Bagley Slanders B. Young = Lots of Attention / Bagley's Slander Proven Bogus and Dishonest = No Attention

[Hyrum Page]

We have no reason to suspect they didn't read it, right. As for Bagley, we have a huge reason for believing he didn't read the original, namely: that he read it completely wrong somehow. But he still might have read the original, and he still might have had access to it even if he didn't read it. Only Bagley ostensibly knows.

I am beginning to suspect that he did consult the original, which would be a real problem. To quote Bagley:

In 1991 I had transcribed the diary of his Indian interpreter and brother-in-law, Dmick Huntington, at the Historical Department of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS, or the Mormons). Its contents demonstrated that the depth of Young

[Scott Lloyd]

I should hope so. After all, their employers own the thing.

Here's what Bagley told the Eighth Annual Ex-Mormon Conference in Salt Lake City on Oct. 5, 2002:

In 1991 I had transcribed the diary of his Indian interpreter and brother-in-law, Dmick Huntington, at the Historical Department of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS, or the Mormons). Its contents demonstrated that the depth of Young

[Scott Lloyd]

I think it is reasonable to assume that Bagley may have only had access to a photocopy while Turley had the original. And, not that they would have tried to foil him, but clearly interested parties would have wanted to look carefully at the passage which Bagley cited--because he was using it to implicate B.Young--so they may have used something to make it more legible.

It may be that the photo copy that we see where it clearly says 'g-r-a-' may have been photoshopped to make it more legible--and possibly it was not this legible in the copy that Bagley used.

I'm not saying this because I want to exonerate Bagley, I'm trying to understand how Bagley could have read 'allies' when it doesn't look like it at all and to me, and just maybe his copy was different. I know that my husband has been able to photoshop pictures to bring out things that were not visible in the original photo.

As I alluded earlier, Photoshopping an image and not saying so would be a clear violation of ethics where I work. I presume similar ethical standards prevail at BYU Studies.

[Hyrum Page]

Now he doesn't mention the quality of the source document, but I'm thinking if the staff there had hampered his research by doing such things as providing bad photocopies, I doubt he would have been so glowing in his praise of the Church Historical Department staff, especially while speaking to an audience of anti-Mormons.

Well, he makes no reference to photocopies. Maybe some were made for him after he saw the documents, and then he later made the transcription from the copies. If so, it is not a part of the process as he describes it. If he did make the transcription from the original, which this statement seems to indicate, then his credibility on this point is poor. I am willing to change my mind. Certainly it does not look good.

[Zakuska]

Well, he makes no reference to photocopies. Maybe some were made for him after he saw the documents, and then he later made the transcription from the copies. If so, it is not a part of the process as he describes it. If he did make the transcription from the original, which this statement seems to indicate, then his credibility on this point is poor. I am willing to change my mind. Certainly it does not look good.

It sounds to me like he went to the Church Documents department and made the transcription there. Oops you already said that.

[LifeOnaPlate]

I am beginning to suspect that he did consult the original, which would be a real problem. To quote Bagley:

Aye, and thus it looks even worse for Bagley.

[Hyrum Page]

It sounds to me like he went to the Church Documents department and made the transcription there.

Yes it does look that way. On the other hand, I have a friend who looks at documents there and then has photocopies made so he can consult them later. But transcription from the original is the most straightforward reading.

[Scott Lloyd]

It sounds to me like he went to the Church Documents department and made the transcription there. Oops you already said that.

If he's sitting there trying to write out the thing by hand, I can see how he could have made an error or two.

These days, at the new Church History Library, they would probably sit him down and let him view the document on a computer screen, but I don't think they had that sort of technology back then.

[Zakuska]

If he's sitting there trying to write out the thing by hand, I can see how he could have made an error or two.

These days, at the new Church History Library, they would probably sit him down and let him view the document on a computer screen, but I don't think they had that sort of technology back then.

