Massacre At Mountain Meadows

[DerAlte]

What "polemical agenda" was that?

Do you really believe that the non-polemical nature of this book will render it entirely irrelevant to the hitherto booming MMM mini-industry?

Do you deny that the MMM has been grist for anti-Mormon polemics until now?

Do you deny that Will Bagley's hatchet job exploited the MMM for his polemical purposes?

Do you deny that a desperately bad movie about the MMM was recently released, and that EV's have used it for their polemical purposes?

Do you take issue with my view that the book under discussion will provide an effective rebuttal to such polemics?

Oh, and just BTW: should the authors of said book subsequently turn their attention to deconstructing the Danite myth you so triumphantly flicked into Scott's face in another thread, will you likewise strike the simon-pure pose of scholarly objectivity, which pose will fool precisely no-one?

Regards,

Pahoran

Hi Pahoran!

It really was a bad movie, wasn't it? Can't disagree with you there.

I'm sure the book will help rebut EV polemics. That is not a very difficult thing to do. As we both know.

I'm interested in two things: what is this 'hitherto booming MMM mini-industry?' It sounds sinister. Did it spring up in Vegas? or...

I'm trying to remember anyone else that gives such a thumbs down on Bagley's book, as you do. What is your reason for calling it a 'hatchet job?' Actually, this is a CFR to back it up. Start with your definition of hatchet job and then we can start from there.

If you don't mind, that is.

[Adamson2]

On another off key note...

Who here thinks the name "Orin Rockwell and the Mountain Meadow Militia" would be a great name for a local bluegrass band?

[Alf O'Mega]

What "polemical agenda" was that?

Your single-minded anti-anti-Mormon (and anti-insufficiently-pro-Mormon) agenda.

Do you really believe that the non-polemical nature of this book will render it entirely irrelevant to the hitherto booming MMM mini-industry?

No. It will be entirely relevant to any inquiry into the facts of the Mountain Meadows Massacre. Which makes it irrelevant to your crusade.

Do you deny that the MMM has been grist for anti-Mormon polemics until now?

Who would deny such a thing?

Do you deny that Will Bagley's hatchet job exploited the MMM for his polemical purposes?

Haven't read it.

Do you deny that a desperately bad movie about the MMM was recently released, and that EV's have used it for their polemical purposes?

Haven't seen it, and EV polemics doesn't interest me in the slightest.

Do you take issue with my view that the book under discussion will provide an effective rebuttal to such polemics?

Haven't read it. (Neither have you.) But my experience with polemics on all sides is that effective rebuttals are seldom recognized as such.

Oh, and just BTW: should the authors of said book subsequently turn their attention to deconstructing the Danite myth you so triumphantly flicked into Scott's face in another thread, will you likewise strike the simon-pure pose of scholarly objectivity, which pose will fool precisely no-one?

I have always admired your precision, if not your accuracy. Scott cited an article that ignored important evidence. I provided a sample of some of it. You are welcome to contest it if you have the sources to do so.

There is more than one Danite myth in circulation.

[Doctor Steuss]

Out of curiosity Dr. Peterson; will FARMS be doing a review of this?

[Scott Lloyd]

I stayed up much of the night reading and am now on page 156 of the 231-page narrative.

The book does address, on pages 146-47, Bagley's "smoking gun" supposedly implicating Brigham Young as instigator of the massacre.

I don't have much time today to go into detail, but here's a brief summation.

Bagley hangs his accusation on the Sept 1, 1857, meeting where President Young reportedly told Indian leaders they could take "all the cattle that had gone to Cal the southe rout." Bagley concluded from this that Brigham encouraged the Indian allies to attack the Fancher party.

"But neither chronology nor unfolding events confirm such a charge," Turley et al. remark. "Young's invitation for Indians to take cattle was a generalized war policy, not an order to massacre the Arkansas company."

Also,

"[isaac] Haight and his associates were recruiting Paiutes before word of the September 1 meeting reached southern Utah" and the Indians at the meeting in Salt Lake were reluctant to take part in the impending crisis of the federal troops marching on the territory.

The Indians did not rush south, evidently remaining in Salt Lake City until Sept. 4. (The massacre, of course, was on Sept. 11.)

"Indian recruitment for the massacre was local, not influenced by the September 1 meeting, and it built on the trust that southern Utah leaders had already developed with the Paiutes."

[emeliza]

Ugh, I have barely started.....again I seem to be a heretic as I like end notes better. I read it thru the first time and then go back with the two book marks to look into the references on my second go thru.

