Viewing Mormons as Christianity's "Other"

Today I researched growth in the Pacific region of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (nicknamed Mormons because they believe the Book of Mormon is comparable to the Bible).

Manfred Ernst

In Winds of Change: Rapidly Growing Religious Groups in the Pacific Islands, Lutheran researcher Manfred Ernst raises a voice of alarm concerning the rapid growth of Mormons and other "fundamentalist" new religious groups. He complains about the tithing and the time commitment required of its members. In response, John Barker of the University of British Columbia, cautions against some of Ernst's conclusion that these new groups are "largely unhealthy" with "oppressive and paternalistic" theology, American-style individualism, racism, and political passivity. He warns against Ernst's top-down assumptions instead of consulting with the indigenous people, who usually "adapt Christianity to their own cultural premises and political ends with great facility" (see review in The Contemporary Pacific, Spring 1996, 235).

A gentle observation: I believe that well-meaning researchers like Ernst treat Mormons as the "Other" of Christianity, trying to classify it with preconceived labels such as "harmful," and "unhealthy" rather than studying it as a careful sociologist does, through evaluating the actual effects on its adherents. Jeff Thayne wrote a thoughtful reflection of "the Other" and "the Same":

According to Levinas,  . . . people try to make sense of "the Other" in a way that turns it into "the Same." It destroys the otherness of the Other by reducing it to the Same. When we describe the Other in words or abstractions, we turn it into something that we can grasp, understand, encapsulate in words, and remake it in our own image. We use the idiomatic phrase, “I get it!” or “I’ve got it!” to describe the way we know the phenomenon we’ve encountered. We thus take possession of the Other, and it thus becomes part of us. We become masters of the Other, because the Other has surrendered to us and has lost its alterity. The word alterity means “the state of being other, or different.” “Perceived in this way,” said Levinas, “philosophy would be engaged in reducing to the Same all that is opposed to it as other.” In essence, the goal of Western philosophy is to turn that which is alien into that which is familiar. (Jeff Thayne, “Levinas and Two Ways of Approaching the World,” http://thinkinginamarrowbone)

Human beings are complicated, and it is vital to see them from "the ground up," as individuals, and not from "the top down," as monolithic abstractions.

So I asked myself, How well do Mormons "adapt . . . to their own cultural premises and political ends"? What do the actual studies say? I searched for "sociological studies on Mormons' well-being" and found a neutral site. Here are a few trends from the same period Ernst wrote his book:

Data from the U.S. Govt. Census Bureau lists Utah as the state with the lowest teen pregnancy rate and the lowest abortion rate in the United States. [Source: Statistical Abstract of the United States 1997: National Data Book. Washington, D.C.: Census Bureau, U.S. Dept. of Commerce (1997).]

Based on a large variety of factors, Utah was ranked as the #1 best state in which to raise children in the 1996 rankings by the Children's Right's Council. [Source: Children's Rights Council Annual Ranking of States Based on Child Well Being] 

Latter-day Saints generally adhere strictly to their health code which prohibits the use of tobacco and alcohol. These practices have always shown up in national health data, which consistently rate Utah as having the lowest rates of smoking, alcohol use, lung cancer, etc. The National Institute of Mental Health ranked Utah as the second-lowest U.S. state in new inpatient admissions to state mental hospitals and the ranked Utah as having the lowest per-capita alcohol consumption. 

Those facts didn't surprise me, but here is one that did: 

Since 2002, Utah has been the state with the #1 highest bankruptcy rate in the nation. Economists and sociologists seem uncertain about exactly why this is the case.

In this very quick survey of sociological studies, I conclude that Mormons seem to adapt to their cultural premises and political ends with great facility (with the possible exception of money management).

When Tragedy Strikes

The daily newspaper screamed the headlines: “Plane Crash Kills 43. No Survivors of Mountain Tragedy,” and thousands of voices joined in a chorus: “Why did the Lord let this terrible thing happen?”
Two automobiles crashed when one went through a red light, and six people were killed. Why would God not prevent this?
Why should the young mother die of cancer and leave her eight children motherless? Why did not the Lord heal her?
A little child was drowned; another was run over. Why?
A man died one day suddenly of a coronary occlusion as he climbed a stairway. His body was found slumped on the floor. His wife cried out in agony, “Why? Why would the Lord do this to me? Could he not have considered my three little children who still need a father?”

So begins a powerful essay by Spencer W. Kimball. He thoughtfully concludes that these questions are unanswerable without a precise understanding of God's motives. Yet too often we grow angry with God for allowing problems to happen. Or we choose to dwell in self-pity, blaming those who have caused our problems, not realizing that it poisons our own future growth and happiness.

President Kimball faced several health challenges that could have ruined his attitude toward life. Instead, he pressed forward with courage. In 1932 he began suffering from painful boils and infectious sores. In May 1948 in Arizona, he suffered severe chest pain from a heart attack. On his next assignment in Idaho, he again experienced chest pains, which escalated into another heart attack several days after his return. These^]chest pains returned during the next several years, particularly in times of greatest stress. Then, in early 1950, his throat began to be persistently hoarse. In late 1956, his hoarseness came back, coupled with occasional bleeding in the back of his throat. In early 1957 a doctor operated on his throat to remove some cancer and surgically removed one of President Kimball's vocal cords and half of the other, leaving him barely able to speak above a whisper. His voice remained raspy the rest of his life. In 1972, at age 76, he began having difficulty breathing and sleeping. Doctors discovered that he had serious heart disease and that his throat cancer had returned. Heart surgery was postponed so that he could undergo radiation on his throat, which was successful. On April 12, 1972, he underwent a 4.5-hour surgery, which was also successful.

After overcoming these severe health problems, President Kimball guided the Church through a period of dramatic growth. During the twelve years of his presidency, the number of missionaries increased by 50 percent, the priesthood was extended to all worthy male members, and the number of temples doubled.

