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8637
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1910
The
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JAMES E.TALMAGE
71
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The
Story of "Mormonism"

BY
JAMES E. TALMAGE
Ph.D., F.R.S.E.
dward
SECOND EDITION

SALT LAKE CITY
Bureau of Information
1910
ВХ
8637
1910
Copyright
by
James E. Talmage
1910


3. Linge Este
bloch
6/26/46
PREFACE.
THE STORY OF “MORMONISM” as pre-
sented in the following pages is a revised
and reconstructed form of lectures deliv-
ered by invitation at the University of
Michigan, at Cornell University, and else-
where. The “Story” first appeared in
print as a lecture report, in the IMPROVE-
MENT ERA, Vol. IV; and was afterward
issued as a booklet from the office of the
“Millennial Star,” Liverpool. It has also
been published in Turkish and Modern
Greek. In this, the second edition, the
lecture style of direct address has been
dropped, and this change constitutes the
principal alteration to which the original
text has been subjected.
J. E. TALMAGE.
SALT LAKE City, UTAH
April, 1910.


MBL


The Story of “Mormonism."
I.

In the minds of many, perhaps of the
majority of people, the scene of the "Mor-
mon” drama is laid almost entirely in
Utah; indeed, the terms "Mormon question”
and “Utah question” have been often
used interchangeably. True it is, that the
development of “Mormonism” is closely as-
sociated with the history of the long-time
Territory and present State of Utah; but
the origin of the system must be sought in
regions far distant from the present gather-
ing-place of the Latter-day Saints, and at
a period ante-dating the acquisition of
Utah as a part of our national domain.
The term "origin" is here used in its
commonest application—that of the first
stages apparent to ordinary observation-
the visible birth of the system. But a long,
long period of preparation led to this physi-
cal coming forth of the “Mormon” religion,
a period marked by a multitude of his-
torical events, some of them preceding
by centuries the earthly beginning of this
modern system of prophetic trust. The
“Mormon” people regard the establishment
of their Church as the culmination of a long

6
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM.”
series of notable events. To them it is the
result of causes unnumbered that have
operated through ages of human history,
and they see in it the cause of many devel-
opments yet to appear. This to them estab-
lishes an intimate relationship between the
events of their own history and the pro-
phecies of ancient times.
In reading the earliest pages of "Mormon”
history, we are introduced to a man whose
name will ever be prominent in the story of
the Church-the founder of the organiza-
tion by
common usage of the term; the
head of the system as an earthly establish-
ment—one who is accepted by the Church
as an ambassador specially commissioned
of God to be the first revelator of the latter-
day dispensation. This man is Joseph
Smith, commonly known as the “Mormon"
prophet. Rarely indeed does history pre-
sent an organization, religious, social, or
political, in which an individual holds as
conspicuous and in all ways as important
a place as does this man in the develop-
ment of “Mormonism." The earnest in-
vestigator, the sincere truth-seeker, can
ignore neither the man nor his work; for
the Church under consideration has risen
from the testimony solemnly set forth, and
the startling declarations made by this

THE STORY OF "MORMONISM."
7
person, who, at the time of his earliest an-
nouncements, was a farmer's boy in the
first half of his teens. If his claims to or-
dination under the hands of divinely com-
missioned messengers be fallacious, forming
as such claims form, the foundation of the
Church organization, the superstructure
cannot stand; if, on the other hand, such
declarations be true, then indeed is there
little cause to wonder at the phenomenally
rapid rise and the surprising stability of the
edifice so begun.
This man was born at Sharon, Vermont,
in December, 1805. He was the son of in-
dustrious parents, who possessed strong
religious tendencies and tolerant natures.
For generations his ancestors had been
laborers, by occupation tillers of the soil;
and though comfortable circumstances had
generally been their lot, reverses and losses
in the father's house had rendered the
family almost abjectly poor; so that from
his earliest days the lad Joseph was made
acquainted with the pleasures and pains of
hard work. He is described as being more
than ordinarily studious for his years; and
when that powerful wave of religious agita-
tion and sectarian revival which character-
ized the first quarter of the last century,
reached the home of the Smiths, Joseph


