The Mountain Meadows Massacre

[Rollo Tomasi]

So what we have is a situation in which Brigham Young, who up to now had used his influence to subdue a volatile situation between Indians and passing emigrant trains, now announced his intention no longer to do so. The government would now be left to deal on its own with this ongoing problem. This, because the United States government, in effect, has declared war upon him and his people without provocation.

I just can't see anything egregious or heinous here.

The egregious part of this is that Brigham Young clearly knew that his tactic (not only failing to further "restrain" the Indians, but also his encouraging them to steal emigrant cattle) would result in the Indians "kill[ing] innocent People." And that's precisely what happened with the Fancher party.

[Zakuska]

"I just can't see anything egregious or heinous here. "

Come on Scott...!

Brigham was a blood thirsty beast and holds 100% of all the blame. Get with Rollos Program dude!

[Scott Lloyd]

So what we have is a situation in which Brigham Young, who up to now had used his influence to subdue a volatile situation between Indians and passing emigrant trains, now announced his intention no longer to do so. The government would now be left to deal on its own with this ongoing problem. This, because the United States government, in effect, has declared war upon him and his people without provocation.

I just can't see anything egregious or heinous here.

The egregious part of this is that Brigham Young clearly knew that his tactic (not only failing to further "restrain" the Indians, but also his encouraging them to steal emigrant cattle) would result in the Indians "kill[ing] innocent People." And that's precisely what happened with the Fancher party.

He was not encouraging them to steal cattle; he was refusing to continue to discourage it. Important distinction. And he was saying if the people fired on the Indians they could expect the Indians to retaliate. Fair warning.

In effect, Brigham is telling the government: The problem is yours now. Deal with it, if you can.

[USU78]

And, as you are also fully aware, the Mormons didn't kill the Fancher wagon train.  Some Mormons did.

You are quite correct -- not all 100,000 or so Mormons living then participated in the massacre. But the highest Church leaders in the area led the way.

{snip to end -- emphasis added}

As Goethe once said, "Na, und?"

Which is to say, "So what?"

Klingensmith and Lee were most culpable on the ground. Klingensmith went state's evidence, eventually went totally inactive (as did his descendents), and Lee, who died bitter, estranged and excommunicated from the Church he loved, paid the ultimate price.

But Buck Buchanan is most culpable, as he wasn't acting out of desparation. He was buying Southern Senators' support for his administration.

[Rollo Tomasi]

He was not encouraging them to steal cattle; he was refusing to continue to discourage it. Important distinction. And he was saying if the people fired on the Indians they could expect the Indians to retaliate. Fair warning.

You're forgetting about Brigham's meeting on September 1, 1857, with the Indian chiefs -- Dimick Huntington (at the meeting) recorded that Brigham "gave them all the cattle that had gone to Cal[ifornia] the south rout[e]." The Fanchers had an enormous herd (the biggest of any emigrant party) and had just passed through Salt Lake City the prior month.

[Zakuska]

Oh that would be great... Brigham and the Mormons keep the blood money.

Of course Brigham gave them the cattle. Was he going to keep them and incure more reason for Johnsons Army to come after the Mormons?

[Rollo Tomasi]

... Lee, who died bitter, estranged and excommunicated from the Church he loved, paid the ultimate price.

Not to worry about John D. Lee -- all his blessings were restored in 1961, with Ezra Taft Benson presiding. He now sits in yonder heavens, the adopted son of Brigham Young.

[Bertram]

JUST A MOMENT!

Can someone explain to me how a "member" can:

1. Hold position of Leadership but does not think the Church is Inspired (sic).

2. Teach LDS Doctrine to Members, Doctrine which he cannot fully accept(sic).

3. "Sustain" the General Authorities but accuses them of failures in Teaching the Truth.....they are human after all and are in error (sic).

4. Receives a Temple Recommend to enter therein but does not believe in all it's Purposes (sic).

5. Cannot trust Priesthood Leadership to discuss his "doubts" (sic)

[Rollo Tomasi]

JUST A MOMENT!

