CHAPTER XVI. — THE MOUNTAIN MEADOWS MASSACRE

We may here interrupt the narrative of events subsequent to the restoration of peace in the territory, with the story of the most horrible massacre of white people by religious fanatics of their own race that has been recorded since that famous St. Bartholemew's night in Paris—the story of the Mountain Meadows Massacre. Committed on Friday, September 11, 1857,—four days before the date of Young's proclamation forbidding the United States troops to enter the territory—it was a considerable time before more than vague rumors of the crime reached the Eastern states. No inquest or other investigation was held by Mormon authority, no person participating in the slaughter was arrested by a Mormon officer; and, when officers of the federal government first visited the scene, in the spring of 1859, all that remained to tell the tale were human skulls and other bones lying where the wolves and coyotes had left them, with scraps of clothing caught here and there upon the vines and bushes. Dr. Charles Brewer, the assistant army surgeon who was sent with a detail to bury the remains in May, 1859, says in his gruesome report:—

"I reached a ravine fifty yards from the road, in which I found portions of the skeletons of many bodies,—skulls, bones, and matted hair,—most of which, on examination, I concluded to be those of men. Three hundred and fifty yards further on another assembly of human remains was found, which, by all appearance, had been left to decay upon the surface; skulls and bones, most of which I believed to be those of women, some also of children, probably ranging from six to twelve years of age. Here, too, were found masses of women's hair, children's bonnets, such as are generally used upon the plains, and pieces of lace, muslin, calicoes, and other materials. Many of the skulls bore marks of violence, being pierced with bullet holes, or shattered by heavy blows, or cleft with some sharp-edged instrument."*

* Sen. Doc. No. 42, 1st Session, 36th Congress.

More than seventeen years passed before officers of the United States succeeded in securing the needed evidence against any of the persons responsible for these wholesale murders, and a jury which would bring in a verdict of guilty. Then a single Mormon paid the penalty of his crime. He died asserting that he was the one victim surrendered by the Mormon church to appease the public demand for justice. The closest students of the Mountain Meadows Massacre and of Brigham Young's rule will always give the most credence to this statement of John D. Lee. Indeed, to acquit Young of responsibility for this crime, it would be necessary to prove that the sermons and addresses in the journal of Discourses are forgeries.

In the summer of 1857 a party was made up in Arkansas to cross the plains to Southern California by way of Utah, under direction of a Captain Fancher.* This party differed from most emigrant parties of the day both in character and equipment. It numbered some thirty families,—about 140 individuals,—men, women, and children. They were people of means, several of them travelling in private carriages, and their equipment included thirty horses and mules, and about six hundred head of cattle, when they arrived in Utah. Most of them seem to have been Methodists, and they had a preacher of that denomination with them. Prayers were held in camp every night and morning, and they never travelled on Sundays. They did not hurry on, as the gold seekers were wont to do in those days, but made their trip one of pleasure, sparing themselves and their animals, and enjoying the beauties and novelties of the route.**

* Stenhouse says that travelling the same route, and encamping

near the Arkansans, was a company from Missouri who called themselves

"Missouri Wildcats," and who were so boisterous that the Arkansans

were warned not to travel with them to Utah. Whitney says that the two

parties travelled several days apart after leaving Salt Lake City. No

mention of a separate company of Missourians appears in the official and

court reports of the massacre.

** Jacob Forney, in his official report, says that he made the

most careful inquiry regarding the conduct of the emigrants after they

entered the territory, and could testify that the company conducted

themselves "with propriety." In the years immediately following the

massacre, when the Mormons were trying to attribute the crime to

Indians, much was said about the party having poisoned a spring and

caused the death of Indians and their cattle. Forney found that one ox

did die near their camp, but that its death was caused by a poisonous

weed. Whitney, the church historian, who of course acquits the church of

any responsibility for the massacre, draws a very black picture of the

emigrants, saying, for instance, that at Cedar Creek "their customary

proceeding of burning fences, whipping the heads off chickens, or

shooting them in the streets or private dooryards, to the extreme danger

of the inhabitants, was continued. One of them, a blustering fellow

riding a gray horse, flourished his pistol in the face of the wife

of one of the citizens, all the time making insulting proposals and

uttering profane threats."—"History of Utah," Vol. I, p. 696.