Writing from this unique perspective of dealing with severe adversity, President Kimball discussed our premortal life and the attitude that we might adopt toward our challenges:

We knew before we were born that we were coming to the earth for bodies and experience and that we would have joys and sorrows, ease and pain, comforts and hardships, health and sickness, successes and disappointments, and we knew also that after a period of life we would die. We accepted all these eventualities with a glad heart, eager to accept both the favorable and unfavorable. We eagerly accepted the chance to come earthward even though it might be for only a day or a year. Perhaps we were not so much concerned whether we should die of disease, of accident, or of senility. We were willing to take life as it came and as we might organize and control it, and this without murmur, complaint, or unreasonable demands.

In the face of apparent tragedy we must put our trust in God, knowing that despite our limited view his purposes will not fail. With all its troubles life offers us the tremendous privilege to grow in knowledge and wisdom, faith and works, preparing to return and share God’s glory.⁹

What an inspiring example of pressing forward with faith and courage! For more on this topic, see https://www.lds.org/manual/teachings-spencer-w-kimball/chapter-2?lang=eng.

Gold Panner to Mail Pioneer: Henry Wells Jackson’s Unlikely Path to the Civil War

On May 8, 1861, Henry Wells Jackson began a journey from Springville, Utah, to Washington, D.C., during the Civil War. He later volunteered for the Union as a lieutenant. How did a Utah Mormon get involved in the Civil War? This is a surprising story involving the Mormon Battalion, the gold rush, Indian attacks, the Utah War, Camp Floyd, the overland mail service, congressional budget battles, and a skinflint postmaster general.

Twenty-year-old Henry Wells Jackson completed service in the Mormon Battalion and then the Mormon Volunteers and traveled north to Mormon Island.

On July 16, 1847, Henry was mustered out of the Mormon Battalion in Los Angeles. He reenlisted in the Mormon Volunteers while many of his comrades headed northeast to the Great Salt Lake Valley and some headed north to Sacramento and began working for John Sutter.

In 1848, two events ten days apart triggered an avalanche of immigration to California: the January 24 discovery of gold at Sutter’s sawmill and the February 2 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, which ceded from Mexico what is now the western United States. 

William Henry Jackson, Marshall Finds Gold, Scotts Bluff National Monument.

Regarding the gold discovery, Sam Brannan later wrote: “On January [24], 1848, when James W. Marshall let the water into the millrace and the water had run clear, he picked up a piece of gold—or rather what he supposed to be gold—at the bottom of the race. . . . A number of young men from the Mormon Battalion were at work on the mill. . . . Marshall, Weimer, Bennett, and Captain Sutter claimed the right to the discovery of gold and charged every man who worked there 10 percent of what they found. Some of the boys became dissatisfied and went prospecting down the river for themselves and found good digging about twenty-five miles below on an island which has ever since been known as Mormon Island.”[1]

Hiram Dwight Pierce, Miners Working at Mormon Island (1849). California State Library.

This discovery at Mormon Island (now under Folsom Lake) was made by Sidney Willis and Wilford Hudson on about March 2. On March 14, twenty-year-old Henry was mustered out of the Mormon Volunteers and traveled there, where he panned for gold for about a year. Meanwhile, Sam Brannan’s newspaper, the California Star, announced the discovery, which furthered the flood of immigration. Of course, this immigration affected not only California but also Utah Territory. Kenneth Owens concludes that “without the 1848 gold discovery and the rush for riches that followed, the development of the LDS church and community in the Great Basin must certainly have taken an alternative course. The difficult economic challenges the Saints faced in their valley in the mountains would have intensified.”[2]

While hordes of Forty-Niners traveled west to the gold fields, Henry traveled east to the Salt Lake Valley. There, he and many others made deposits in the gold account worth tens of thousands of dollars, which became an important resource to back the early Mormon currency and furthered trade with the California-bound emigrants.[3] However, “this was a mixed blessing,” wrote Kenneth Davies and Loren Hansen in Mormon Gold. “With their bags of gold, they became a disruptive force in the days of dire community poverty. They served as a visual reminder of the gold to be found in El Dorado and of the poverty of the Saints.”[4] Shown here is a 2½-dollar gold coin.

Original coins such as this were auctioned in 2014 for $500,000.

In Bountiful, Utah, Henry Jackson’s fiddling, riding, and shooting abilities captured the heart of twenty-year-old Eliza Ann Dibble,[5] and the two were married by Brigham Young on February 3, 1850.[6] 

Henry Wells Jackson, about 1861.

Eliza Ann Dibble Jackson. International Society Daughters of Utah Pioneers.

Throughout his life, Henry was strongly motivated by his family’s financial well-being and traveled extensively. They first homesteaded in Tooele, and while his first child was being born, Henry was on the road to Iowa to claim 160 acres of bounty land for his Mormon Battalion service. He returned to Utah in early 1851.[7] The Tooele settlers lived on the western frontier and were easy prey for marauding Goshiute Indians, who often killed their cattle or stole their crops. “It is estimated that the Indians cost the Tooele settlers over five thousand dollars in stolen horses and cattle. . . . The Goshiutes regarded land, water, and food resources as belong to everyone, meaning no one owned them at all.”[8] For safety, the settlers moved their houses into a fort in 1851. 

Henry enlisted in the Utah territorial militia and often participated in campaigns to pursue these raiders.[9] In 1852, Henry traveled to San Francisco to make another land claim for his reenlistment in California.[10] Then, in 1853, he enlisted again in the Utah territorial militia.[11] 

Utah Territorial Militia, 1861. Church History Library.

After a three-year stay in San Bernardino, they were called back to Utah in 1857 during the Utah War. The Jacksons moved to Bountiful in late November to early December 1857. Later, the family relocated again, temporarily moving south to Springville, being prepared to torch the crops to deny the federal troops any forage.