We have access to all kinds of Documents now through the new technology. Thats how the name extraction is going as well.

[Mola Ram Suda Ram]

11 pages..... It is evident that Bagley wasn't completly honest in his approch here. This seems, well.... DCP stated once to not to ever state that something is obvious. So I wont do it.

[mysteryman]

Great spin there, MM! You've PROVEN that there is no evidence that counts against your hero's simon-pure academic disinterest!

You have also PROVEN that you know how to blatantly misrepresent your hero's argument. Bagley is not simply arguing that the Mormons wanted to fight and the Indians didn't. He is arguing that "the atrocity was not a tragedy but a premeditated criminal act initiated in Great Salt Lake City." And what does he think has PROVEN that "fact?" Why, the Huntington journal entry.

The one Bagley saw fit -- for whatever reason -- to, um, "improve."

His argument is not that the Mormons were gung-ho and the Indians hanging back. His argument is that the journal entry in question is the record of the birth of a conspiracy. Think Don Corleone calling together the heads of the Five Families.

That's why he needs it to say "allies." He wants the Indians to be saying, "Hold the phone for a few days while we dash off into the hills and round up some more braves." And a few days later, some Paiute braves do indeed turn up at Las Vegas de Santa Clara and start taking potshots at the Fancher train; post hoc ergo propter hoc, and his case is made.

Except that they are not saying that. They are saying, "We don't want to fight the army." (Note please that the army, NOT the Fancher train, is indisputably the subject of the meeting.) "We'll go up into the hills and plant corn, and help you out with food supplies while you guys go and fight." Thus, "allies" supports Bagley's conspiracy theory; "grain," to put it charitably, disembowels it.

Exactly. And since "allies" appears in brackets as an interpolation, it is indisputably clear that it was a deliberate word choice.

So why would he deliberately choose a word that is clearly wrong, if indeed it had no bearing upon his argument?

Because he clearly did deliberately choose it, and it is clearly wrong.

Regards,

Pahoran

Well, you really need to read the previous posts to understand what I was saying. I will once again turn to the text to challenge anybody to show me where I am wrong. Trust me Pahoran, even an intelligent guy like Scott Lloyd has been unable to answer my questions, he's tried to spin it elsewhere, but he hasn't been able to do it and he knows it.

Page 113

As the Fancher train made camp some seventy miles north of Mountain Meadows on the evening of September 1, 1857, Young met for about an hour with southern chiefs to implement his plan to stop overland emigration on the southern road. The Indians included "the chief of the Piedes and of the Deserts and Santa Clara, and Rio Virgen, and of Harmony." Kanosh of Corn Creek was the dedicated collaborator who the Mormons rewarded with guns and wives. Ammon from Beaver Creek, the brother of the late Wakara, was now presumed leader of the Ute Nation. Younwuds (also known as Yungwuds (also known as Yungweids or Youngquick) was chief of the Paiute band at Harmony, Lee

[J Green]

Hi, mysteryman.

Thanks for the high praise on my reading comprehension skills. The issue here is that Bagley ties BY's strategy vis-a-vis overland travel to violence, including the Indians as part of the violence and that this ties directly to the Fancher party. His thesis:

As the Fancher party struggled southward, its fate was being sealed in a meeting in Great Salt Lake City between the leaders of the southern Paiute bands and the man they called "Big Um"--Brigham Young, (Bagley, 112)

Bagley's point from here through the passage in question is that Brigham Young's policy to store food by halting overland emigrant trains and confiscating cattle included approval of violence that incorporated the Paiutes as part of the equation. And he starts with the thesis statement (above) that tells us that the meeting is the central factor. He uses narrative rhetoric like "unleash the battle ax of the Lord" (p. 112) then frames Brigham's prayer circle plea into the context of Lamanites doing the fighting against the government on behalf of the saints (p. 113). Each of his narrative elements after this thesis statement tie to violence or the threat of violence (such as resurrecting the Danites to attack, p. 112) along with the Paiutes as part of the arm of vengeance wielded by BY and the Lord. It's very clear after his thesis statement about the meeting that the supposed rhetoric of violence connected to BY's cattle strategy concerns the LDS and the Paiutes.

