Wayward Saints

A story that includes spiritualistic séances, hidden conspiracy, and
an important church trial, Wayward Saints chronicles the challenge,
during the 1870's, of a group of British Mormon intellectuals to Brigham
Young's leadership and authority. William S. Godbe and his associates
revolted because they disliked Young's authoritarian community and resented
what they perceived as the church's intrusion into matters of personal
choice. Expelled from the church, they established the "New Movement,"
which eventually faltered. Both a study in intellectual history and an
investigation of religious dissent, Wayward Saints explores nineteenth-century
American spiritualism as well as the ideas and institutional structure
of first- and second-generation Mormonism.