[Scott Lloyd]

That's my expectation as well, which is why I find it so distasteful (and not a little ironic) when Pahoran dragoons it into service of his own polemical agenda.

I think it indisputable that the Mountain Meadows Massacre, deplorable as it is, has been used for polemical purposes to attack the Latter-day Saints from the moment it occurred 151 years ago.

Perhaps the best means to counter polemical excess is solid research, even-handed truth-telling, painstaking accuracy and wise conclusions. If that be the case, then the new book by Turley et al. will be useful in that respect.

[Jaybear]

I think it indisputable that the Mountain Meadows Massacre, deplorable as it is, has been used for polemical purposes to attack the Latter-day Saints from the moment it occurred 151 years ago.

Perhaps the best means to counter polemical excess is solid research, even-handed truth-telling, painstaking accuracy and wise conclusions. If that be the case, then the new book by Turley et al. will be useful in that respect.

Are there any legitimate criticisms of the Saints or the LDS Church that flow from the massacre?

[Alf O'Mega]

Perhaps the best means to counter polemical excess is solid research, even-handed truth-telling, painstaking accuracy and wise conclusions. If that be the case, then the new book by Turley et al. will be useful in that respect.

I hope so. But as I observed above, polemics is usually impervious to scholarship and seldom recognizes when it has been rebutted.

I recognize that at least half of our readers will consider that I speak with unconscious irony. I can live with that.

[emeliza]

Are there any legitimate criticisms of the Saints or the LDS Church that flow from the massacre?

Well there are definitely legitmate criticisms for the Saints that participated in the event. I would also guess book 2 will show some legitimate criticisms on how they handled the massacre.

[danhoward1]

Are there any legitimate criticisms of the Saints or the LDS Church that flow from the massacre?

That we aren't perfect.

[Scott Lloyd]

I hope so. But as I observed above, polemics is usually impervious to scholarship and seldom recognizes when it has been rebutted.

This may be true of the practitioners. But the otherwise ill-informed who are prone to be influenced by the polemics may not be so impervious to the scholarship. Good scholarship is never a wasted effort.

[Scott Lloyd]

Are there any legitimate criticisms of the Saints or the LDS Church that flow from the massacre?

I suggest you read the book. The rhetoric and policies of Brigham Young and other Church leaders may have been unintended contributors to it.

For example, the strict policy, it being a time of war, was not to sell grain to outsiders, as foodstuffs would be needed in the event the settlers had to escape into the mountains or elsewhere rather than submit themselves to what they viewed as essentially a mob in uniform. This, perhaps unavoidably, caused resentment among some of the emigrant travelers, who, in turn, made taunting insults about the Mormons and incendiary remarks about joining with the soldiers in killing every Mormon in the territory, about having been with the mob that killed Joseph Smith, and so forth. All of which, no doubt, was merely idle venting, but you can see how it would escalate an already tense situation.

That said, I don't hold with the notion that the Church as an institution today is accountable for the unauthorized deeds of a few panicky, hot-headed locals who lived a century-and-a-half ago, if that's what you're asking.

[Jaybear]

I suggest you read the book. The rhetoric and policies of Brigham Young and other Church leaders may have been unintended contributors to it.

For example, the strict policy, it being a time of war, was not to sell grain to outsiders, as foodstuffs would be needed in the event the settlers had to escape into the mountains or elsewhere rather than submit themselves to what they viewed as essentially a mob in uniform. This, perhaps unavoidably, caused resentment among some of the emigrant travelers, who, in turn, made taunting insults about the Mormons and incendiary remarks about joining with the soldiers in killing every Mormon in the territory, about having been with the mob that killed Joseph Smith, and so forth. All of which, no doubt, was merely idle venting, but you can see how it would escalate an already tense situation.

That said, I don't hold with the notion that the Church as an institution today is accountable for the unauthorized deeds of a few panicky, hot-headed locals who lived a century-and-a-half ago, if that's what you're asking.

The policy you cite seems rather innocuous. I would have to agree with you that it a stretch to connect the two events.

But what about the Young's war policy that Turley mentioned in the quote you provided above, by which Young encouraged the Indians to take cattle from emigrant travelers passing through.

Do you think that policy contributed to the attack on the Fancher party? Surely Young understood that that for the Indians to take the cattle, they would first have to attack the travelers.

[selek]

But what about the Young's war policy that Turley mentioned in the quote you provided above, by which Young encouraged the Indians to take cattle from emigrant travelers passing through.