8
THE STORY OF “MORMONISM.”'
with others of the family was profoundly
affected. The household became somewhat
divided on the subject of religion, and some
of the members identified themselves with
the most popular sects; but Joseph, while
favorably impressed by the Methodist sect
in comparison with others, confesses that
his mind was sorely troubled over the con-
templation of the strife and tumult exist-
ing among the religious bodies; and he hesi-
tated. He tried in vain to solve the mys-
tery presented to him in the warring fac-
tions of what professed to be the Church of
Christ. Surely, thought he, these several
churches, opposed as they are to one an-
other on what appear to be the vital points
of religion, cannot all be right. While
puzzling over this anomaly he chanced
upon this verse of the epistle of St. James:
“If any of you lack wisdom let him ask of
God, that giveth to all men liberally, and
upbraideth not; and it shall be given him."
In common with so many others, the
earnest youth found here within the scrip-
tures, admonition and counsel as directly
applicable to his case and circumstances as
if the lines had been addressed to him by
A brief period of hesitation, in
which he shrank from the thought that a
mortal like himself, weak, youthful, and

uame.
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM.''
9
unlearned, should approach the Creator
with a personal request, was followed by a
humble and contrite resolve to act upon the
counsel of the ancient apostle. The result,
to which he bore solemn record (testifying
at first with the simplicity and enthusiasm
of youth, afterward confirming the declara-
tion with manhood's increasing powers, and
at last voluntarily sealing the testimony
with his life's blood), proved most startling
to the sectarian world-a world in which
according to popular belief no new revela-
tion of truth is possible. It is a surprising
fact that while growth, progress, advance-
ment, development of known truths and
the acquisition of new ones, characterize
every living science, the sectarian world
has declared that nothing new must be ex-
pected from the fountain head of wisdom.
The testimony of this lad is, that in re-
sponse to his supplication, drawn forth by
the admonition of an inspired apostle, he
received a divine ministration; heavenly
beings manifested themselves to him-
two, clothed in purity, and alike in form
and feature. Pointing to the other, one
said, “This is my beloved Son, hear him.”
In answer to the lad's prayer, the heavenly
personage so designated informed Joseph
that the Spirit of God dwelt not with war-


10
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM."
ring sects, which, while professing a form
of godliness, denied the power thereof, and
that he should join none of them. Over-
joyed at the glorious manifestation thus
granted unto him, the boy prophet could
not withhold from relatives and aquaint-
ances the tidings of the heavenly vision.
From the ministers, who had been so ener-
getic in their efforts to convert the boy, he
received, to his surprise, the greatest abuse
and the utmost ridicule. “Visions and
manifestations from God," said they, "are
of the past, and all such things ceased with
the apostles of old; the canon of scripture
is full; religion has reached its perfection
in plan, and, unlike all other systems con-
trived or accepted by human kind, is in-
capable of development or growth. It is
true God lives, but he cares not for His
children of modern times as He did for
those of ancient days; He has shut Himself
away from the people, closed the windows
of heaven, and has suspended all direct
communication with the people of earth.”
The persecution thus originating with
those who called themselves ministers of
Christ spread throughout the community;
and the sects that before could not agree
together nor abide in peace for a day, be-
came as one in their efforts to oppose the

THE STORY OF “MORMONISM.”
11
youth who thus testified of facts, which
though vehemently denounced, produced an
effect that alarmed them the more. And
such a spectacle has ofttimes presented
itself before the world— men who cannot
tolerate one another in peace swear fidelity
and mutual support in strife with a common
opponent. The importance of this alleged
revelation from the heavens to the earth is
such as to demand attentive consideration.
If a fact, it is a full contradiction of the
vague theories that had been increasing
and accumulating for centuries, denying
personality and parts to Deity.
In 1820, there lived one person who knew
that the word of the Creator, “Let us make
man in our own image, after our likeness,"
had a meaning more than in metaphor.
Joseph Smith, the youthful prophet and
revelator of the nineteenth century, knew
that the Eternal Father and the well-
beloved Son, Jesus Christ, were in form and
stature like unto perfect men; and that the
human family was in very truth of Divine
descent. But this wonderful vision was not
the only manifestation of celestial power
and personality made to the young man,
nor the only incident of the kind destined
to bring upon him the fury of persecution.
Sometime after this visitation, which con-