In this context Bagley introduces Huntington's entry that he has already set up as sealing the fate of the party. Here again we see the [apparent] themes of violence and the [apparent] encouragement of Indians to fight. Bagley's one-two punch. The speaker from the journal entry is encouraging the Indians to take the cattle, there is the talk of fighting Americans, and then the Indians responding with the fact that they are afraid of the Americans so they will raise [allies] in order to fight. For the last two pages, Bagley has pounded home the theme of violence and Indian violence as an arm of the Lord. He precedes the Huntington quote with BY's journal entry about Indians "exterminating Americans" and he bookends it afterward with BY's remarks to apostles that the Indians will shoot and kill innocent people when attacked. In this frame of reference, the strategy to take the cattle is framed as violent and the hostile intent on the part of the Indians is made clear by bookends about Indians exterminating Americans on both sides of the quote.

So this is how Bagley has used the passage. It is exhibit A in his thesis that BY's overland strategy was built on LDS violence combined with Indian violence. But he has sold us a bill of goods and ignores the evidence that BY's overland strategy was directed at confiscating the cattle and having the Indians keep them in the mountains as part of the plan to prepare for a siege with war on the horizon. It wasn't a violent strategy, and the Indians weren't encouraged to violence against the Fancher party. Turley (et al) gives us a more careful, nuanced context for this policy and evidence of previous non-violent Paiute raids on cattle in this manner.

How does the wording change Bagley's argument? It's self evident. Bagley's one-two punch is built on a foundation of LDS and Indian violence in respect to BY'S cattle policy. It starts with his thesis statement concerning the meeting on p. 112 and culminates in his citation of the passage (p. 114) after which he gives us BY's quote about Indians killing innocent people as if it applies to this context. Does the fact that the Indians are going to raise allies and fight the Americans follow this thesis? Yes. And with "allies" it says exactly that. But with the original reading the passage actually says the exact opposite. The Indians would rather raise grain and have the LDS fight Johnston's army. Raising grain is crucial here because it connects the request for the Paiutes to take the emigrant train cattle for storing as food to the response from the Paiutes that they would rather raise grain instead. The meeting was evidently about taking the cattle as part of BY's over-arching strategy to store food for the coming siege. Yet due to the inauspicous word switch, both of Bagley's main elements --which weren't originally there to begin with -- have now been injected into the passage. There was no inherent LDS or Indian violence in the passage when you place it in the context of BY's cattle/food policy. But replace "grain" with "allies" and you have both elements there.

The passage is the centerpiece of Bagley's argument. And the word change manifestly creates a different dynamic that just happens to coincide with Bagley's main foucs of the chapter. Your argument fails. The change is suspicious.

Regards

[LifeOnaPlate]

Good thing no one admitted that mysteryman "PROVED" his case, etc.

[smac97]

MysteryMan has been talking (a lot) about how he has "proved" (his word) that Bagley's use of the interpolated term "allies" (instead of "grain") does not take away from his overall thesis.

I disagree. Here's why (settle in, folks, this is looonnng):

1. Bagley describes Dimick Huntington's journal as "troubling new evidence" against Brigham Young (p. 379).

2. Specifically, Bagley is referring to a journal entry dated September 1, 1857 about a meeting purportedly held between Huntington (Young's Indian interpreter), Brigham Young, and twelve Indian chiefs. Here it is:

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 [allies] & we might fight.

3. In his review of BOTP, Crocket notes (fn. 9): "Bagley interpolates 'allies' where 'grain' should be used. I think Bagley's conclusion is wrong. See Lawrence Coates, review of Blood of the Prophets: Brigham Young and the Massacre at Mountain Meadows, by Will Bagley, BYU Studies 42/1 (2003): 153."