Do you think that policy contributed to the attack on the Fancher party? Surely Young understood that that for the Indians to take the cattle, they would first have to attack the travelers.

Answered in Post #30, above.

The Indian leadership remained in Salt Lake until at least the fourth- and there is no indication that they were involved in the Massacre, nor made any effort to head for that area.

Recruitment for that tragedy was done locally, and not on a state-wide level.

[Jaybear]

Answered in Post #30, above.

The Indian leadership remained in Salt Lake until at least the fourth- and there is no indication that they were involved in the Massacre, nor made any effort to head for that area.

Recruitment for that tragedy was done locally, and not on a state-wide level.

The operative question is whether the local mormons, who allegedly recruited the Indians, were aware of Young's "war policy" to encourage the Indians to attack the travelers, and take their cattle.

That question is not addressed in Post 30.

[Pahoran]

Your single-minded anti-anti-Mormon (and anti-insufficiently-pro-Mormon) agenda.

Ah. The agenda that exists only in your mind then. Got it.

No. It will be entirely relevant to any inquiry into the facts of the Mountain Meadows Massacre. Which makes it irrelevant to your crusade.

No, it makes it entirely relevant to what I was actually talking about. Whether it is relevant to what you merely imagine to be going on in my head is entirely up to you, and I invite you to keep it to yourself, where it will obviously do the most good.

Who would deny such a thing?

In my experience? Just about anyone who wanted to, and thought they could get away with it. Evidently you don't think you can get away with it. You are right to think that.

Haven't read it.

Haven't seen it, and EV polemics doesn't interest me in the slightest.

In which case you are simply not aware of what I was talking about, and yet you just know I must be wrong. Got it.

Well, it's a fact: the MMM has been a key piece of anti-Mormon ammunition. This book is going to be a very effective counter thereto. My post wasn't personal to you--I was not thinking of anyone in this forum when I wrote it--but the fact that you chose to take umbrage demonstrates that you see that particular shoe as fitting you.

Haven't read it. (Neither have you.) But my experience with polemics on all sides is that effective rebuttals are seldom recognized as such.

I agree. Witness your own reliance upon Quinn's discredited attempt to pin the blame for Sampson Arvard's Danite racket on Joseph Smith.

I have always admired your precision, if not your accuracy. Scott cited an article that ignored important evidence. I provided a sample of some of it. You are welcome to contest it if you have the sources to do so.

Scott's summary, being a summary, naturally left out reams of details. The intentionally non-representative snippets you very selectively provided merely gave undue weight to the accusations, which have in fact been refuted.

The point, though, is that you threw them in Scott's face rather triumphantly, in a manner that undermines your belated attempt to claim Noble Scholarly Objectivity.

There is more than one Danite myth in circulation.

And we know which one of them you prefer.

Regards,

Pahoran

[Pahoran]

The operative question is whether the local mormons, who allegedly recruited the Indians, were aware of Young's "war policy" to encourage the Indians to attack the travelers, and take their cattle.

As you know, Jaybear, you are misrepresenting Brigham's policy. It was not "to encourage the Indians to attack the travelers, and take their cattle." It was to enlist the Indians as allies in the Saints' resistance against the army, and any cattle they could pick up along the way would be legitimate spoils of war.

That question is not addressed in Post 30.

Yes it is.

"[isaac] Haight and his associates were recruiting Paiutes before word of the September 1 meeting reached southern Utah" and the Indians at the meeting in Salt Lake were reluctant to take part in the impending crisis of the federal troops marching on the territory.

Is that clear now?

Regards,

Pahoran

[Scott Lloyd]

The operative question is whether the local mormons, who allegedly recruited the Indians, were aware of Young's "war policy" to encourage the Indians to attack the travelers, and take their cattle.

That question is not addressed in Post 30.

The policy was essentially one of ceasing to intervene. That is to say, up until that time, Brigham Young and the Mormons had done what they could to restrain the Indian tribes from attacking the emigrant wagon trains. This was a great challenge, as some of the emigrant parties held the native people in very low regard. Some of the emigrants would shoot Indians on sight for target practice, for example.

Now, with an armed invasion sent by the federal government bearing down on the settlements in Utah, Brigham was saying he and his people would no longer be a buffer between the Indian tribes and the emigrant travelers. This would greatly cripple overland travel, as emigrant travel through Utah would be far more dangerous, and wagon trains would need to find other routes to California. It thus played into the overall strategy of resistance against the armed invasion.