12
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM."
stituted him a living witness of God unto
men, and which demonstrated the great
fact that humanity is the child of Deity, he
was visited by an immortal personage who
announced himself as Moroni, a messenger
sent from the presence of God. The celes-
tial visitor stated that through Joseph as
the earthly agent the Lord would accom-
plish a great work, and that the boy would
come to be known by good and evil repute
amongst all nations. The angel then an-
nounced that an ancient record, engraven
on plates of gold, lay hidden in a hill near
by, which record gave a history of the na-
tions that had of old inhabited the Ameri-
can continent, and an account of the Sav-
ior's ministrations among them. He fur-
ther explained that with the plates were
two sacred stones, known as Urim and
Thummim, by the use of which the Lord
would bring forth a translation of the ancient
record. Joseph further testifies that he was
told that if he remained faithful to his trust
and the confidence reposed in him, he would
some day receive the record into his keeping,
and be commissioned and empowered to
translate it. In due time these promises
were literally fulfilled, and the modern ver-
sion of these ancient writings was given to
the world.
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM.'
13
The record proved to be an account of
certain colonies of immigrants to this hemi-
sphere from the east, who came several cent-
uries before the Christian era. The principal
company was led by one Lehi, described as a
personage of some importance and wealth,
who had formerly lived at Jerusalem in the
reign of Zedekiah, and who left his eastern
home about 600 B. C. The book tells of the
journeyings across the water in vessels
constructed according to revealed plan, of
the peoples' landing on the western shores
of South America probably somewhere in
Chile, of their prosperity and rapid growth
amid the bounteous elements of the new
world, of the increase of pride and conse-
quent dissension accompanying the accu-
mulation of material wealth, and of the
division of the people into factions which
became later two great nations at enmity
with each other. One part following Nephi,
the youngest but most gifted son of Lehi,
designated themselves Nephites; and the
other faction, led by Laman, the elder and
wicked brother of Nephi, were known as
Lamanites.
The Nephites lived in cities, some of
which attained great size and were distin-
guished by singular architectural beauty.
Continually advancing northward, these peo-


14
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM.”
ple soon occupied the greater part of the
valleys of the Orinoco, the Amazon, and the
Magdalena. During the thousand years
covered by the Nephite record, the people
crossed the Isthmus of Panama, which is
graphically described as a neck of land but
a day's journey from sea to sea, and occu-
pied successively extensive tracts in what
is now Mexico, the valley of the Mississippi,
and the Eastern States. It is not to be
supposed that these vast regions were all
populated at any one time by the Nephites;
the people were continually moving to es-
cape the depredations of their hereditary
foes, the Lamanites; and they abandoned in
turn all their cities established along the
course of migration. The unprejudiced stu-
dent sees in the discoveries of the ancient and
now forest-covered cities of Mexico, Central
America, Yucatan, and the northern regions
of South America, collateral testimony hav-
ing a bearing upon this history.
Before their more powerful foes, the
Nephites dwindled and fled; until about the
year 400 A. D. they were entirely anni-
hilated after a series of decisive battles,
the last of which was fought near the very
hill, called Cumorah, in the State of New
York, where the hidden record was subse-
quently revealed to Joseph Smith.