4. Coates, in turn, has this to say:

Serious errors in historical scholarship, however, severely undermine the fundamental arguments in his book. First, there are several important primary sources that he did not use accurately. Historians must verify the facts they use and avoid misusing information to support their interpretations. Bagley fails on both counts, because he seems to be driven by his passion to blame Brigham Young for this tragic event. For example, Bagley sees Young's offer to give the Piedes, a band of the Paiutes, "all the cattle that had gone to Cal[ifornia] the south rout" as the formation of an alliance (114). To make this point, Bagley quotes D. B. Huntington, Brigham Young's interpreter, as saying that the Piedes were "afraid to fight the Americans & so would raise [allies]" (114). Instead, Huntington's journal for September 1, 1857, says the Piedes "would raise grain"1 (fig 1). Replacing the word grain with allies substantially changes the meaning, but most readers will not be aware of Bagley's changing these words.

1. Dimick Baker Huntington Journal 1808

[smac97]

8. On March 5, 2009, UVU hosted a panel discussion on the Mountain Meadows Massacre featuring Rick Turley, Will Bagley, and Forrest Cuch and was moderated by Alex Caldiero. The notes from this panel discussion provide further illumination.

Let's start with this comment from Rick Turley:

Describing the September 1 parlay, Huntington wrote: I gave them all the cattle that had gone to California the south route, it made them open their eyes, they said that you have not told us to steal, so I have but now they have come to fight us and you, for when they kill us they will kill you, they said they was afraid to fight the Americans and so would raise allies, he's changed that to grain in his new book,

[smac97]

14. Back to Bagley:

would put more stress on the Indians not pitching into it. But I did not, I didn't know when I wrote the piece that I would absolutely bet that any of those Indians were at Mountain Meadows. I thought the crimes were evident from that journal were sufficient to indict Brigham Young as at least an accessory to the fact.

Huh? Young was an accessory to cattle-rustling. I get that. But how does Bagley get from that to an "accessory to the fact" of the Massacre?

15. Back to Bagley:

Alex: So you're not going to change it right?

Will: I'm going to point out that the evidence is ambiguous. Who you gonna believe in this story? My point is don't believe the murderers, they're liars. The whole story is this web of lies, trying to figure out what actually happened is very complicated, as Rick has pointed out.

And that complicated situation is so much improved by a "historian" branding the leaders of a religion he hates as "murderers" and "liars."

16. Now here comes Rick Turley. Hoo, boy!

Alex: Rick, would you respond to that?

[mysteryman]

Valiant effort valiant effort. A major stretch by all means, but a valiant effort.

The issue here is that Bagley ties BY's strategy vis-a-vis overland travel to violence, including the Indians as part of the violence and that this ties directly to the Fancher party. His thesis:

As the Fancher party struggled southward, its fate was being sealed in a meeting in Great Salt Lake City between the leaders of the southern Paiute bands and the man they called "Big Um"--Brigham Young, (Bagley, 112)

Good good, we know that Bagley is saying that Young wanted to stir up the Indians against the Fanchers and met on Sept 1 to plan their destruction. Good so far!

Bagley's point from here through the passage in question is that Brigham Young's policy to store food by halting overland emigrant trains and confiscating cattle included approval of violence that incorporated the Paiutes as part of the equation. And he starts with the thesis statement (above) that tells us that the meeting is the central factor. He uses narrative rhetoric like "unleash the battle ax of the Lord" (p. 112) then frames Brigham's prayer circle plea into the context of Lamanites doing the fighting against the government on behalf of the saints (p. 113).

Ohh, still trucking. He said "Brigham Young had unleashed the battle-ax of the lord against emigrants passing through Utah." Excellent! He is arguing that Young and the Mormons are want to rally up the Indians!!!