Can someone explain to me how a "member" can:

1. Hold position of Leadership but does not think the Church is Inspired (sic).

2. Teach LDS Doctrine to Members, Doctrine which he cannot fully accept(sic).

3. "Sustain" the General Authorities but accuses them of failures in Teaching the Truth.....they are human after all and are in error (sic).

4. Receives a Temple Recommend to enter therein but does not believe in all it's Purposes (sic).

5. Cannot trust Priesthood Leadership to discuss his "doubts" (sic)

Yet again, you're trying to turn a thread into a personal attack against me. Wouldn't you rather keep it on topic?

[Scott Lloyd]

He was not encouraging them to steal cattle; he was refusing to continue to discourage it. Important distinction. And he was saying if the people fired on the Indians they could expect the Indians to retaliate. Fair warning.

You're forgetting about Brigham's meeting on September 1, 1857, with the Indian chiefs -- Dimick Huntington (at the meeting) recorded that Brigham "gave them all the cattle that had gone to Cal[ifornia] the south rout[e]." The Fanchers had an enormous herd (the biggest of any emigrant party) and had just passed through Salt Lake City the prior month.

The characterization that he "gave" them the cattle makes no sense. He could not give what was not his to give.

In effect, Brigham simply withdrew his influence, leaving the federal government to shoulder what should have been its own burden all along: ensuring safe overland travel.

Why did Brigham do this? Because the President of the United States sent an army to wipe out the leadership and destroy the Church.

[Rollo Tomasi]

The characterization that he "gave" them the cattle makes no sense. He could not give what was not his to give.

It makes perfect sense when you understand that part of Brigham's plan against the U.S. Army was to stop overland emigration travel through Utah -- and one way to do this was to get the Indians to steal emigrant cattle and otherwise disrupt emigrant travel. Dimick Huntington also records that when the Indian chiefs balked at Brigham's suggestion, saying that Brigham had taught them not to steal, Brigham responded, "so I have[,] but now they have come to fight us & you[,] for when they kill us they will kill you."

[Zakuska]

It makes perfect sense when you understand that part of Brigham's plan against the U.S. Army

Ohhh. Conspiracy theories running rampant again.

[USU78]

The characterization that he "gave" them the cattle makes no sense. He could not give what was not his to give.

It makes perfect sense when you understand that part of Brigham's plan against the U.S. Army was to stop overland emigration travel through Utah -- and one way to do this was to get the Indians to steal emigrant cattle and otherwise disrupt emigrant travel. Dimick Huntington also records that when the Indian chiefs balked at Brigham's suggestion, saying that Brigham had taught them not to steal, Brigham responded, "so I have[,] but now they have come to fight us & you[,] for when they kill us they will kill you."

So . . . a head of state is reported to have enlisted the aid of allies when faced with an implacable and much better equipped foe?

[sarcasm]The Dastard![/sarcasm]

[Bertram]

isamo,

DID I MENTION ANYONE BY NAME?

If you, however equate yourself with this fictitious "member", then at last/least you are being honest with us!

So if you are identifying yourself to us then I assume you can answer the proposition: instead of a sample member we have you graciously informing us, at last, that you "fit the bill"!

How can you,as you have now accepted the description,continue with "forked tongue" ( oops.... nearly back on thread) and teach one thing and believe another?

I am of course assuming that you do in fact do teach according to Church Guidelines?

Surely you would not produce false doctrine material into an LDS Chapel?

As for sticking to the thread why are you constantly introducing false and entirely misleading quotations on every thread on which you teach falsehoods about the Church?

[awyatt]

When the Fancher party was massacred, who got the cattle? It seems that the Indians at Brigham's meeting on Sept. 1, 1857, would have no way to get down to Southern Utah to kill the Fancher party on Sept. 11, 1857.