THE STORY OF "MORMONISM."
15
The Lamanites led a roving. aggressive
life; kept few or no records, and soon lost
the art of history writing. They lived on the
results of the chase and by plunder, degener-
ating in habit until they became typical pro-
genitors of the dark-skinned race, afterward
discovered by Columbus and named Indians.
The last writer in the ancient record, and
the one who hid away the plates in the hill
Cumorah, was Moroni—the same personage
who appeared as a resurrected being in the
nineteenth century, a divinely appointed
messenger sent to reveal the depository of
the sacred documents; but the greater part
of the plates since translated had been en-
graved by the father of Moroni, the Nephite
prophet Mormon. This man, at once war-
rior, prophet and historian, had made a
transcript and compilation of the hetero-
geneous records that had accumulated dur-
ing the troubled history of the Nephite
nation; this compilation was named on the
plates “The Book of Mormon,” which name
has been given to the modern translation-
a work that has already made its way over
most of the civilized world. The translation
and publication of the Book of Mormon
were marked by many scenes of trouble
and contention, but success attended the




16
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM.”
>
undertaking, and the first edition of the
work appeared in print in 1830.
The question, “What is the Book of Mor-
mon?”-a very pertinent one on the part of
every earnest student and investigator of
this phase of American history-has been
partly answered already. The work has
been derisively called the "Mormon Bible,"
a name that carries with it the misrepre-
sentation that in the faith of this people the
book takes the place of the scriptural volume
which is universally accepted by Christian
sects. No designation could be more mis-
leading, and in every way more untruthful.
The Latter-day Saints have but one "Bible”
and that the Holy Bible of Christendom.
They place it foremost amongst the stand-
ard works of the Church; they accept its
admonitions and its doctrines, and accord
thereto a literal significance; it is to them,
and ever has been, the word of God, a com-
pilation made by human agency of works
by various inspired writers; they accept its
teachings in fulness, modifying the meaning
in nowise, except in the rare cases of un-
doubted mistranslation, concerning which
Biblical scholars of all faiths differ and criti-
cise; and even in such cases their reverence
for the sacred letter renders them even more
conservative than the majority of Bible
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM.”
17
commentators and critics in placing free
construction upon the text. The historical
part of the Jewish scriptures tells of the di-
vine dealings with the people of the eastern
hemisphere; the Book of Mormon recounts
the mercies and judgments of God, the in-
spired teachings of His prophets, the rise
and fall of His people as organized com-
munities on the western continent.
The Latter-day Saints believe the coming
forth of the Book of Mormon to have been
foretold in the Bible, as its destiny is prophe-
sied of within its own lids; it is to the people
the true "stick of Ephraim” which Ezekiel
declared should become one with the "stick
of Judah”—or the Bible. The people chal-
lenge the most critical comparison between
this record of the west and the holy
scriptures of the east, feeling confident
that no discrepancy exists in letter or spirit.
As to the original characters in which the
record was engraved, copies were shown to
learned linguists of the day, and pronounced
by them as closely resembling the Reformed
Egyptian writing.
The Book of Mormon was before the
world; the Church circulated the work as
freely as possible. The true account of its
origin was rejected by the general public,
who thus assumed the responsibility of ex-