Commanding General’s Quarters, Camp Floyd, Utah Territory, January 1859. Photograph by C. C. Mills, National Archives. 

Despite caustic rhetoric on both sides, most hostilities were mitigated, with the notable exception of the Mountain Meadows Massacre.[12] The army peacefully marched in and established Camp Floyd, the country’s largest outpost of troops. Ironically, the unwelcome presence of federal troops infused much-needed cash and job opportunities into the local economy.[13] For example, early in 1858 George W. Chorpenning Jr. resecured a contract to deliver “mail every two weeks between Salt Lake City and Placerville, California, for about $34,000 a year. By the time service started that July, the route had been improved to weekly, and his pay nearly quadrupled.”[14] 

George W. Chorpenning Jr., western mail pioneer.

To prepare for this weekly service, Chorpenning ordered twenty Concord coaches, and “mules were stationed in teams at remount points twenty-five miles apart. . . . Chorpenning’s associates in the old Utah–Southern California contract, meanwhile, hustled their gear north and built a similar line of stations from Salt Lake City to Wells, Nevada.”[15] In the fall of 1858, Henry began working for Chorpenning. 

Major Howard Egan. Painting by William Egan Sylvester.

One of his coworkers was Major Howard Egan, who had created a shortcut trail through the desert.[16] Essentially, Egan’s shortcut “ran south out of Salt Lake through the Jordan Narrows into . . . Utah Valley, where it then turned west and ascended through Rush Valley at Five Mile Pass. This new route, used for both passenger and mail transport, shortened the traveling distance at least 250 miles. . . . There were 54 stations marked on the Egan trail from Salt Lake City to Placerville, covering a distance of approximately 650 miles.”[17]

Chorpenning's mail route in 1858–1860 is marked with a dotted line. John M. Townley, “Stalking Horse for the Pony Express: The Chorpenning Mail Contracts between California and Utah, 1851–1860,” Arizona and the West 24, no. 3 (Autumn 1982): 233.

Over the years, mail was delayed by Indian attacks and the snow-packed northern Utah valleys and Sierra Nevada. Congress heard about the mail delays and then delayed payment because of budget battles (some things never change!). In June 1858, Congress adjourned without appropriating money for the mail. Postmaster General Aaron Brown apologetically offered “letters of obligation” to use as security to get loans.[18] 

Postmaster General Aaron Brown, March 1857– March 1859.

To stay afloat, Chorpenning mortgaged several properties, and his coaches finally arrived in October 1858. “On November 21 he dispatched a column of fifty wagons and over 300 animals southwest from Temple Square along the new cutoff. Weekly coaches would thereafter be rerouted south from Granite Pass, bypassing the snow-clogged northern valleys.”[19] Then in December 1858, Chorpenning had a bright idea that others eventually coopted. He had men on horses deliver a presidential message from coast to coast in just seventeen days, proving that his central route was the quickest way to the West. He thus unwittingly gave William Russell the idea for a faster Pony Express, which displaced his service two years later using the very same roads and stations.

Pony Express rider flanked by American Indians.

In February 1859, Chorpenning was promised an additional $60,000 a year, but then the postmaster general died in March. The new postmaster general, Joseph Holt, was very budget conscious and cut the deliveries back to bimonthly, trimming the fee by $70,000. Congress again adjourned without paying for the mail—this was the final straw.

Postmaster General Joseph Holt, March 1859–December  1860.

On May 11, 1860, the postmaster general acted on complaints of mail delays and Chorpenning’s indebtedness. He nullified the mail contract with the claim of “bad management.”[20] That same day a contract was signed with the Pony Express, which had begun service a month earlier. Ironically, the Pony Express would be replaced eighteen months later by the transcontinental telegraph. Talk about disruptive technology!

Pony Express rider passing workers laying telegraph line.

Chorpenning’s financial woes left many workers unpaid, including Henry Jackson. In April 1861, just after Civil War broke out in the East, Henry finished gathering the papers necessary to file a claim for his back pay of $1,300. On May 8, 1861, he left his wife and three children in Springville. He traveled between various states, staying with his siblings and their families and working to pay his bills. In Washington, D.C., he contacted Chorpenning, who promised to pay him in four months. For the rest of his life, Chorpenning unsuccessfully attempted to collect his promised $430,000.[21]

In the fall of 1861, being low on cash, Henry began working as an assistant wagon master for thirty-five dollars a month. He hauled provisions and forage for federal military units located around the city.[22] His duties eventually expanded to areas outside the capital, and during one trip he was captured by Confederate forces. For about three months, he was held in a Southern prison camp and later exchanged for Confederate prisoners. Because of the way he was treated, he decided to fight for the Union, volunteering as a lieutenant in the First Regiment, District of Columbia Cavalry.[23] Unfortunately, he was soon transferred from his defensive position around the capital to an overland campaign in Virginia to control railways supplying Confederate troops. 

Typical cavalry skirmish in the Civil War.

Exactly three years to the day that he left home, he would be mortally wounded while taking a railroad bridge from Confederates, becoming Utah’s only Civil War battle fatality.

Notes

[1] Samuel Brannan, “Gold Discovery in California,” Calistoga Tribune, April 11, 1872, 1, 37. For a discussion of Mormon Battalion involvement in the gold rush, see Kenneth N. Owens, “Far from Zion: The Frayed Ties between California’s Gold Rush Saints and LDS President Brigham Young,” California History 89, no. 4 (2012): 5–23.

[2] Kenneth N. Owens, Gold Rush Saints: California Mormons and the Great Rush for Riches (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2004), 369.

[3] Henry Jackson’s deposits to the Utah gold accounts are listed by amount in J. Kenneth Davies and Lorin K. Hansen, Mormon Gold: Mormons in the California Gold Rush, 2^nd ed. (North Salt Lake City: Granite Mountain, 2010), 83–84, 153. For the minting of Mormon currency, see chapter 7.