Each of his narrative elements after this thesis statement tie to violence or the threat of violence (such as resurrecting the Danites to attack, p. 112) along with the Paiutes as part of the arm of vengeance wielded by BY and the Lord. It's very clear after his thesis statement about the meeting that the supposed rhetoric of violence connected to BY's cattle strategy concerns the LDS and the Paiutes.

Absolutely! He is arguing that Young wants to use the Indians! And yes, this is part of the cattle strategy according to Bagley. Great.

In this context Bagley introduces Huntington's entry that he has already set up as sealing the fate of the party. Here again we see the [apparent] themes of violence and the [apparent] encouragement of Indians to fight. Bagley's one-two punch. The speaker from the journal entry is encouraging the Indians to take the cattle, there is the talk of fighting Americans, and then the Indians responding with the fact that they are afraid of the Americans so they will raise [allies] in order to fight. For the last two pages, Bagley has pounded home the theme of violence and Indian violence as an arm of the Lord. He precedes the Huntington quote with BY's journal entry about Indians "exterminating Americans" and he bookends it afterward with BY's remarks to apostles that the Indians will shoot and kill innocent people when attacked. In this frame of reference, the strategy to take the cattle is framed as violent and the hostile intent on the part of the Indians is made clear by bookends about Indians exterminating Americans on both sides of the quote.

Oh man!!! Now your argument goes South and becomes very desperate. So what do we have so far? We have Bagley saying Young wants to use the Indians as a Battle Axe. How is he going to do that? Well Bagley tells us doesn't he. "Dimick Huntington had already given the Shoshonis all the cattle on the northern road to California, and only days before Little Soldier had seized some four hundred animals from a Missouri emigrant name Squires--the transaction Bishop Blackburn had reported in Provo. Describing his meeting with the Paiutes in his journal, Young claimed he could 'hardly restrain them from exterminating the "Americans."' In truth, that Tuesday night Young encouraged the Indians to seize the stock of the wagon trains on the southern route." So he is going to use them as the battle axe by giving them permission to steal cattle. Any reference here that makes the notorious "allies" word at all relevant to what he has argued. NOPE, not one thing needs to be changed. So lets continue. He quotes Huntington, "I gave them all the cattle that had gone to Cal the south rout it mad 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 they will kill you they sayd the[y] was afraid to fight the Americans & so would raise [allies] and we might fight." Ok, so this passage reinforces Bagley's argument that he is trying to make that Young was trying to use the Indians as his battle axe by giving them permission to steal cattle. Now how does the word grains change one thing Bagley has said just prior to the quote? NOTHING. What does he say after the quote. "The language of Huntington

[mysteryman]

Good thing no one admitted that mysteryman "PROVED" his case, etc.

Now that everyone else has failed, do you want to try demonstrating where I am wrong?

[mysteryman]

8. On March 5, 2009, UVU hosted a panel discussion on the Mountain Meadows Massacre featuring Rick Turley, Will Bagley, and Forrest Cuch and was moderated by Alex Caldiero. The notes from this panel discussion provide further illumination.

Let's start with this comment from Rick Turley:

9. To which Bagley responds in pertinent part:

Well, there's also something "a little discordant" about the President of the United States sending the largest standing body of soldiers in the country against United States citizens. Citizens who only a few years before had been driving out of Missouri and Illinois with government officials either paying no mind or actively assisting in and facilitiating that expulsion. Citizens who were not given any explanation by the President as to why he was sending the country's largest armed force to Utah.

But I digress.

10. Back to Bagley:

So the journal is both "complicated" and "simple." Thanks for clearing that up, Will!

And "grain" could have easily been mistaken for "allies." After all, these words are practically interchangeable. They share two freakin' vowels!

But I digress.

