Did God Really Protect Him?

Here’s something that still stirs debate in back corners of Sunday School and late-night campfire talks:

Was Porter Rockwell actually divinely protected?

If you take Joseph Smith at his word — and Porter certainly did — then the promise was clear: As long as you never cut your hair, no bullet or blade will ever harm you. Rockwell believed it. Lived by it. And, by all appearances, it held true. He survived gunfights, ambushes, prisons, and the kinds of scrapes that should’ve ended a lesser man. He died at home, of old age. Hair long. Prophecy intact.

But was it divine intervention? Or just grit, timing, and a fierce belief in something bigger than himself?

That’s the real question, isn’t it?

Even for those of us who are spiritual — who believe in God’s hand in our lives — it’s a strange concept: a lifelong blanket of invincibility, guaranteed by a prophetic promise. Doesn’t that sound more like folklore than doctrine?

And yet… maybe that belief was the protection. Maybe believing he couldn’t be hurt gave Porter Rockwell the kind of courage that makes a man move faster, aim steadier, think clearer. Maybe it gave him the edge that tipped the scales his way just enough, just often enough, to keep him alive.

Belief is a powerful thing. Not just because it connects us to God, but because it changes how we carry ourselves in the world.

Did God shield him? Did he simply believe he was shielded? Or were those one and the same?

Maybe that’s how faith works.

Not as a cosmic force field that prevents all harm, but as a lens that reshapes the way we step into danger. Maybe what we learn from Porter isn’t whether the promise was literal — but that when we believe something deeply, it changes how we move, how we act, and how much fear we carry into the unknown. Maybe that’s the power of faith: not to make us invincible, but to make us bold.

Something to think about.

Better yet — drop your thoughts in the comments. I’d love to know what you make of it.

Comparing the Flawed — Rockwell, Brigham, and Joseph

It’s easy to hold up Porter Rockwell as an outlier. A bruiser. A necessary roughness. The guy who didn’t quite fit the mold but was too loyal, too useful, too legendary to leave behind.

But what if the mold was never that clean to begin with?

When we talk about Porter’s contradictions — his drinking, his violence, his rough edges — we sometimes forget that the men he followed so faithfully weren’t without their own complexity.

Take Joseph Smith.

To many, he was the Prophet of the Restoration — visionary, revelator, martyr. And he was. But he also made mistakes. He trusted the wrong men more than once. He struggled with temper. He introduced doctrines — like plural marriage — that fractured the Church, tore at families, and left wounds that still haven’t fully healed. He clashed with the law, with politicians, even with his own people. He was loved, hated, misunderstood, and eventually killed.

Then there’s Brigham Young.

A powerful organizer. A fierce preacher. The man who led thousands across the plains and carved a community out of desert stone. But also the man whose sermons could cut with fire and fury. Who oversaw a theocratic structure that sometimes blurred the line between divine guidance and centralized control. Who defended polygamy until his dying breath, who sanctioned violence when he believed it necessary, and who left a legacy as complicated as it is enduring.

We call them prophets. And we should. But if we’re honest, they weren’t clean-cut either — not in temperament, not in reputation, and certainly not in the eyes of history.

So where does that leave Rockwell?

He never claimed revelation. Never led a church. Never penned scripture. But he followed. Fiercely. Humbly. Through storms, deserts, bloodshed, and exile. He believed when others doubted. He stayed when others fled. He didn’t ask for sainthood, but he lived like the gospel was something worth defending — with fists if necessary.

When I was younger — especially growing up in the 1980s — there was a movement in the Church to present history in a very polished, almost pristine light. It was driven in part by the global growth of the Church, the need for unity, and the desire to build faith by highlighting all that was noble and inspiring. And there is so much that is noble and inspiring. But in the process, some of the rougher truths were sanded off. Stories were sweetened. The grit, the heartbreak, the apostasies, the reasons behind the apostasies — those got buried beneath a glossy version of history that felt more like a family portrait than a battlefield memoir.

Then the internet came along.

Suddenly, that polished version of the past began to crack. People started reading journals, letters, government documents. The unvarnished version of Church history was no longer limited to historians — it was in everyone’s browser. And for some, the truth hit hard. The picture they’d been given in Primary and seminary didn’t match what they were reading at midnight in footnotes and archived newspapers.

But that’s not a failure of the gospel. That’s just how history works.

Read the Bible — really read it — and you’ll find murderers, liars, exiles, and traitors. The New Testament isn’t a polished reel of perfect people. It’s a raw, unfolding record of struggle and redemption. Of Peter denying. Of Paul persecuting. Of disciples scattering before they gathered again.

Every movement has its mess. Every faith, every government, every great cause carries both the glory and the weight of its flaws.

Maybe it’s time we let our history breathe like that too.

Porter Rockwell wasn’t a sanitized hero. Neither were Joseph and Brigham. And if we insist on clean stories, we’ll miss the truth of what they really did — and what God did through them.

Maybe what’s uncomfortable about Porter Rockwell isn’t just his flaws. Maybe it’s that his flaws are too obvious to hide. He didn’t speak in parables. He didn’t soften his story. He was out in the open — a mirror to every uncomfortable truth we carry about faith and imperfection.

And maybe that’s why he belongs beside Joseph and Brigham in the telling. Not because he was polished, but because he was part of the same rough, revelatory work. They each bore the weight of building Zion in the wild — and none of them walked away clean.

We like to think of discipleship as tidy. But the Restoration was anything but. It was violent, chaotic, beautiful, and holy — all tangled together. And the men who carried it forward were equally tangled.

Porter Rockwell wasn’t a prophet. But he believed one. Followed two. And bore the burden of their leadership with a quiet, unwavering loyalty that just might be one of the purest forms of faith.