[4] Davies and Hansen, Mormon Gold, 87.

[5] Eliza Ann Dibble was born on August 16, 1829, in Claymore, Cayuga County, Ohio, to Philo Dibble (1806–95) and Celia Kent (1803–40). Eliza was briefly married to Orson Spencer, though Brigham Young later canceled the marriage.

[6] The Youngs and the Jacksons were indeed well acquainted. Brigham Young performed their wedding, and Henry Jackson paid fifty dollars in California gold dust to Brigham’s wife Mima for providing the wedding party. The Story of Eliza Ann Dibble and Her Three Husbands, Orson Spencer, Henry W. Jackson, and Julius A. C. Austin (n.p., 1995), 49, 60.

[7] Smith, “Hidden Personalities among Mormon Battalion Members.”

[8] Tooele County Daughters of Utah Pioneers, History of Utah’s Tooele County: From the Edge of the Great Basin Frontier (Tooele, UT: Transcript Bulletin, 2012), 262, 17.

[9] Archival records show him as a private in James Ferguson’s Company from April 23 to May 1 and in W. McBride’s Company from June 14 to 27, 1851. Territorial Militia Service Cards, Utah State Archives and Records Service, Series 6195, reel 1. I appreciate the research assistance of Tony Castro and Doug Misner at the Utah State Archives.

[10] Smith, “Hidden Personalities among Mormon Battalion Members.”

[11]He appears on militia records as a private in W. H. Kimball’s Company from August 25 to September 10 and in J. W. Cumming’s Company from September 6 to October 9, 1853 (the last two periods overlap a few days).

[12] For a history of the Utah War and Kane’s intervention between the Saints and the federal army, see Matthew J. Grow, “Liberty to the Downtrodden”: Thomas L. Kane, Romantic Reformer (New Haven, CT: Yale, 2009), chaps. 9–10.

[13] Durwood Ball, Army Regulars on the Western Frontier, 1848–1861 (Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 2001), 166.

[14] Smith, The Story of Eliza Ann Dibble and Her Three Husbands, 61.

[15] John M. Townley, “Stalking Horse for the Pony Express: The Chorpenning Mail Contracts between California and Utah, 1851–1860,” Arizona and the West 24, no. 3 (Autumn 1982): 240.

[16] http://familysearch.org/learn/wiki/en/Central_Overland_Trail.

[17] Massey, “Synopsis of Major Howard Egan,” http://www.xphomestation.com/ks-massey.pdf.

[18] Townley, “Stalking Horse for the Pony Express,” 246–47.

[19] Townley, “Stalking Horse for the Pony Express,” 245.

[20] Townley, “Stalking Horse for the Pony Express,” 248–52.

[21] Obituary for George W. Chorpenning, Somerset Herald, April 11, 1894.

[22] Henry Wells Jackson to John and Rachel Wright, October 27, 1861, transcript of letter in author’s possession.

[23] Smith, The Story of Eliza Ann Dibble and Her Three Husbands, 63.

The Utah War and Mountain Meadows Massacre

The Utah War and Mountain Meadows Massacre together form one of the darkest chapters in the history of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons). To help readers understand these events, this blog post gathers historical perspectives from historians both outside and inside the faith. Like a tapestry woven of many threads, the various accounts show us the complex issues and individuals involved in the Utah War.

A Non-Mormon Perspective on the Utah War

“So what was the Utah War?” asks William P. MacKinnon, an independent historian who happens to be Presbyterian. He then answers his own question: “In one sense it was President James Buchanan’s effort to replace Brigham Young as governor of Utah Territory and to install his successor with an army escort of 2,500 troops, a change that Young resisted with guerrilla tactics until a settlement was reached a year later in 1858. Over the years I have come to define it more formally as the armed confrontation over power and authority during 1857–58 between the civil-religious leadership of Utah Territory, led by Governor Brigham Young, and the administration of President James Buchanan—a conflict that pitted perhaps the nation’s largest, most experienced territorial militia (called the Nauvoo Legion) against an expeditionary force that ultimately grew to involve almost one-third of the U.S. Army.[i] 

President James Buchanan

MacKinnon says that while teaching or writing about the Utah War, we would be wise to avoid inaccurate or belittling nicknames for elements of this conflict such as “Johnston’s Army” or “Buchanan’s Blunder.” These terms oversimplify the nature of the events and complex issues at stake.[ii] 

Human nature being what it is, mistakes were made by both President Buchanan and Governor Young: “In Buchanan’s case, he knew shockingly little in 1857 about either conditions in Utah or Brigham Young’s likely reaction to his removal as governor. Compounding this serious shortfall in intelligence was a series of horrible selection decisions—the appointment of a homicidal, ham-handed brevet brigadier general, William S. Harney, as the Utah Expedition’s initial commander and Alfred Cumming, an inexperienced four-hundred-pound alcoholic, as Young’s successor. These were appointments that bring to mind the old lesson about nothing being as expensive as bad management.”[iii] Another huge mistake was unwillingness to communicate with Governor Young before or after sending a hostile force.