Every emigrant train for California then expected to restock in Utah. The Mormons had profited by this traffic, and such a thing as non-intercourse with travellers in the way of trade was as yet unheard of. But Young was now defying the government, and his proclamation of September 15 had declared that "no person shall be allowed to pass or repass into or through or from this territory without a permit from the proper officer." To a constituency made up so largely of dishonest members, high and low, as Young himself conceded the Mormon body politic to be, the outfit of these travellers was very attractive. There was a motive, too, in inflicting punishment on them, merely because they were Arkansans, and the motive was this:—

Parley P. Pratt was sent to explore a southern route from Utah to California in 1849. He reached San Francisco from Los Angeles in the summer of 1851, remaining there until June, 1855. He was a fanatical defender of polygamy after its open proclamation, challenging debate on the subject in San Francisco, and issuing circulars calling on the people to repent as "the Kingdom of God has come nigh unto you." While in San Francisco, Pratt induced the wife of Hector H. McLean, a custom-house official, the mother of three children, to accept the Mormon faith and to elope with him to Utah as his ninth wife. The children were sent to her parents in Louisiana by their father, and there she sometime later obtained them, after pretending that she had abandoned the Mormon belief. When McLean learned of this he went East, and traced his wife and Pratt to Houston, Texas, and thence to Fort Gibson, near Van Buren, Arkansas. There he had Pratt arrested, but there seemed to be no law under which he could be held. As soon as Pratt was released, he left the place on horseback.

McLean, who had found letters from Pratt to his wife at Fort Gibson which increased his feeling against the man,* followed him on horseback for eight miles, and then, overtaking him, shot him so that he died in two hours.** It was in accordance with Mormon policy to hold every Arkansan accountable for Pratt's death, just as every Missourian was hated because of the expulsion of the church from that state.

* Van Buren Intelligencer, May 15, 1857.

** See the story in the New York Times of May 28, 1857, copied

from the St. Louis Democrat and St. Louis Republican.

When the company pitched camp on the river Jordan their food supplies were nearly exhausted, and their draught animals needed rest and a chance to recuperate. They knew nothing of the disturbed relations between the Mormons and the government when they set out, and they were astonished now to be told that they must break camp and move on southward. But they obeyed. At American Fork, the next settlement, they offered some of their worn-out animals in exchange for fresh ones, and visited the town to buy provisions. There was but one answer—nothing to sell. Southward they continued, through Provo, Springville, Payson, Salt Creek, and Fillmore, at all settlements making the same effort to purchase the food of which they stood in need, and at all receiving the same reply.

So much were their supplies now reduced that they hastened on until Corn Creek was reached; there they did obtain a little relief, some Indians selling them about thirty bushels of corn. But at Beaver, a larger place, nonintercourse was again proclaimed, and at Parowan, through which led the road built by the general government, they were forbidden to pass over this directly through the town, and the local mill would not even grind their own corn. At Cedar Creek, one of the largest southern settlements, they were allowed to buy fifty bushels of wheat, and to have it and their corn ground at John D. Lee's mill. After a day's delay they started on, but so worn out were their animals that it took them three days to reach Iron Creek, twenty miles beyond, and two more days to reach Mountain Meadows, fifteen miles farther south.

These "meadows" are a valley, 350 miles south of Salt Lake City, about five miles long by one wide. They are surrounded by mountains, and narrow at the lower end to a width of 400 yards, where a gap leads out to the desert. A large spring near this gap made that spot a natural resting-place, and there the emigrants pitched their camp. Had they been in any way suspicious of Indian treachery they would not have stopped there, because, from the elevations on either side, they were subject to rifle fire. Their anxiety, however, was not about the Indians, whom they had found friendly, but about the problem of making the trip of seventy days to San Bernardino, across a desert country, with their wornout animals and their scant supplies. Had Mormon cruelty taken only the form of withholding provisions and forage from this company, its effect would have satisfied their most evil wishers.

On the morning of Monday, September 7, still unsuspicious of any form of danger, their camp was suddenly fired upon by Indians, (and probably by some white men disguised as Indians). Seven of the emigrants were killed in this attack and sixteen were wounded. Unexpected as was this manifestation of hostility, the company was too well organized to be thrown into a panic. The fire was returned, and one Indian was killed, and two chiefs fatally wounded. The wagons were corralled at once as a sort of fortification, and the wheels were chained together. In the centre of this corral a rifle pit was dug, large enough to hold all their people, and in this way they were protected from shots fired at them from either side of the valley. In this little fort they successfully defended themselves during that and the ensuing three days. Not doubting that Indians were their only assailants, two of their number succeeded in escaping from the camp on a mission to Cedar City to ask for assistance. These messengers were met by three Mormons, who shot one of them dead, and wounded the other; the latter seems to have made his way back to the camp.