So why are we even discussing Brigham's Sept. 1, 1857 meeting with the Indians (and what he may have said) if there is no possible connection between that meeting and the massacre?

-Allen

[Zakuska]

But see Brigham Young was an "influencial blood thirsty bigot" awyatt. He had the entire west under his strings.

The indians sent pony express to the indians in cedar city. Or maybe that was smoke singals.

[Scott Lloyd]

The characterization that he "gave" them the cattle makes no sense. He could not give what was not his to give.

It makes perfect sense when you understand that part of Brigham's plan against the U.S. Army was to stop overland emigration travel through Utah -- and one way to do this was to get the Indians to steal emigrant cattle and otherwise disrupt emigrant travel. Dimick Huntington also records that when the Indian chiefs balked at Brigham's suggestion, saying that Brigham had taught them not to steal, Brigham responded, "so I have[,] but now they have come to fight us & you[,] for when they kill us they will kill you."

In swallowing Will Bagley's rendition of events, you have followed him into the same dubious interpretation of evidence.

In his review of Bagley's book in FARMS Review of Books (Vol. 15 Issue 2) Robert D. Crockett deals with the Huntington diary entry and makes the case that it had reference to the Indians scattering the cattle of the invading army and the emigrant trains in front of the army, thus closing off the trail leading into the territory, not waging attacks against any specific emigrant train, and certainly not the Fancher train.

Crockett wrote:

Bagley's "troubling new evidence," which separates his work from Brooks's, is simply a diary entry, dated 1 September 1857, in which Indian interpreter Dimick Huntington describes a meeting purportedly held between himself, Brigham Young, and twelve Indian chiefs:

Kanosh the Pahvant Chief[,] Ammon & wife (Walkers Brother) & 11 Pahvants came into see B & D & find out about the soldiers. Tutseygubbit a Piede chief over 6 Piedes Bands Youngwuols another Piede chief & I gave them all the cattle that had gone to Cal[.] the southa rout[.] it made them open their eyes[.] they sayed that you have told us not to steal[.] so I have but now they have come to fight us & you for when they kill us then they will kill you[.] they sayed the[y] was afraid to fight the Americans & so would raise grain & we might fight.9 (cf. p. 114)

For Bagley this cryptic entry proves that "the atrocity was not a tragedy but a premeditated criminal act initiated in Great Salt Lake City" (p. 378). Blood of the Prophets tells us that "if any court in the American West (excepting, of course, one of Utah's probate courts) had seen the evidence [the Dimick Huntington diary] contained, the only debate among the jurors would have been when, where, and how high to hang Brigham Young" (p. 425 n. 42).

This scrap of evidence cannot support Bagley's conclusions, particularly in light of contemporaneous evidence. Brigham Young, if it was truly he who spoke,10 did not refer to a specific emigrant train. Instead, on that day and on many others, as I will demonstrate, he asked Indian tribal leaders to help scatter the cattle of the army and of all emigrants on the trail in front of the army in order to completely close the trail. As historian Norman Furniss observed fifty years ago, "early in the war at least, the Church's leaders had a deliberate policy of seeking military assistance from the Indians."11 When Brigham Young told the Indian tribes he wanted assistance in fighting the Americans, he meant only the army.12

Bagley tells us that the language in Huntington's diary entry for 1 September 1857 implies an instruction for attack on the Fancher train. Why then did Dimick Huntington use the same language elsewhere with Indian tribal leaders who could have had no geographic proximity to the Fancher train? For instance, two days earlier in Huntington's diary, 30 August 1857, Huntington wrote:

I [Huntington] told them that the Lord had come out of his Hiding place & they had to commence their work[.] I gave them all the Beef cattle & horses that was on the Road to CalAfornia[,] the North Rout[,] that they must put them into the mountains & not kill any thing as Long as they can help it but when they do Kill[,] take the old ones & not kill the cows or young ones.13

When Huntington talks about not killing anything "as Long as they can help it" he is talking about "cows." He asked the northern Indians for help to run cattle off the northern California route upon which the Fancher train would never tread. Following the massacre, Indian agent Garland Hurt, certainly no friend of the Mormons, noted the same requests were made to the northern Snake Indians.14 T. B. H. Stenhouse also confirms that running the cattle off was a general strategy used successfully against the army.15 Thus, Brigham Young's 1 September 1857 comment: "I gave them all the cattle" can only mean one thing. He offered the Indians all the cattle they could scatter that were owned by the army.

