[5] As the injury limited his physical activity, he focused his attention on education and obtained a teacher's certificate at age sixteen.

[7] At the age of thirty, after the death of his sister Susan, Richards decided to become a medical doctor.

[8] In 1836, Richards was introduced to the newly published Book of Mormon by his cousins, Joseph and Brigham Young.

[10][11] Shortly following his ordination as an elder, Richards was called on a brief three-month mission to the Eastern United States.

[10] With his high level of education, Richards was often counseled by Heber C. Kimball to focus on the basic tenets of the gospel.

[14] Their first child, named Heber John, was born on July 17, 1839, but died of smallpox just five months later in October.

[14][16] Richards returned to Richmond and retrieved his wife Jennetta, arriving back in Nauvoo on November 21, 1842.

[citation needed] He became Joseph Smith's private secretary in December 1841, when he was also made recorder of the Nauvoo Temple.

[19] In December 1842, Richards was called to be the Church Historian and Recorder, a position he held until his death.

This work was later incorporated into The History of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, edited by B. H. Roberts.

Over a year prior to the attack, Joseph Smith had told Richards that "the time would come that the balls would fly around him like hail, and he should see his friends fall on the right and on the left, but that there should not be a hole in his garment.

[23] Richards, his cousin Brigham Young, and other church elders left Nauvoo in February 1846, spending the remainder of the year at Winter Quarters, Nebraska.

Richards was called as Second Counselor to Brigham Young in the First Presidency on December 27, 1847, in Council Bluffs, Iowa.

After moving to Utah, Richards was involved in establishing the Deseret News, serving as its first Editor-in-Chief.