The Arkansans soon suffered for water, as the spring was a hundred yards distant. Two of them during one day made a dash, carrying buckets, and got back with them safely, under a heavy fire.

* Lee denies positively a story that the Mormons shot two little

girls who were dressed in white and sent out for water. He says that

when the Arkansans saw a white man in the valley (Lee himself) they

ran up a white flag and sent two little boys to talk with him; that he

refused to see them, as he was then awaiting orders, and that he kept

the Indians from shooting them. "Mormonism Unveiled," p. 231.

With some reenforcements from the south, the Indians now numbered about four hundred. They shot down some seventy head of the emigrants' cattle, and on Wednesday evening made another attack in force on the camp, but were repulsed. Still another attack the next morning had the same result. This determined resistance upset the plans of the Mormons who had instigated the Indian attacks. They had expected that the travellers would be overcome in the first surprise, and that their butchery would easily be accounted for as the result of an Indian raid on their camp. But they were not to be balked of their object. To save themselves from the loss of life that would be entailed by a charge on the Arkansans' defences, they resorted to a scheme of the most deliberate treachery.

On Friday, the 11th, a Mormon named William Bateman was sent forward with a flag of truce. The other undisguised Mormons remained in concealment, and the Indians had been instructed to keep entirely out of sight. The beleaguered company were delighted to see a white man, and at once sent one of their number to meet him. Their ammunition was almost exhausted, their dead were unburied in their midst, and their situation was desperate. Bateman, following out his instructions, told the representative of the emigrants that the Mormons had come to their assistance, and that, if they would place themselves in the white men's hands and follow directions, they would be conducted in safety to Cedar City, there to await a proper opportunity for proceeding on their journey.* This plan was agreed to without any delay, and John D. Lee was directed by John M. Higbee, major of the Iron Militia, and chief in command of the Mormon party, to go to the camp to see that the plot agreed upon was carried out, Samuel McMurdy and Samuel Knight following him with two wagons which were a part of the necessary equipment.

* This account follows Lee's confession, "Mormonism Unveiled," p.

236.

Never had a man been called upon to perform a more dastardly part than that which was assigned to Lee. Entering the camp of the beleaguered people as their friend, he was to induce them to abandon their defences, give up all their weapons, separate the adults from the children and wounded, who were to be placed in the wagons, and then, at a given signal, every one of the party was to be killed by the white men who walked by their sides as their protectors. Lee draws a picture of his feelings on entering the camp which ought to be correct, even if circumstances lead one to attribute it to the pen of a man who naturally wished to find some extenuation for himself: "I doubt the power of man being equal to even imagine how wretched I felt. No language can describe my feelings. My position was painful, trying, and awful; my brain seemed to be on fire; my nerves were for a moment unstrung; humanity was overpowering as I thought of the cruel, unmanly part that I was acting. Tears of bitter anguish fell in streams from my eyes; my tongue refused its office; my faculties were dormant, stupefied and deadened by grief. I wished that the earth would open and swallow me where I stood."

When Lee entered the camp all the people, men, women, and children, gathered around him, some delighted over the hope of deliverance, while others showed distrust of his intentions. Their position was so strong that they felt some hesitation in abandoning it, and Lee says that, if their ammunition had not been so nearly exhausted, they would never have surrendered. But their hesitation was soon overcome, and the carrying out of the plot proceeded.

All their arms, the wounded, and the smallest children were placed in the two wagons. As soon as these were loaded, a messenger from Higbee, named McFarland, rode up with a message that everything should be hastened, as he feared he could not hold back the Indians. The wagons were then started at once toward Cedar City, Lee and the two drivers accompanying them, and the others of the party set out on foot for the place where the Mormon troops were awaiting them, some two hundred yards distant. First went McFarland on horseback, then the women and larger children, and then the men. When, in this order, they came to the place where the Mormons were stationed, the men of the party cheered the latter as their deliverers.

As the wagons passed out of sight over an elevation, the march of the rest of the party was resumed. The women and larger children walked ahead, then came the men in single file, an armed Mormon walking by the side of each Arkansan. This gave the appearance of the best possible protection. When they had advanced far enough to bring the women and children into the midst of a company of Indians concealed in a growth of cedars, the agreed signal the words, "Do your duty"—was given. As these words were spoken, each Mormon turned and shot the Arkansan who was walking by his side, and Indians and other Mormons attacked the women and children who were walking ahead, while Lee and his two companions killed the wounded and the older of the children who were in the wagons.