Let us look at who was present at that 1 September 1857 meeting because this bears on Bagley's theory about instructions to destroy the Fancher train. Most of the Indians present led tribes that had no geographic proximity to the Fancher train, as massacre historian and attorney Robert Briggs has pointed out.16 Only two or three of the twelve chieftains present might have had some connection to the tribes that participated in the massacre. Tutsegabit and Youngwuds were the two Southern Paiute chiefs present in Brigham Young's office whose tribes resided in Iron County (p. 113).

Not only were the wrong people in the 1 September 1857 meeting, the participants were probably talking about a geographic area far from the location of the Fancher train. I have substantial doubt that Brigham Young's reference to the "south rout[e]" on 1 September meant anything more than the entire route south of present-day Wyoming upon which the army was advancing. With contemporaneous descriptions of the south route referring to the entire road south of Lander Pass in Wyoming, it is unreasonable to conclude that Brigham Young had some other meaning for "south rout[e]."17

Further, Bagley's chronology is problematic to the point of impossibility. Tutsegabit and Youngwuds did not have time to get from Salt Lake City to Mountain Meadows and return to Salt Lake City by 16 September 1857 or, as Huntington says, by 10 September 1857.18 Blood of the Prophets tells us these Indian chiefs were surprised when they were purportedly told to massacre the Fancher train on 1 September but that they recovered from this surprise, and within five days (without horses, no less)19 traveled three hundred miles to organize and lead the first wave of assaults, assembling for the assault on the evening of 5 September for a predawn attack the next morning. In contrast, John D. Lee claims he rushed on horseback to Salt Lake City to make a report to Brigham Young of the massacre, saying that "I was on the way about ten days," and Lee did not get started for ten days.20 With excellent and replenished horseflesh, it took James Haslam three days to travel the same distance with Isaac Haight's request for instructions. Wilford Woodruff records Tutsegabit's presence to be ordained an elder in Salt Lake City, certainly not an emergency, five days after the massacre concluded or, as the Huntington diary says, in the middle of the massacre.21 It is implausible to think that Tutsegabit and Youngwuds made this round-trip in such a short period of time. Moreover, neither Tutsegabit nor Youngwuds were reported to be at the massacre.

Thus, I disagree with Bagley's effort to render what is simple and relatively benign (general cattle running) to what is complex and malicious (killing emigrants). The developed law of evidence cautions against reaching conclusions about wrongful conduct from a set of facts that could explain more benign actions.22 As Robert Briggs asks in his Sunstone essay, with twenty-five hundred troops approaching, why would Brigham Young concern himself with forty armed men in the Arkansas train?23 [Emphasis mine]

I haven't bothered to delete the footnotes. You can find them if you go to the article on line. Here is the link:

http://farms.byu.edu/display.php?table=review&id=509

[Pahoran]

Rollo "Searchingfortruth" Tomasi,

you previously propagated:

Oh, there's plenty of blame to spread around. I just think Brigham ought to be included for his role in setting the stage.

To which I responded:

His "role in setting the stage" was to prepare the people to defend themselves against an unprovoked attack.

[Pahoran]

So . . . you agree, then, that Buck Buchanan is to blame for MMM?

No. Problems with proximate cause. I think Brigham Young and George A. Smith had quite a bit more influence over the saints than Buchanan did.

"Proximate cause" being, you hope, vague enough to serve as your blank cheque to (1) implicate Brigham, and (2) exonerate Buchanan.

