In September 1990, some two thousand persons gathered in Cedar City, Utah,
to effect a reconciliation among those whose ancestors died or participated
in what may be considered the most unfortunate incident in the history of the
LDS Church, the Mountain Meadows Massacre. The massacre occurred between September
7 and 11, 1857, when a group of Mormon settlers in southern Utah joined with
nearby Indians in killing all but some of the youngest members of a group of
non-Mormon emigrants en route to California.
After years of painstaking research, Juanita Brooks, author of an oft-cited
book on the tragedy, concluded, "The complete—the absolute—truth of
the affair can probably never be evaluated by any human being; attempts to understand
the forces which culminated in it and those which were set into motion by it
are all very inadequate at best" (Brooks, p. 223). Yet, as Brooks makes clear,
a few elements that helped contribute to the tragedy are evident.
Among these is the fact that a large contingent of United States troops was
marching westward toward Utah Territory in the summer of 1857 (see Utah Expedition).
Despite having been the federally appointed territorial governor, Brigham Young
was not informed by Washington of the army´s purpose and interpreted the move
as a renewal of the persecution the Latter-day Saints had experienced before
their westward hegira. "We are invaded by a hostile force who are evidently
assailing us to accomplish our overthrow and destruction," he proclaimed on
August 5, 1857. Anticipating an attack, he declared the territory to be under
martial law and ordered "[t]hat all the forces in said Territory hold themselves
in readiness to March, at a moment´s notice, to repel any and all such threatened
invasion" (Arrington, p. 254).
Part of Brigham Young´s strategy in repelling the approaching army was to enlist
local Indian tribes as allies. In an August 4 letter to southern Utah, for example,
he urged one Latter-day Saint to "[c]ontinue the conciliatory policy towards
the Indians, which I have ever recommended, and seek by works of righteousness
to obtain their love and confidence, for they must learn that they have either
got to help us or the United States will kill us both" (Brooks, p. 34).
Meanwhile, owing to the lateness of the season, a party of emigrants bound
for California elected to take the southern route that passed through Cedar
City and thirty-five miles beyond to the Mountain Meadows, which was then an
area of springs, bogs, and plentiful grass where travelers frequently stopped
to rejuvenate themselves and their stock before braving the harsh desert landscape
to the west. Led by John T. Baker and Alexander Fancher, the diverse party consisted
of perhaps 120 persons, most of whom left from Arkansas but others of whom joined
the company along their journey.
As the Baker-Fancher party traveled from Salt Lake City to the Mountain Meadows,
tensions developed between some of the emigrants, on the one hand, and Mormon
settlers and their Native American allies, on the other. Spurred by rumors,
their own observations, and memories of atrocities some of them had endured
in Missouri and Illinois, Mormon residents in and around Cedar City felt compelled
to take some action against the emigrant train but ultimately decided to dispatch
a rider to Brigham Young seeking his counsel. Leaving September 7, 1857, the
messenger made the nearly 300-mile journey in just a little more than three
days.
Approximately one hour after his arrival, the messenger was on his way back
with a letter from Brigham Young, who said he did not expect the federal soldiers
to arrive that fall because of their poor stock. "They cannot get here this
season without we help them," he explained. "So you see that the Lord has answered
our prayers and again averted the blow designed for our heads." Responding to
the plea for counsel, he added, "In regard to the emigration trains passing
through our settlements, we must not interfere with them until 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"
(Brooks, p. 63). The messenger arrived back in Cedar City on September 13.
By that time, however, it was too late, and nearly all the men, women, and
children of the Baker-Fancher party lay dead. Besides a few persons who left
the party before the attack, only about eighteen small children were spared.
Two years later, seventeen of the children were returned to family members in
northwestern Arkansas. Two decades after the tragedy, one of the Mormon settlers
who were present at the massacre, John D. Lee, was executed by a firing squad
at the Mountain Meadows, symbolically carrying to the grave the responsibility
for those who "were led to do what none singly would have done under normal
conditions, and for which none singly can be held responsible" (Brooks, p. 218).
Yet for more than another century after Lee´s death, the community guilt of
those who participated in the massacre continued to fester alongside the collective
pain of both the children who survived it and the relatives of those who did
not. Then in the late 1980s, the descendants of those affected by the tragedy
began meeting to bind the wounds and achieve a reconciliation. On September
15, 1990, many of them gathered to dedicate a memorial marker to those who died
at the Mountain Meadows.
One speaker at the marker dedication was Judge Roger V. Logan, Jr., of Harrison,
Arkansas, a man related to twenty-one of the massacre victims listed on the
marker, as well as to five of the children who survived. "I am happy to say
that thanks to the work, cooperation and gifts of many of you," he said, "there
is now an appropriate monument standing in the place of the emigrants´ demise;
a monument containing the names of eighty-two persons who died and seventeen
who survived and [that] also contains reference to many others who may have
been a part of the caravan." As he read the victims´ names, he asked all related
to them to stand in their honor.
Brigham Young University President Rex E. Lee, a descendant of John D. Lee,
also spoke at the memorial service, saying he found little solace in recognizing
that similar tragedies had occurred across time and space. "Any attempt to recreate
the human dynamics that were at work in southern Utah in the fall of 1857 can
only leave us bewildered as to how rational human beings at any time, in any
place, under any circumstances could have permitted such a tragedy to occur."
"Fortunately," he added, "full comprehension of the reasons is as unnecessary
as it would be impossible. Our task for today is not to look backward, nor to
rationalize, nor to engage in any kind of retroactive analysis nor apology.
Our focus is not on 1857. It is on 1990. It is on our generation, and on those
that are yet to come. And whatever drove the actions of those who came before,
ours must be driven by something higher and more noble."
Gordon B. Hinckley, First Counselor in the LDS Church First Presidency, offered
the prayer dedicating the new monument. In a talk delivered before the prayer,
President Hinckley said he came "not as a descendant of any of the parties involved
at Mountain Meadows" but "as a representative of an entire people who have suffered
much over what occurred there."
"In our time," he said, "we can read such history as is available, but we really
cannot understand nor comprehend that which occurred those tragic and terrible
September days in 1857. Rather, we are grateful for the ameliorating influence
that has brought us together in a spirit of reconciliation as new generations
gather with respect and appreciation one for another. A bridge has been built
across a chasm of cankering bitterness. We walk across that bridge and greet
one another with a spirit of love, forgiveness, and with hope that there will
never be a repetition of anything of the kind." (Excerpts from the talks are
all taken from unpublished manuscripts found in the Mountain Meadows Memorial
collection, LDS Church Historical Department, Salt Lake City, Utah.)