And, to answer your question, yes, from what I've read in the book, the settlers in Iron County had been made aware of Brigham Young's war policy and may well have distorted it or used it as a rationalization to incite the Paiute Indians to attack the Fancher wagon train, although that was never what Brigham Young had in mind.

[Scott Lloyd]

The policy you cite seems rather innocuous. I would have to agree with you that it a stretch to connect the two events.

I didn't say it was a stretch.

The overland travelers counted on being able to replenish their supplies at settlements along the way, and not being able to do so understandably would cause tempers to flare.

Brigham's policy of not selling grain to outsiders is also understandable, given the perceived threat from the army making its way to Utah.

It's just part of the conditions that caused a volatile situation to escalate out of control and led to otherwise good people doing utterly horrible things.

One of the great elements in the new book is the application of scholarly literature pertaining to violence and group dynamics. It applies extremely well to the situation in southern Utah in 1857, and helps explain how such a thing could have happened.

[Jaybear]

As you know, Jaybear, you are misrepresenting Brigham's policy. It was not "to encourage the Indians to attack the travelers, and take their cattle." It was to enlist the Indians as allies in the Saints' resistance against the army, and any cattle they could pick up along the way would be legitimate spoils of war.

No, you are deliberately misrepresenting Brigham's policy. It was the settlers, not the army taking cattle south to California. The cattle could only be a spoil of war, if the war was expanded to include attacks on the travelers.

Scott: The policy was essentially one of ceasing to intervene.

But above Pahoran used the term "allies." Turley used the phrase "invitation to take the cattle".

Those terms do not connote a position of non-interference.

[Scott Lloyd]

Turley used the phrase "invitation to take the cattle".

In context, I take the phrase to mean Brigham Young rescinding his earlier forbiddance or discouragement of the Indians taking cattle from the emigrants. At a number of places in the narrative, President Young's new policy is characterized as letting Indians and emigrants resolve their own problems without Mormon interference.

For example, on pages 184-185, which contain a quote from (and a photo of) the reply written by Brigham to Isaac Haight to be delivered by express rider, the narrative reads:

Haight's letter said the emigrants had gotten into a scrape with Indians, and Young had emphasized the importance of not alienating native tribes since their help was wanted to resist the army. His instructions to Haight reflected his new policy of letting Indians and emigrants resolve their own problems without Mormon interference.

"The Indians we expect will do as they please but you should try and preserve good feelings with them."

Again, I suggest you read the book and come to your own conclusions rather than parsing the wording of posts on an Internet message board.

[Scott Lloyd]

No, you are deliberately misrepresenting Brigham's policy. It was the settlers, not the army taking cattle south to California.

It might have contemplated both army and emigrants' cattle. The meeting in Brigham Young's office included Indian leaders from both the north and the south. Part of the resistance strategy was depriving the army of needed supplies, including cattle.

[Alf O'Mega]

Ah. The agenda that exists only in your mind then.

No, it's fully documented here.

Well, it's a fact: the MMM has been a key piece of anti-Mormon ammunition. This book is going to be a very effective counter thereto. My post wasn't personal to you--I was not thinking of anyone in this forum when I wrote it--but the fact that you chose to take umbrage demonstrates that you see that particular shoe as fitting you.

You misparse my umbrage. Since I never use the MMM as an argument against the Church's truth claims, I obviously don't qualify as one of the polemicists you are delighted to see prospectively silenced. No, my umbrage was at your misappropriation of this work of scholarship as a polemical tool. Mainly, though, I was amused at your certainty (prior to any chance of having read it) that the book's scholarship would necessarily support your polemical position. I expect it to be a fine piece of scholarship independent of how it confirms or amends my opinions about the Church's truthfulness. And I am open to amending my position in any direction the data might take it, unlike your own august self.

You'll find my response to your Danite comments in the appropriate thread.

[TAK]

Interesting Review ..

http://www.bycommonconsent.com/2008/06/rev...untain-meadows/

"The area where I see the authors insufficiently treating the subject material is the ever-popular â??blood atonementâ? rhetoric of the Mormon Reformation (pg. 26). Only one moderate paragraph broaches the subject and no effort is given to contextualize or clarify the ramifications of the sermonizing. This lacuna is perhaps shaded by authorsâ?? quotation of Heber C. Kimballâ??s words at the July 24 canyon celebration. They ultimately temper Kimballâ??s comments by not showing that the words immediately preceding those quoted, curse the US President and his staff in the name of Jesus and by the Mormon Priesthood (pg. 44). Is this a systemic perspective in the volume?"