Well, you are wrong.

"Proximate cause means the active, efficient cause that sets in motion a chain of events which brings about a result without the intervention of any new and independent cause."

"A cause that sets in motion a sequence of events uninterrupted by any superseding causes and that results in a usually foreseeable effect (as an injury) which would not otherwise have occurred."

"In the law, a proximate cause is an event sufficiently related to a legally recognizable injury to be held the cause of that injury. There are two elements needed to determine proximate cause: the activity must produce a foreseeable risk, and the injury must be caused directly by the defendant's negligence. There may be more than one proximate cause of an injury or event."

Buchanan ordered the troops into Utah. It was foreseeable to a man of his military experience that (1) the invaded population would attempt to defend themselves, and (2) innocents caught in the crossfire could be killed. Thus, the MMM is a result of the chain of events his order set in motion; his order is, therefore, the proximate cause of the MMM.

Q.E.D.

Regards,

Pahoran

[Rollo Tomasi]

So why are we even discussing Brigham's Sept. 1, 1857 meeting with the Indians (and what he may have said) if there is no possible connection between that meeting and the massacre?

According to Juanita Brooks, these chiefs overtook the Fancher party at Parowan. (Juanita Brooks, John Doyle Lee, p. 203). And James Haslam (who carried Isaac Haight's message to Brigham Young) made the ride from Cedar City to Salt Lake in just 2 and a half days (leaving the afternoon of 9/7, and arriving at daybreak on 9/10). (Will Bagley, Blood of the Prophets, pp. 127, 136). There was ample time (9 days) from when the chiefs left SLC to arrive by 9/11 to participate in the slaughter.

[thesometimesaint]

RT:

The fastest means of travel avaible was a horse. Try covering 300 miles in about a week on a horse. You'll kill the horse.

[Rollo Tomasi]

In his review of Bagley's book in FARMS Review of Books (Vol. 15 Issue 2) Robert D. Crockett deals with the Huntington diary entry and makes the case that it had reference to the Indians scattering the cattle of the invading army and the emigrant trains in front of the army, thus closing off the trail leading into the territory, not waging attacks against any specific emigrant train, and certainly not the Fancher train.

...

I haven't bothered to delete the footnotes. You can find them if you go to the article on line. Here is the link:

http://farms.byu.edu/display.php?table=review&id=509

I had read that review previously -- I agreed with some of his points, disagreed with others:

1. Unlike Bagley, I do not see BY in the 9/1 meeting instructing that the Fancher party be massacred. Rather, consistent with his defense plan, he instructed Indians to steal emigrant travel in an effort to shut down the overland routes through Utah. I based this on Brigham's sermon on August 16 (quoted in a prior post of mine) and his statements to the apostles on August 26 (as recorded by Wilford Woodruff) regarding the killing that will occur between "Gentile emigrants" and the Indians (also quoted above). Thus, BY's instruction to the Indians chiefs to steal cattle involved emigrant cattle, not just army cattle, was consistent with his battle plan.

2. Dimick Huntington wrote down Brigham's instructions to the Indians concerning cattle that already "had gone to Cal[ifornia] the south rout[e]." As you know, the army hadn't arrived yet, and their cattle "had (not yet) gone to Cal[ifornia] the south rout[e]." Brigham obviously was speaking of cattle that had already come through Salt Lake and was now on the trail to California through southern Utah, including the Fancher party (which had gone through Salt Lake the prior month and now was near Parowan).

3. In his review, Crockett tries to argue that Brigham's reference to "south route" is actually speaking to a route northeast of Salt Lake (the road south of Lander Pass in Wyoming), the trail the army will take into Utah. Crockett gives no evidence as to why, and I think it is more reasonable that Brigham's reference was to the route through southern Utah to California, where the Fancher party had the misfortune of being at the moment.