Governor Brigham Young

On Governor Young's side, MacKinnon notes "the impossibility of serving effectively two masters—as in Brigham Young’s case, when he eagerly sought to serve simultaneously both the federal government, in a myriad of overlapping civil and military roles, as well as his church as its supreme religious leader. This was a hopeless conflict of interest, and it all came crashing down with tragic results and by-products during 1857–58.”[iv] MacKinnon believes that the governor's “biggest, most costly blunder was the miscalculation by which for years he indulged in hostile, violent rhetoric as governor, behavior that brought down on him and his people needlessly the full force of the U.S. government. As a result, Utah and Mormonism changed forever.”[v] MacKinnon then summarizes long-lasting consequences of the Utah War: “The war unleashed a wide range of societal forces—political, religious, economic, and even geographic—that, among other things, barred statehood for Utah until 1896. In some cases the issues set in motion by these forces are still unresolved today. For example, I would say that today’s Sagebrush Rebellion in the West is in many ways a downstream by-product of the Utah War. Ask yourself why, in 1996, President Bill Clinton felt it best to announce his unilateral, highly unpopular creation of Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument not in southern Utah—where the new park was to be located and where local residents muttered to New York newspaper reporters about ‘Johnston’s Army’—but rather from the relative political safety of northern Arizona.”[vi]

If there is a bright spot in the story of the Utah War, it is Colonel Thomas L. Kane's heroic effort to travel west and mediate peace between the disgruntled parties. Matthew Grow has written a fine biography of Kane's life and leadership titled "Liberty to the Downtrodden": Thomas L. Kane, Romantic Reformer. Kane has become one of my heroes.

Historical Perspective on the Utah War

In 2014, the Church website LDS.org posted an official statement on the historical context of the Utah War:

The “Reformation” and the Utah War

In the mid-1850s, a “reformation” within the Church and tensions between the Latter-day Saints in Utah and the U.S. federal government contributed to a siege mentality and a renewed sense of persecution that led to several episodes of violence committed by Church members. Concerned about spiritual complacency, Brigham Young and other Church leaders delivered a series of sermons in which they called the Saints to repent and renew their spiritual commitments. Many testified that they became better people because of this reformation.

Nineteenth-century Americans were accustomed to violent language, both religious and otherwise. Throughout the century, revivalists had used violent imagery to encourage the unconverted to repent and to urge backsliders to reform. At times during the reformation, President Young, his counselor Jedediah M. Grant, and other leaders preached with fiery rhetoric, warning against the evils of those who dissented from or opposed the Church. Drawing on biblical passages, particularly from the Old Testament, leaders taught that some sins were so serious that the perpetrator’s blood would have to be shed in order to receive forgiveness. Such preaching led to increased strain between the Latter-day Saints and the relatively few non-Mormons in Utah, including federally appointed officials.

In early 1857, U.S. President James Buchanan received reports from some of the federal officials alleging that Governor Young and the Latter-day Saints in Utah were rebelling against the authority of the federal government. A strongly worded memorial from the Utah legislature to the federal government convinced federal officials the reports were true. President Buchanan decided to replace Brigham Young as governor and, in what became known as the Utah War, sent an army to Utah to escort his replacement. Latter-day Saints feared that the oncoming army—some 1,500 troops, with more to follow—would renew the depredations of Missouri and Illinois and again drive the Saints from their homes. In addition, Parley P. Pratt, a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, was murdered in Arkansas in May 1857. News of the murder—as well as newspaper reports from the eastern United States that celebrated the crime—reached Utah in late June 1857. As these events unfolded, Brigham Young declared martial law in the territory, directed missionaries and settlers in outlying areas to return to Utah, and guided preparations to resist the army. Defiant sermons given by President Young and other Church leaders, combined with the impending arrival of an army, helped create an environment of fear and suspicion in Utah.

The Mountain Meadows Massacre

At the peak of this tension, in early September 1857, a branch of the territorial militia in southern Utah (composed entirely of Mormons), along with some Indians they recruited, laid siege to a wagon train of emigrants traveling from Arkansas to California. As the wagon train traveled south from Salt Lake City, the emigrants had clashed verbally with local Mormons over where they could graze their cattle. Some of the members of the wagon train became frustrated because they had difficulty purchasing much-needed grain and other supplies from local settlers, who had been instructed to save their grain as a wartime policy. Aggrieved, some of the emigrants threatened to join incoming troops in fighting against the Saints.

Although some Saints ignored these threats, other local Church leaders and members in Cedar City, Utah, advocated violence. Isaac C. Haight, a stake president and militia leader, sent John D. Lee, a militia major, to lead an attack on the emigrant company. When the president reported the plan to his council, other leaders objected and requested that he call off the attack and instead send an express rider to Brigham Young in Salt Lake City for guidance. But the men Haight had sent to attack the emigrants carried out their plans before they received the order not to attack. The emigrants fought back, and a siege ensued.

Over the next few days, events escalated, and Mormon militiamen planned and carried out a deliberate massacre. They lured the emigrants from their circled wagons with a false flag of truce and, aided by Paiute Indians they had recruited, slaughtered them. Between the first attack and the final slaughter, the massacre destroyed the lives of 120 men, women, and children in a valley known as Mountain Meadows. Only small children—those believed to be too young to be able to tell what had happened—were spared. The express rider returned two days after the massacre. He carried a letter from Brigham Young telling local leaders to “not meddle” with the emigrants and to allow them to pass through southern Utah. The militiamen sought to cover up the crime by placing the entire blame on local Paiutes, some of whom were also members of the Church.

Two Latter-day Saints were eventually excommunicated from the Church for their participation, and a grand jury that included Latter-day Saints indicted nine men. Only one participant, John D. Lee, was convicted and executed for the crime, which fueled false allegations that the massacre had been ordered by Brigham Young.

In recent years, the Church has made diligent efforts to learn everything possible about the massacre. In the early 2000s, historians in the Church History Department of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints scoured archives throughout the United States for historical records; every Church record on the massacre was also opened to scrutiny. In the resulting book, published by Oxford University Press in 2008, authors Ronald W. Walker, Richard E. Turley Jr., and Glen M. Leonard concluded that while intemperate preaching about outsiders by Brigham Young, George A. Smith, and other leaders contributed to a climate of hostility, President Young did not order the massacre. Rather, verbal confrontations between individuals in the wagon train and southern Utah settlers created great alarm, particularly within the context of the Utah War and other adversarial events. A series of tragic decisions by local Church leaders—who also held key civic and militia leadership roles in southern Utah—led to the massacre.

