He then returned to Sturbridge, Massachusetts, and worked for a farmer in the general vicinity of where his grandfather lived for a time.
Allen also had hired a young woman, Nancy Lampson, to help his wife in cheese making, spinning and other household chores.
They did not have a copy of the Book of Mormon, which Holbrook sought, but he was eventually able to get one from his cousin Mary Ann Angel.
In April 1833, Holbrook served a mission traveling through parts of New York and then onto Connecticut, Rhode Island, and Massachusetts with his cousin Truman O. Angell.
He sold his farm in Wethersfield, and relocated his family to Kirtland, and then left them there as he headed west to Missouri.
After the Mormons were driven from Missouri, Holbrook settled for a time in Quincy, Illinois, where he worked at making fence rails.
He then was assigned by Joseph Smith to buy corn from the country to the north and east of Quincy, process it, and then distribute it to the Mormon refugees fleeing Missouri.
In the summer of 1842 at the urging of Anson Call Holbrook moved to Nauvoo, Illinois, shortly after which his wife died.