The work of killing the men was performed so effectually that only two or three of them escaped, and these were overtaken and killed soon after.* Indeed, only the nervousness natural to men who were assigned to perform so horrible a task could prevent the murderers from shooting dead the unarmed men walking by their sides. With the women and children it was different. Instead of being shot down without warning, they first heard the shots that killed their only protectors, and then beheld the Indians rushing on them with their usual whoops, brandishing tomahawks, knives, and guns. There were cries for mercy, mothers' pleas for children's lives, and maidens' appeals to manly honor; but all in vain. It was not necessary to use firearms; indeed, they would have endangered the assailants themselves. The tomahawk and the knife sufficed, and in the space of a few moments every woman and older child was a corpse.

* This is Judge Cradlebaugh's and Lee's statement. Lee said he

could have given the details of their pursuit and capture if he had had

time. An affidavit by James Lynch, who accompanied Superintendent Forney

to the Meadows on his first trip there in March 1859 (printed in Sen.

Doc. No. 42), says that one of the three, who was not killed on the

spot, "was followed by five Mormons who through promises of safety,

etc., prevailed upon him to return to Mountain Meadows, where they

inhumanly butchered him, laughing at and disregarding his loud and

repeated cries for mercy, as witnessed and described by Ira Hatch, one

of the five. The object of killing this man was to leave no witness

competent to give testimony in a court of justice but God."

When Lee and the men in charge of the two wagons heard the firing, they halted at once, as this was the signal agreed on for them to perform their part. McMurdy's wagon, containing the sick and wounded and the little children, was in advance, Knight's, with a few passengers and the weapons, following. We have three accounts of what happened when the signal was given, Lee's own, and the testimony of the other two at Lee's trial. Lee says that McMurdy at once went up to Knight's wagon, and, raising his rifle and saying, "O Lord my God, receive their spirits; it is for Thy Kingdom I do this," fired, killing two men with the first shot. Lee admits that he intended to do his part of the killing, but says that in his excitement his pistol went off prematurely and narrowly escaped wounding McMurdy; that Knight then shot one man, and with the butt of his gun brained a little boy who had run up to him, and that the Indians then came up and finished killing all the sick and wounded. McMurdy testified that Lee killed the first person in his wagon—a woman—and also shot two or three others. When asked if he himself killed any one that day, McMurdy replied, "I believe I am not upon trial.

I don't wish to answer." Knight testified that he saw Lee strike down a woman with his gun or a club, denying that he himself took any part in the slaughter: Nephi Johnson, another witness at Lee's second trial, testified that he saw Lee and an Indian pull a man out of one of the wagons, and he thought Lee cut the man's throat. The only persons spared in this whole company were seventeen children, varying in age from two months to seven years. They were given to Mormon families in southern Utah—"sold out," says Forney in his report, "to different persons in Cedar City, Harmony, and Painter Creek. Bills are now in my possession from different individuals asking payment from the government. I cannot condescend to become the medium of even transmitting such claims to the department." The government directed Forney in 1858 to collect these children, and he did so. Congress in 1859 appropriated $10,000 to defray the expense of returning them to their friends in Arkansas, and on June 27 of that year fifteen of them (two boys being retained as government witnesses) set out for the East from Salt Lake City in charge of a company of United States dragoons and five women attendants.

Judge Cradlebaugh quotes one of these children, a boy less than nine years old, as saying in his presence, when they were brought to Salt Lake City, "Oh, I wish I was a man. I know what I would do. I would shoot John D. Lee. I saw him shoot my mother."

The total number in the Arkansas party is not exactly known. The victims numbered more than 120. Jacob Hamblin testified at the Lee trial that, the following spring, he and his man buried "120 odd" skulls, counting them as they gathered them up.

A few young women, in the confusion of the Indian attack, concealed themselves, but they were soon found. Hamblin testified at Lee's second trial that Lee, in a long conversation with him, soon after the massacre, told him that, when he rejoined the Mormon troops, an Indian chief brought to him two girls from thirteen to fifteen years old, whom he had found hiding in a thicket, and asked what should be done with them, as they were pretty and he wanted to save them. Lee replied that "according to the orders he had, they were too old and too big to let go."

Then by Lee's direction the chief shot one of them, and Lee threw the other down and cut her throat. Hamblin said that an Indian boy conducted him to the place where the girls' bodies lay, a long way from the rest, up a ravine, unburied and with their throats cut. One of the little children saved from the massacre was taken home by Hamblin, and she said the murdered girls were her sisters. Richard F. Burton, who visited Utah in 1860, mentions, as one of the current stories in connection with the massacre, that, when a girl of sixteen knelt before one of the Mormons and prayed for mercy, he led her into the thicket, violated her, and then cut her throat.*