Aside from the Mountain Meadows Massacre, a few Latter-day Saints committed other violent acts against a small number of dissenters and outsiders. Some Latter-day Saints perpetrated acts of extralegal violence, especially in the 1850s, when fear and tensions were prevalent in Utah Territory. The heated rhetoric of Church leaders directed toward dissenters may have led these Mormons to believe that such actions were justified. The perpetrators of these crimes were generally not punished. Even so, many allegations of such violence are unfounded, and anti-Mormon writers have blamed Church leaders for many unsolved crimes or suspicious deaths in early Utah.

Conclusion

Many people in the 19th century unjustly characterized the Latter-day Saints as a violent people. Yet the vast majority of Latter-day Saints, in the 19th century as today, lived in peace with their neighbors and families, and sought peace in their communities. Travelers in the 19th century often noted the peace and order that prevailed in Mormon communities in Utah and elsewhere. Nevertheless, the actions of relatively few Latter-day Saints caused death and injury, frayed community relationships, and damaged the perception of Mormons as a peaceful people.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints condemns violent words and actions and affirms its commitment to furthering peace throughout the world. Speaking of the Mountain Meadows Massacre, Elder Henry B. Eyring, then a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, stated, “The gospel of Jesus Christ that we espouse abhors the cold-blooded killing of men, women, and children. Indeed, it advocates peace and forgiveness. What was done here long ago by members of our Church represents a terrible and inexcusable departure from Christian teaching and conduct.”

Throughout the Church’s history, Church leaders have taught that the way of Christian discipleship is a path of peace. Elder Russell M. Nelson of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles connected the Latter-day Saints’ faith in Jesus Christ to their active pursuit of love of neighbor and peace with all people: “The hope of the world is the Prince of Peace. … Now, as members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, what does the Lord expect of us? As a Church, we must ‘renounce war and proclaim peace.’ As individuals, we should ‘follow after the things which make for peace.’ We should be personal peacemakers.”[vii]

Details of the Mountain Meadows Massacre

Richard E. Turley, Assistant Church Historian, provided details about the Mountain Meadows Massacre in an Ensign article (before publishing the landmark book Massacre at Mountain Meadows with Ronald Walker and Glen Leonard):

On September 11, 1857, some 50 to 60 local militiamen in southern Utah, aided by American Indian allies, massacred about 120 emigrants who were traveling by wagon to California. The horrific crime, which spared only 17 children age six and under, occurred in a highland valley called the Mountain Meadows, roughly 35 miles southwest of Cedar City. The victims, most of them from Arkansas, were on their way to California with dreams of a bright future.

For a century and a half the Mountain Meadows Massacre has shocked and distressed those who have learned of it. The tragedy has deeply grieved the victims’ relatives, burdened the perpetrators’ descendants and Church members generally with sorrow and feelings of collective guilt, unleashed criticism on the Church, and raised painful, difficult questions. How could this have happened? How could members of the Church have participated in such a crime?

Two facts make the case even more difficult to fathom. First, nothing that any of the emigrants purportedly did or said, even if all of it were true, came close to justifying their deaths. Second, the large majority of perpetrators led decent, nonviolent lives before and after the massacre.

As is true with any historical episode, comprehending the events of September 11, 1857, requires understanding the conditions of the time, only a brief summary of which can be shared in the few pages of this magazine article. For a more complete, documented account of the event, readers are referred to the forthcoming book Massacre at Mountain Meadows.

Historical Background

In 1857 an army of roughly 1,500 United States troops was marching toward Utah Territory, with more expected to follow. Over the preceding years, disagreements, miscommunication, prejudices, and political wrangling on both sides had created a growing divide between the territory and the federal government. In retrospect it is easy to see that both groups overreacted—the government sent an army to put down perceived treason in Utah, and the Saints believed the army was coming to oppress, drive, or even destroy them.

In 1858 this conflict—later called the Utah War—was resolved through a peace conference and negotiation. Because Utah’s militiamen and the U.S. troops never engaged each other in pitched battle, the Utah War has been characterized as “bloodless.” But the atrocity at Mountain Meadows made it far from bloodless.

As the troops were making their way west in the summer of 1857, so were thousands of overland emigrants. Some of these emigrants were Latter-day Saint converts en route to Utah, but most westbound emigrants were headed for California, many with large herds of cattle. The emigration season brought many wagon companies to Utah just as Latter-day Saints were preparing for what they believed would be a hostile military invasion. The Saints had been violently driven from Missouri and Illinois in the prior two decades, and they feared history might repeat itself.

Church President and territorial governor Brigham Young and his advisers formed policies based on that perception. They instructed the people to save their grain and prepare to cache it in the mountains in case they needed to flee there when the troops arrived. Not a kernel of grain was to be wasted or sold to merchants or passing emigrants. The people were also to save their ammunition and get their firearms in working order, and the territory’s militiamen were put on alert to defend the territory against the approaching troops if necessary.

These orders and instructions were shared with leaders throughout the territory. Elder George A. Smith of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles carried them to southern Utah. He, Brigham Young, and other leaders preached with fiery rhetoric against the enemy they perceived in the approaching army and sought the alliance of Indians in resisting the troops.

These wartime policies exacerbated tensions and conflict between California-bound emigrants and Latter-day Saint settlers as wagon trains passed through Utah’s settlements. Emigrants became frustrated when they were unable to resupply in the territory as they had expected to do. They had a difficult time purchasing grain and ammunition, and their herds, some of which included hundreds of cattle, had to compete with local settlers’ cattle for limited feed and water along the trail.

Some traditional Utah histories of what occurred at Mountain Meadows have accepted the claim that poisoning also contributed to conflict—that the Arkansas emigrants deliberately poisoned a spring and an ox carcass near the central Utah town of Fillmore, causing illness and death among local Indians. According to this story, the Indians became enraged and followed the emigrants to the Mountain Meadows, where they either committed the atrocities on their own or forced fearful Latter-day Saint settlers to join them in the attack. Historical research shows that these stories are not accurate.