4. There was no reason for Brigham to discuss stealing cattle on the northern trail in Wyoming with southern Utah Indians -- he was meeting with southern Utah Indian chiefs, who would never go near that area. Crockett states that only some of the chiefs meeting with Brigham had connections to the tribes that participated in the massacre. But, as far as the evidence shows, ALL the chiefs were from southern Utah, and Crockett offers no evidence to show that any of the chiefs meeting Brigham on 9/1 were connected at all to the tribes anywhere near Wyoming or other northern route. It is just absurd to argue that Brigham would instruct chiefs from southern Utah to steal cattle in northern Utah and Wyoming. Clearly, Brigham had to be speaking of cattle traveling on the route south of Salt Lake, where no army cattle was then located (but Fancher cattle surely was).

5. The reason I believe the 9/1 meeting is evidence of Brigham Young's "setting the stage" for the massacre is because Brigham, by instructing the Indians to steal emigrant cattle, knew that a fight or engagement between the emigrants and Indians was a virtual certainty (and in such a fight, Brigham told his apostles on 8/26, the Indians would "kill Innocents"). Thus, his explicit direction for the Indians to engage emigrants and steal their cattle was done with the foreknowledge that violence would assuredly occur -- I don't think Brigham had any idea such violence would escalate into wholesale murder, but it does not excuse the fact he may have unwittingly started the ball rolling toward the ultimate massacre.

6. I think these chiefs had horses and ample time to get back down to southern Utah after their meeting with Brigham. According to Brooks, Jacob Hamblin and Thales Haskell took the Indian chiefs to meet Brigham, "picking up others along the way until he had ten in his company." (Brook, John Doyle Lee, p. 203). Now, unless Hamblin and Haskell decided to trudge through Utah on foot, they had enough horses for all to travel to the meeting with BY.

[Rollo Tomasi]

MMM is a result of the chain of events his order set in motion; his order is, therefore, the proximate cause of the MMM.

Sorry, but there is no way you're gonna get anyone to agree that the slaughter of 120 unarmed and defenseless civilians was proximately caused by Buchanan's military order. The army hadn't even arrived in Utah yet -- and the Fancher party was nearly out of Utah (they posed absolutely no threat to anyone). In the end, the Mormons didn't even fight the army, which shows how small the real threat was. Your effort to divert blame from the real cause is just silly.

[Zakuska]

I find it intresting in all of Rollo's "conspiracy theory" mania he forgets of all the Battles Israel went through to obtain their promised land. Saul and David comes to mind.

But, as far as the evidence shows, ALL the chiefs were from southern Utah

Can you back that "ALL" up?

When Huntington talks about not killing anything "as Long as they can help it" he is talking about "cows." He asked the northern Indians for help to run cattle off the northern California route upon which the Fancher train would never tread. Following the massacre, Indian agent Garland Hurt, certainly no friend of the Mormons, noted the same requests were made to the northern Snake Indians.14 T. B. H. Stenhouse also confirms that running the cattle off was a general strategy used successfully against the army.15 Thus, Brigham Young's 1 September 1857 comment: "I gave them all the cattle" can only mean one thing. He offered the Indians all the cattle they could scatter that were owned by the army.

Kanosh the Pahvant Chief[,] Ammon & wife (Walkers Brother) & 11 Pahvants came into see B & D & find out about the soldiers. Tutseygubbit a Piede chief over 6 Piedes Bands Youngwuols another Piede chief & I gave them all the cattle that had gone to Cal[.] the southa rout[.] it made them open their eyes[.] they sayed that you have told us not to steal[.] so I have but now they have come to fight us & you for when they kill us then they will kill you[.] they sayed the[y] was afraid to fight the Americans & so would raise grain & we might fight.9 (cf. p. 114)

We have Kanosh, Piede?

There were 15 Cheifs present.

[katherine the great]

I find it intresting in all of Rollo's "conspiracy theory" mania he forgets of all the Battles Israel went through to obtain their promised land. Saul and David comes to mind.

I seriously doubt Rollo believes in the literal accuracy of those Bible stories.