11. Back to Bagley:

Okay. So how does he get from "Hey, you Mormons can fight Johnston's Army. We're gonna go raise grain" to "Whuzzat, Brigham? You want us to track down a wagon train from Arkansas and murder them?" (As Parshall put it: "the Fancher train, according to Will, is specifically targeted because of the presence of Arkansans who had been accused, Will claims, by Parley P. Pratt's widow of PPP's assassination...").

12. Back to Bagley:

Right. It's not like Brigham Young was gearing up to fight the United State Army, or anything. It's not like a relatively bloodless guerrila war (which would involve impeding the Army's movements by depriving them of their cattle) would have been preferable to an all-out confrontational bloodbath.

But anyway, how does Bagley get from "Hey, Indians, please steal some cattle" to "Hey, Indians, go murder a wagon train full of Arkansas transplants?"

13. Back to Bagley (pay attention, now):

What "key word" is Bagley talking about here? From the context, it looks like he's talking about "grain" as used in Huntington's journal.

Now MysteryMan is bloviating (a lot) about how this incorrect interpolation was meaningless, that it did not impact Bagley's thesis one whit.

But if that's so, why is Bagley himself referring to it as "that key word?"

More in the next post.

Those were sure a lot of words. You did everything but actually address the issue. I ask, what meaning does Bagley place on the passage and how does he use it to make his argument? If you place grains in the right place, what does Bagley have to change in his argument? Show me from the text of the book, I provided it above. Which passages and argument in bold before the quote and after must be changed due to that word. I await your silence. Or you can try some mental gymnastics like J Green did. Or you can be like LOAP and hope that someone will come along to put me in my place since he knows he can't answer my questions.

[mysteryman]

14. Back to Bagley:

Huh? Young was an accessory to cattle-rustling. I get that. But how does Bagley get from that to an "accessory to the fact" of the Massacre?

15. Back to Bagley:

And that complicated situation is so much improved by a "historian" branding the leaders of a religion he hates as "murderers" and "liars."

16. Now here comes Rick Turley. Hoo, boy!

Rick's point is well-taken. Bagley's thesis relies, in part, on the notion that the Indians that met with Brigham Young on September 1 were involved in the Massacre.

But they weren't. And Bagley apparently has recognized this. And yet he is trying - as Rick puts it - to "have it both ways." If the meeting precipitated the Massacre, then the Indians who attended it had to have been involved. But they weren't.

17. Now take a look at how Bagley tries to dodge Rick's point:

Note that Bagley earlier characterized the Indians as "telling Brigham Young, that he encouraged them to murder Americans, that they didn't want to do it, they were going to stand aside and let the Mormons and the Army fight, and whoever won, they would help pick up the pieces."

This sounds exactly like Rick's description of the Indians as saying "we're going to go out, we're going to raise grain, as this account said, we're going to go up in the hills, we'll negotiate with the victor."

So Bagley agrees with Rick.

And note that Bagley never gets around to rebutting Rick's point that the Indians who met with Brigham Young on September 1 "were [not] at Mountain Meadows."

But Bagley, uh, sorta needs them to be a Mountain Meadows in order for his thesis (that the meeting with Brigham Young precipitated the massacre) to work.

And yet later on, Bagley admits that there is no evidence that any of these Indians participated in the massacre:

Of course, he has no evidence that Brigham Young sent any such orders. It's sheer, unadulterated speculation. Mighty kewl of a "historian" to indulge in such crap, doncha think?

18. Later on, we have Bagley making some interesting admissions about his "case" against Brigham Young:

The evidence that Brigham Young did not order the massacre is not circumstantial. It's in a letter he sent before the massacre (keep in mind that Bagley's "most compelling evidence" is the "the cover-up" after the massacre).