What Porter Teaches Us About Discipleship Today

You won’t find Porter Rockwell’s name in the Doctrine and Covenants. There are no epistles addressed to him, no hymns written in his honor. He didn’t lead a mission, preside over a stake, or speak from the Tabernacle pulpit.

And yet — he’s unforgettable.

Maybe that’s because his story pushes us to ask deeper questions about what discipleship actually looks like. We’re used to thinking of it in terms of checklists: church attendance, clean language, a white shirt on Sunday, temple recommend in hand. Those are good things. Sacred things. But Rockwell reminds us that discipleship is something far more primal than polished behavior.

At its core, discipleship is loyalty. It’s choosing who you follow when it’s hard. It’s showing up even when your name isn’t on the program. It’s staying when others leave. And in that sense, Porter Rockwell may have been one of the truest disciples the early Church ever had.

He wasn’t clean. But he was committed.

He didn’t speak eloquently. But he listened to prophets — and acted on what he heard.

He wasn’t what we’d call “temple-worthy” by today’s standards, but he was willing to risk his life for the restoration of the gospel.

There’s something deeply moving about that.

Because if we’re honest, we all fall short. We all carry contradictions. We all have corners of our lives that don’t line up with the version of ourselves we wish we could present. But Rockwell’s life says, in a quiet and rugged way, God can still use you. Even if you’re messy. Even if you’re not what everyone expects. Even if you stumble through the door more than once with your hair in your eyes and a little whiskey on your breath.

It’s not an invitation to excuse sin or glorify violence. It’s an invitation to see the power of belief when it’s rooted deep, even if it’s wrapped in grit.

Faith doesn’t require polish. Just direction. Just devotion.

Rockwell reminds us that belief isn’t always expressed through reverence — it can show up as fierce loyalty, as unshakable trust, as a steady presence when things fall apart.

And maybe, just maybe, the kind of faith that survives the wilderness, the mobs, and the exile doesn’t always come dressed in its Sunday best. Maybe it rides into town, covered in dust, unshaven, eyes sharp, hands steady, and says, I’m still here. I still believe.

So what do we take from Porter Rockwell?

We take the challenge to be loyal when it’s inconvenient. To stay when it would be easier to leave. To let God work through us even when we’re still a work in progress. And to stop waiting until we’re perfect to show up and serve.

The gospel isn’t just for the polished. It’s for the determined.

But more than that — Porter Rockwell’s life points us back to Jesus Christ.

For all his loyalty to Joseph Smith and Brigham Young, Porter’s foundation was always in Christ. He believed in the Savior. He believed in the Atonement. However rough his edges, he was a Christian in the truest Latter-day Saint sense: someone who knew he needed the Redeemer and didn’t flinch from that need. And if there’s one thing we can say for sure about Porter, it’s that he never stopped believing that Jesus Christ was at the center of it all.

The Atonement is for people like Porter Rockwell — people who are deeply flawed but fiercely faithful. But it’s not just for individuals. It’s for the Church itself.

There have been times when the Church, as an institution, has made mistakes. That’s not a scandal — it’s a reality. Our early history is filled with painful chapters, misjudgments, hard corrections. Church leaders — from Joseph Smith to Brigham Young to modern-day prophets — have all grown, repented, and learned. Even President Russell M. Nelson, our living prophet today, has humbly led with a spirit of continual course correction and acknowledgment of the need for healing, greater inclusion, and more Christlike love.

That’s how the Atonement works — not just for sinners, but for Saints. For prophets. For people. For institutions. It’s not just for where we’ve been wrong. It’s for where we’re still becoming right.

Porter believed in that. And so can we.

The Long Hair and the Long Shadow

Porter Rockwell died on June 9, 1878, in Salt Lake City. Not in a shootout. Not in a canyon ambush. Not in a duel at high noon. He died quietly, of natural causes, at the age of sixty-four.

His hair was still long.

He had kept the promise. Or maybe the promise had kept him.

No bullet or blade had ever touched him, just as Joseph Smith had said. He outlived the Prophet. Outlived his enemies. Outlived the frontier that had once made him necessary. And when he passed, people didn’t quite know what to do with the space he left behind.

He was buried in the Salt Lake City Cemetery. His headstone reads simply:

“He was brave and loyal to his faith. He was a true friend to the Prophet Joseph.”

That’s it. No marble statue. No long epitaph. Just loyalty, remembered.

But his shadow remains.

It lingers not just in the stories we tell, but in the questions he raises: Can someone be both devoted and deeply flawed? Can God use people who don’t fit the mold? Can discipleship look like dust and sweat and steel instead of sermons and suits?

Porter Rockwell never led a congregation, but he showed us what it looks like to follow. He showed us what loyalty looks like when it costs something. And he showed us that you don’t have to be perfect to stand with the Lord’s work — you just have to stand.

That’s what discipleship looks like sometimes. It’s long hair, a worn coat, and eyes that have seen too much — but still choose to believe.

And as for me?

I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, the Redeemer of the world, and the Savior of my soul. I believe He lived, died, and rose again — not just to cleanse perfect people, but to reach the imperfect, the gritty, the honest, and the broken. People like Porter Rockwell. People like me.

I believe the gospel is true — not because it’s tidy, but because it’s transformative. I believe the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is Christ’s church, restored to help us make and keep covenants with Him, even if we’re still figuring it out along the way.

I believe the Atonement is real. Not theoretical. Not just doctrinal. Real. And I believe it applies not only to our sins but to our growth. To our stumbles. To our sincere efforts to do better tomorrow than we did today.

That’s what I see in the life of Porter Rockwell. And that’s what I see in the life of every Saint who walks forward — flawed, yes, but faithful.

May we do the same.