While it is true that some of the emigrants’ cattle were dying along the trail, including near Fillmore, the deaths appear to be the result of a disease that affected cattle herds on the 1850s overland trails. Humans contracted the disease from infected animals through cuts or sores or through eating the contaminated meat. Without this modern understanding, people suspected the problem was caused by poisoning.

Escalating Tensions

The plan to attack the emigrant company originated with local Church leaders in Cedar City, who had recently been alerted that U.S. troops might enter at any time through southern Utah’s passes. Cedar City was the last place on the route to California for grinding grain and buying supplies, but here again the emigrants were stymied. Badly needed goods weren’t available in the town store, and the miller charged a whole cow—an exorbitant price—to grind a few dozen bushels of grain. Weeks of frustration boiled over, and in the rising tension one emigrant man reportedly claimed he had a gun that killed Joseph Smith. Others threatened to join the incoming federal troops against the Saints. Alexander Fancher, captain of the emigrant train, rebuked these men on the spot.

The men’s statements were most likely idle threats made in the heat of the moment, but in the charged environment of 1857, Cedar City’s leaders took the men at their word. The town marshal tried to arrest some of the emigrants on charges of public intoxication and blasphemy but was forced to back down. The wagon company made its way out of town after only about an hour, but the agitated Cedar City leaders were not willing to let the matter go. Instead they planned to call out the local militia to pursue and arrest the offending men and probably fine them some cattle. Beef and grain were foods the Saints planned to survive on if they had to flee into the mountains when the troops arrived.

Cedar City mayor, militia major, and stake president Isaac Haight described the grievances against the emigrant men and requested permission to call out the militia in an express dispatch to the district militia commander, William Dame, who lived in nearby Parowan. Dame was also the stake president of Parowan. After convening a council to discuss the matter, Dame denied the request. “Do not notice their threats,” his dispatch back to Cedar City said. “Words are but wind—they injure no one; but if they (the emigrants) commit acts of violence against citizens inform me by express, and such measures will be adopted as will insure tranquility.”

Still intent on chastening the emigrants, Cedar City leaders then formulated a new plan. If they could not use the militia to arrest the offenders, they would persuade local Paiute Indians to give the Arkansas company “a brush,” killing some or all of the men and stealing their cattle.

They planned the attack for a portion of the California trail that ran through a narrow stretch of the Santa Clara River canyon several miles south of the Mountain Meadows. These areas fell under the jurisdiction of Fort Harmony militia major John D. Lee, who was pulled into the planning. Lee was also a federally funded “Indian farmer” to local Paiutes. Lee and Haight had a long, late-night discussion about the emigrants in which Lee told Haight he believed the Paiutes would “kill all the party, women and children, as well as the men” if incited to attack. Haight agreed, and the two planned to lay blame for the killing at the feet of the Indians.

The generally peaceful Paiutes were reluctant when first told of the plan. Although Paiutes occasionally picked off emigrants’ stock for food, they did not have a tradition of large-scale attacks. But Cedar City’s leaders promised them plunder and convinced them that the emigrants were aligned with “enemy” troops who would kill Indians along with Mormon settlers.

On Sunday, September 6, Haight presented the plan to a council of local leaders who held Church, civic, and military positions. The plan was met with stunned resistance by those hearing it for the first time, sparking heated debate. Finally, council members asked Haight if he had consulted with President Young about the matter. Saying he hadn’t, Haight agreed to send an express rider to Salt Lake City with a letter explaining the situation and asking what should be done.

A Five-Day Siege

But the next day, shortly before Haight sent the letter to Brigham Young, Lee and the Indians made a premature attack on the emigrant camp at the Mountain Meadows, rather than at the planned location in the Santa Clara canyon. Several of the emigrants were killed, but the remainder fought off their attackers, forcing a retreat. The emigrants quickly pulled their wagons into a tight circle, holing up inside the defensive corral. Two other attacks followed over the next two days of a five-day siege.

After the initial attack, two Cedar City militiamen, thinking it necessary to contain the volatile situation, fired on two emigrant horsemen discovered a few miles outside the corral. They killed one of the riders, but the other escaped to the emigrant camp, bringing with him the news that his companion’s killers were white men, not Indians.

The conspirators were now caught in their web of deception. Their attack on the emigrants had faltered. Their military commander would soon know they had blatantly disobeyed his orders. A less-than-forthcoming dispatch to Brigham Young was on its way to Salt Lake City. A witness of white involvement had now shared the news within the emigrant corral. If the surviving emigrants were freed and continued on to California, word would quickly spread that Mormons had been involved in the attack. An army was already approaching the territory, and if news of their role in the attack got out, the conspirators believed, it would result in retaliatory military action that would threaten their lives and the lives of their people. In addition, other California-bound emigrant trains were expected to arrive at Cedar City and then the Mountain Meadows any day.

Ignoring the Council’s Decision

On September 9 Haight traveled to Parowan with Elias Morris, who was one of Haight’s two militia captains as well as his counselor in the stake presidency. Again they sought Dame’s permission to call out the militia, and again Dame held a Parowan council, which decided that men should be sent to help the beleaguered emigrants continue on their way in peace. Haight later lamented, “I would give a world if I had it, if we had abided by the deci[s]ion of the council.”

Instead, when the meeting ended, Haight and his counselor got Dame alone, sharing with him information they had not shared with the council: the corralled emigrants probably knew that white men had been involved in the initial attacks. They also told Dame that most of the emigrants had already been killed in these attacks. This information caused Dame, now isolated from the tempering consensus of his council, to rethink his earlier decision. Tragically, he gave in, and when the conversation ended, Haight left feeling he had permission to use the militia.