Here's a summary of what happened:

Isaac Haight, a stake president in Cedar City, dispatched James Haslam to Brigham Young for instructions about the Fancher train. It is not contested that Brigham Young received Haight's message and sent Haslam back to tell Haight not to meddle with the Fancher train and to "spare no horseflesh" about it. As Haslam describes it, when he arrived in Salt Lake City, he found President Young in council with several others. Young read the message from Haight and told Haslam to rest and return to Brigham Young's office at 1:00 p.m. "He asked if I could stand the trip back; he said the Indians must be kept from the emigrants at all cost, if it took all of Iron County to protect them." When Haslam returned to Young's office at the appointed time, President Young "told me to start and not to spare horseflesh, but to go down there just as quick as possible." When Haight received the message, Haight said: "Too late, too late." Haight "cried like a child." Haslam was never impeached as to his story, and it remained consistent throughout his lifetime.

Here's the actual language from Pres. Young's letter: ""In regard to 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...let them go in peace."

So on the one hand, we have the President of the United States sending the largest standing army in the country against the Mormons, with no explanation or forewarning (IIRC, the telegraph lines were even cut so that the Mormons wouldn't catch wind of the military movement against them).

We have Brigham Young assuming a war footing because, well, the United States was all but declaring war on the Mormons (and the Mormons had had plenty of prior experience with persecution at the hands of various government officials).

We have Brigham Young meeting with Indians to discuss guerrila tactics (stealing cattle) that, in my humble opinion, were morally superior to drawing up battle lines and opening fire on Johnston's Army.

We have tensions flaring up all through the territory. Information is sketchy and sparse. There are no telegraphs in Southern Utah. The Mormons begin to fear that their prior history of being driven out of their homes is about to be repeated. Again.

We have a leader in Southern Utah (Haight) sending a letter to Brigham Young via Jacob Haslam that said something like "The Indians have gotten the emigrants coralled at Mountain Meadows and Lee wants to know what to do." (BOTP, p. 127).

We have Haslam arriving in Salt Lake after an exhausting multi-day journey from Cedar City and delivering Haight's letter to Brigham Young.

We have Brigham Young, within a few hours of receiving Haight's letter, giving a response to Haslam telling the Mormons in Southern Utah to "not interfere" and "not meddle" with emigration trains and to "let them go in peace."

We have Haslam's unimpeached testimony that Brigham Young told him to get the letter to Southern Utah and to "spare no horseflesh" in getting there.

We have Haslam quoting Brigham as saying that "the Indians must be kept from the emigrants at all cost, if it took all of Iron County to protect them."

We have Haslam's testimony that Haight, having received Young's letter, saying "Too late, too late," and that he (Haight) "cried like a child."

On the other hand, we have Bagley interpolating "allies" for "grain," thus radically altering the tone and context of the meeting between the Indians and Brigham Young.

We have Bagley saying that a meeting between Brigham Young and some Indians on September 1 precipitated the massacre, even though those Indians did not participate in the massacre.

We have Bagley admitting that his "case" against Brigham Young is "circumstantial," while never engaging the substantive evidence that contradicts his thesis (the extant letter from Brigham Young, Haslam's testimony, the fact that the Indians who met with Brigham Young didn't participate in the massacre, etc.).

We have Bagley being forced to speculate about Brigham Young sending two sets of directly contradictory orders: One set was sent with Haslam (see above) and told the Southern Utah Mormons to "not meddle" with the emigrants (and his instructions to Haslam were that the church members were to protect the emigrants from the Indians, even "if it took all of Iron County to protect them." The other set of orders were "carried south before [the massacre]," possibly "with George A. Smith." (Bagley probably got this speculuation from John D. Lee's memoirs, which were doctored by Lee's attorney, William Bishop, to make them more enticing for publication - which would help pay Bishop's legal bills. In these "confessions" Lee (Bishop, more likely) claimed that he (Lee) met with George A. Smith in Southern Utah on September 1, which was impossible because Smith was hundreds of miles away in Salt Lake on September 1 and the day before).

We have Bagley indulging in this sheer speculation even though he has no documentary evidence in support of it, and even though it is plainly contradicted by documentary evidence that does exist (Young's letter and Haslam's unimpeached testimony).

