Brigham Young told of a large room of plates in the hill, and of the sword of Laban laid unsheathed on a table. He presented it as an account from Oliver Cowdery. It is a secondhand report.
Illustration, not a photograph.
On 17 June 1877, at a special conference in Farmington, Utah, President Brigham Young told what he called “an incident in the life of Oliver Cowdery.” He said Oliver went with the Prophet Joseph when the plates were deposited back in the hill Cumorah, after the angel instructed Joseph to carry them there. Brigham was careful to mark the next part as Oliver’s own report:
“Oliver says that when Joseph and Oliver went there, the hill opened, and they walked into a cave, in which there was a large and spacious room. He says he did not think, at the time, whether they had the light of the sun or artificial light; but that it was just as light as day. They laid the plates on a table; it was a large table that stood in the room. Under this table there was a pile of plates as much as two feet high, and there were altogether in this room more plates than probably many wagon loads; they were piled up in the corners and along the walls. The first time they went there the sword of Laban hung upon the wall; but when they went again it had been taken down and laid upon the table across the gold plates; it was unsheathed, and on it was written these words: ‘This sword will never be sheathed again until the kingdoms of this world become the kingdom of our God and his Christ.’” Brigham Young, discourse at Farmington, Utah, Sunday afternoon, 17 June 1877, reported by George F. Gibbs, Journal of Discourses 19:38 · read the page (PDF)
He then added that he told it “as coming not only from Oliver Cowdery, but others who were familiar with it.”
The words on the sword are quoted here exactly as they were printed in the Journal of Discourses. That volume is a nineteenth-century published report of the discourse, not a first-person record by Joseph Smith or Oliver Cowdery. The opening of the same talk, with the date and place, is on page 36 of the same volume.
This is not Joseph Smith’s own narrative of a vision. In the published report, Brigham Young presents it as what Oliver Cowdery said, and as something others also knew. Joseph Smith—History describes the stone box in the hill, not this cave room. The Church’s narrative history Saints does not appear to recount the cave story.
A Church History Library essay on Book of Mormon artifacts retells the 1877 talk and is clear about the chain of reporting:
“On June 17, 1877, Brigham Young gave a talk in Farmington, Utah, in which he recounted a story from Oliver Cowdery. Oliver had said that he and Joseph Smith saw the sword of Laban inside a cave in the Hill Cumorah. The cave, Oliver had told him, also contained piles of gold plates bearing the records of the Nephites. Other Saints of Brigham’s era were familiar with the story of the cave, too, though Brigham’s version remains perhaps the most well-known of the accounts, as it was published in the Journal of Discourses.” Church History Library, “Ask Us: Top Reference Questions about Book of Mormon Artifacts” · churchofjesuschrist.org
The same essay notes that the New York hill is a drumlin, “a giant pile of sand and gravel that is unlikely to support naturally-occurring cave structures,” that “nobody has found” the cave Oliver described, and that Cameron Packer’s 2004 comparison of the story’s versions found them “at least secondhand.” It adds: “Based on the available information, some researchers have concluded that Oliver may have seen the cave in a dream, not during an in-person visit.”
Cameron J. Packer, “Cumorah’s Cave,” Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 13, no. 1 (2004) · scholarsarchive.byu.edu
More than twenty years earlier, Heber C. Kimball used the word “vision” for a related recollection. In remarks printed in the Deseret News on 8 October 1856, he asked:
“How does it compare with the vision that Joseph and others had, when they went into a cave in the hill Cumorah, and saw more records than ten men could carry? There were books piled up upon tables, book upon book. Those records this people will yet have, if they accept of the Book of Mormon and observe its precepts, and keep the commandments.” Heber C. Kimball, remarks, Deseret News, 8 October 1856, as transcribed in the Church History Biographical Database · churchofjesuschrist.org
Kimball’s details differ from Brigham Young’s (he speaks of “books” and “more records than ten men could carry,” and he does not mention the sword). It is also a secondhand report. It is included here because it is an early, official-site transcription that uses the word “vision.”
This painting shows the room as Brigham Young described it on the later visit: the unsheathed sword laid on the table across the gold plates, a pile of plates under the table, and more plates along the walls. It does not portray Joseph or Oliver, and it is not a photograph of a known place.
Nephi describes Laban’s sword as having “a hilt… of pure gold” and “a blade… of the most precious steel.”
Joseph Smith’s own history places the plates he was given in a stone box on the west side of the hill, “under a stone of considerable size,” with the Urim and Thummim and the breastplate. That is a different deposit from the cave room in this later account.
Joseph Smith—History 1:51–52 · also on our page, the hill and the stone box
In 1829 the Three Witnesses were promised a view of the plates, the breastplate, the sword of Laban, and the Liahona. That promise was fulfilled in a vision in the woods near the Whitmer home in Fayette, not in a cave. It should not be read as the same event.
The cave in this later account is described as holding far more plates than the book Joseph was given to translate. That hope—that more of the Lord’s word will yet come forth—is already in the Book of Mormon. In the October 2026 general conference, President Dallin H. Oaks returned to it:
“We believe that the Lord will eventually cause the inspired teachings He has given to His children in various nations to be brought forth for the benefit of all people. This will include accounts of the visit of the resurrected Lord to what we call the lost tribes of Israel and His revelations to all the seed of Abraham.” President Dallin H. Oaks, “The Gospel of Jesus Christ Is for All,” Sunday morning session of the October 2026 general conference, 4 October 2026 · churchofjesuschrist.org
He pointed readers to the Lord’s promise in 2 Nephi 29:13:
“And it shall come to pass that the Jews shall have the words of the Nephites, and the Nephites shall have the words of the Jews; and the Nephites and the Jews shall have the words of the lost tribes of Israel; and the lost tribes of Israel shall have the words of the Nephites and the Jews.” 2 Nephi 29:13 · churchofjesuschrist.org
President Oaks did not describe the cave in the hill, and this page does not treat his words as a commentary on that account. They belong together only in this larger promise: more of the Lord’s word is still to come forth.
Each of these is a preview, not an official Church publication.