On arriving at Cedar City, Haight immediately called out some two dozen militiamen, most of them officers, to join others already waiting near the emigrant corral at the Mountain Meadows. Those who had deplored vigilante violence against their own people in Missouri and Illinois were now about to follow virtually the same pattern of violence against others, but on a deadlier scale

The Massacre

On Friday, September 11, Lee entered the emigrant wagon fort under a white flag and somehow convinced the besieged emigrants to accept desperate terms. He said the militia would safely escort them past the Indians and back to Cedar City, but they must leave their possessions behind and give up their weapons, signaling their peaceful intentions to the Indians. The suspicious emigrants debated what to do but in the end accepted the terms, seeing no better alternative. They had been pinned down for days with little water, the wounded in their midst were dying, and they did not have enough ammunition to fend off even one more attack.

As directed, the youngest children and wounded left the wagon corral first, driven in two wagons, followed by women and children on foot. The men and older boys filed out last, each escorted by an armed militiaman. The procession marched for a mile or so until, at a prearranged signal, each militiaman turned and shot the emigrant next to him, while Indians rushed from their hiding place to attack the terrified women and children. Militiamen with the two front-running wagons murdered the wounded. Despite plans to pin the massacre on the Paiutes—and persistent subsequent efforts to do so—Nephi Johnson later maintained that his fellow militiamen did most of the killing.

Communication—Too Late

President Young’s express message of reply to Haight, dated September 10, arrived in Cedar City two days after the massacre. His letter reported recent news that no U.S. troops would be able to reach the territory before winter. “So you see that the Lord has answered our prayers and again averted the blow designed for our heads,” he wrote.

“In regard to emigration trains passing through our settlements,” Young continued, “we must not interfere with them untill they are first notified to keep away. You must not meddle with them. The Indians we expect will do as they please but you should try and preserve good feelings with them. There are no other trains going south that I know of[.] [I]f those who are there will leave let them go in peace. While we should be on the alert, on hand and always ready we should also possess ourselves in patience, preserving ourselves and property ever remembering that God rules.” 

When Haight read Young’s words, he sobbed like a child and could manage only the words, “Too late, too late.”

Aftermath

The 17 spared children, considered “too young to tell tales,” were adopted by local families. Government officials retrieved the children in 1859 and returned them to family members in Arkansas. The massacre snuffed out some 120 lives and immeasurably affected the lives of the surviving children and other relatives of the victims. A century and a half later, the massacre remains a deeply painful subject for their descendants and other relatives.

Although Brigham Young and other Church leaders in Salt Lake City learned of the massacre soon after it happened, their understanding of the extent of the settlers’ involvement and the terrible details of the crime came incrementally over time. In 1859 they released from their callings stake president Isaac Haight and other prominent Church leaders in Cedar City who had a role in the massacre. In 1870 they excommunicated Isaac Haight and John D. Lee from the Church.

In 1874 a territorial grand jury indicted nine men for their role in the massacre. Most of them were eventually arrested, though only Lee was tried, convicted, and executed for the crime. Another indicted man turned state’s evidence, and others spent many years running from the law. Other militiamen who carried out the massacre labored the rest of their lives under a horrible sense of guilt and recurring nightmares of what they had done and seen.[viii]

Learning from the Lessons of History
"Therefore, what?" is the question we might ask. The clear answer is that if we fail to learn the lessons of history we are doomed to repeat it. Several important themes emerge from the story of the Utah War: 

1. Speak peace, not hostility. With the hindsight of history, we see that righteous indignation for a cause or crusade can spark hostility or even violence toward fellow human beings. In a modern application of this idea, social media allows us to share our views, but we must remember to speak peaceably of our brothers and sisters, even if they are imperfect. Hostile words always produce victims, and there are always social consequences toward purveyors of gossip.

2. Remember there are at least two sides to every issue, and good decisions come from good information. In retrospect, it would have been wise for President Buchanan to hear Governor Young's side of things before sending a hostile force to replace him. Applying this to our lives, when we overhear one side of an argument, we would be wise to seek out and hear the other side, developing a more accurate and complete view of the situation. Only then are we prepared to take tentative steps toward peace.

3. Recall that people view things through the lenses of past experiences. Governor Young and other leaders had been cast out of Missouri and Illinois into the wilderness of Utah. They saw a silent army approaching them as a threat and took what they considered to be appropriate defensive measures. What this suggests today is that we do not always understand why other people react the way they do until we talk to them about why they feel as they do.

4. When strong emotions rule, counsel with wise friends and leaders and do not act rashly. Isaac Haight started out right by counseling with friends and trusted leaders, but then he disregarded counsel and chose a rash and vengeful action. He later regretted charging forward before listening to Governor Young's counsel. In settings where emotions run deep, we must take opportunities to counsel with wise friends and then act calmly, patiently, and without vengeance.

For other applications of these lessons, see the excellent home-study lesson shared by Seminaries and Institutes here.

Notes

[i] William P. MacKinnon, “The Utah War and Its Mountain Meadows Massacre: Lessons Learned, Surprises Encountered,” FARMS Review 20, no. 2 (2008): 239–40, http://publications.maxwellinstitute.byu.edu/publications/review/20/2/S00010-5176a44954a5710MacKinnon.pdf.

[ii] MacKinnon, “Utah War,” 240–41, 244.

[iii] MacKinnon, “Utah War,” 245.

[iv] MacKinnon, “Utah War,” 246.

[v] MacKinnon, “Utah War,” 245–46.

[vi] MacKinnon, “Utah War,” 243.

[vii] “Peace and Violence among 19th-Century Latter-day Saints,” https://www.lds.org/topics/peace-and-violence-among-19th-century-latter-day-saints?lang=eng.

[viii] Richard E. Turley Jr., “The Mountain Meadows Massacre,” Ensign, September 2007, https://www.lds.org/ensign/2007/09/the-mountain-meadows-massacre?lang=eng.