And yet for all that, we are supposed to take Bagley's word for it that his estimation of Brigham Young is trustworthy.

I think...not.

Thanks,

-Smac

Once again, you did everything but actually address the issue. I ask, what meaning does Bagley place on the passage and how does he use it to make his argument? If you place grains in the right place, what does Bagley have to change in his argument? Show me from the text of the book, I provided it above. Which passages and argument in bold before the quote and after must be changed due to that word.

I picked apart your arguments on page 1 of the thread. You tried to say that the "allies" word was crucial to Bagley's argument, once again I ask you to demonstrate this using the text. Ok, we both know you fail to do so, so why not just move on and answer the real question, why would Bagley deliberately change a word that has no bearing on his argument?

And one more thing there Smac, you asked in some of your earlier posts that Bagley hasn't publicly admitted his mistake, yet here you are quoting him saying in a public place, "Now, in Dimick Huntington's journal, it's a very complicated, very simple, but very complicated document, and I made a grave error in mis-transcribing a word,

[mysteryman]

What I've maintained is that Brigham Young refused to continue to restrain the Indians, as he had done up to then. Quite a difference between that and instructing the Indians to attack. And quite a gap between that and the crime-worthy-of-death that Bagley has alleged.

Don't misrepresent my position again.

Sure, I won't do it again. As soon as you stop misrepresenting Bagley's argument by saying it is some how dependent on the word "allies." I know it sucks to be proven wrong, but it is really not a big deal. So what if Bagley's argument is not centered on the word "allies"? You can still not like his book.

[mysteryman]

I hope you have all learned a lot from this exercise. Here are just a few suggestions:

1. Don't just rely on a book review, the review may be wrong. Actually check the the relevant passages in the book. I think Smac would have saved himself from this embarrassment had he done so.

2. Don't immediately assume wrong doing, look into it. Ask the person you think committed the deception. Give them the same courtesy and benefit of the doubt you would those you do respect, such as your prophet Always ask yourself if it makes sense for the person to have used deception. In this case I have PROVEN beyond doubt it wouldn't have. So be careful in the future.

3. Be careful about the desire to demonize, I think caution in this area would have saved some of you from having misread this book. (If you even read the book at all, see #1).

4. Be careful about pointing fingers and crying willful deception because you never know who else may be even more guilty of it. As I demonstrated in Post #22, there are people out there who beyond any doubt are guilty of intentionally falsifying historical documents, but I doubt many of you are going to want to criticize them in the same manner you have Bagley who you can't demonstrate that he deliberately falsified a document. Doing so demonstrates a lack of logical consistency.

5. And last but not least, it is ok to admit when you are wrong. When you can't demonstrate your claim, that is a good indication you are wrong.

Hope this helps.

[maklelan]

Now that everyone else has failed, do you want to try demonstrating where I am wrong?

It's been demonstrated time and time again, but you reject every criticism of your explanation on the grounds that your explanation is perfectly accurate. You've not engaged any of the credible criticisms of your point and your only weapon is the presupposition that you're right. This is simply infantile bickering.

[Hyrum Page]

And one more thing there Smac, you asked in some of your earlier posts that Bagley hasn't publicly admitted his mistake, yet here you are quoting him saying in a public place, "Now, in Dimick Huntington's journal, it's a very complicated, very simple, but very complicated document, and I made a grave error in mis-transcribing a word,

[J Green]

Valiant effort valiant effort. A major stretch by all means, but a valiant effort.

Well, I'll give you credit for creative use of uppercase, objective phrases such as "mental gymnastics," and quoting the same material over again. But in the end you never really engaged my argument that Bagley creates a thesis that the cattle stealing is connected to LDS and Indian violence as part of the cattle policy and that the word change injects that element of LDS and Indian violence into the passage that wasn't there to begin with.

In short, I reject your jejune response and say once again that that your argument has failed. I'll let others judge between the two.

Regards