18
THE STORY OF “MORMONISM.”
plaining in some plausible way the source
of the record. Among the many false
theories propounded, perhaps the most
famous is the so-called Spaulding story.
Solomon Spaulding, a clergyman of Amity,
Pennsylvania, died in 1816. He wrote a
romance to which no name other than
"Manuscript Story” was given, and which,
but for the unauthorized use of the writer's
name and the misrepresentation of his
motives, would never have been published.
Twenty years after the author's death, one
Hurlburt, an apostate “Mormon,” announ-
ced a resemblance between the “Story” and
the Book of Mormon, and expressed a belief
that the work brought forward by Joseph
Smith was nothing but the Spaulding ro-
mance revised and amplified. The apparent
credibility of the statement was increased by
various signed declarations to the effect
that the two were alike, though no extracts
for comparison were presented. But the
“Manuscript Story” was lost for a time, and
in the absence of proof to the contrary, re-
ports of the parallelism between the two
works multiplied. By a fortunate circum-
.
stance, in 1884, President James H. Fair-
child, of Oberlin College, and a literary
friend of his—a Mr. Rice-while exam-
ining a heterogeneous collection of old
THE STORY OF “MORMONISM.”
19
* *
*
papers which had been purchased by Mr.
Rice, found the original story.
After a careful perusal and comparison
with the Book of Mormon, President Fair-
child declared in an article in the New York
OBSERVER, February 5, 1885:
The theory of the origin of the Book of Mor-
mon in the traditional manuscript of Solomon
Spaulding will probably have to be relinquished.
Mr. Rice, myself, and others compared
it [the Spaulding manuscript] with the Book of
Mormon and could detect no resemblance be-
tween the two, in general or in detail. There
seems to be no name nor incident common to the
two. The solemn style of the Book of Mormon
in imitation of the English scriptures does not ap-
pear in the manuscript. * * Some other
explanation of the origin of the Book of Mormon
must be found if any explanation is required.
The manuscript was deposited in the
library of Oberlin College where it now
reposes. Still, the theory of the "Manu-
script Found,” as Spaulding's story has
come to be known, is occasionally pressed
into service in the cause of anti-"Mormon”
zeal, by some whom we will charitably be-
lieve to be ignorant of the facts set forth
by President, Fairchild. A letter of more
recent date, written by that honorable
gentleman in reply to an inquiring corre-
spondent, was published in the MILLEN-
NIAL STAR, Liverpool, November 3rd, 1898,
and is as follows:



20
THE STORY OF “MORMONISM.'
OBERLIN COLLEGE, OHIO,
October 17, 1895.
his papers.
J. R. HINDLEY, Esq.,
Dear Sir: We have in our college library an
original manuscript of Solomon Spaulding- un-
questionably genuine.
I found it in 1884 in the hands of Hon. L. L.
Rice, of Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands. He was
formerly state printer at Columbus, Ohio, and
before that, publisher of a paper in Painesville
whose preceding publisher had visited Mrs.
Spaulding and obtained the manuscript from
her. It had lain among his old papers forty
years or more, and was brought out by my ask-
ing him to look up anti-slavery documents among
The manuscript has upon it the signatures of
several men of Conneaught, Ohio, who had
heard Spaulding read it and knew it to be his.
No one can see it and question its genuineness.
The manuscript has been printed twice, at least;
-once by the Mormons of Salt Lake City, and
once by the Josephite Mormons of Iowa. The
Utah Mormons obtained the copy of Mr. Rice,
at Honolulu, and the Josephites got it of me
after it came into my possession.
This manuscript is not the original of the Book
of Mormon.
Yours very truly,
JAMES H. FAIRCHILD.
LOS

THE STORY OF "MORMONISM.”
21
The "Manuscript Story” has been pub-
lished in full, and comparisons between the
same and the Book of Mormon may be made
by anyone who has a mind to investigate
the subject.


II.
But we have anticipated the current of
events. With the publication of the Book
of Mormon, opposition grew more intense
toward the people who professed a belief in
the testimony of Joseph Smith. On the
6th of April, 1830, the Church of Jesus Christ
of Latter-day Saints was formally organized
and thus took on a legal existence. The
scene of this organization was Fayette, New
York, and but six persons were directly
concerned as participants. At that time
there may have been and probably were
many times that number who had professed
adherence to the newly restored faith; but
as the requirements of the law governing
the formation of religious societies were
satisfied by the application of six, only the
specified number formally took part. Such
was the beginning of the Church, soon to
be so universally maligned. Its origin was
small—a germ, an insignificant seed, little
calculated to arouse opposition. What is
there to fear in the voluntary association
of six men, avowedly devoted to peaceful
pursuits and benevolent purposes? Yet the

THE STORY OF “MORMONISM.”
23
storm of persecution raged from the earliest
day. At first but a family affair, opposition
to the work has involved successively the
town, the county, the state, the country,
and to-day the "Mormon” question has been
accorded extended consideration at the
hands of the national government, and in-
deed most civilized nations have been forced
to take cognizance of the same.
Let us observe the contrast between the
beginning and the present proportions of
the Church. Instead of but six regularly
affiliated members, and at most two score
of adherents, the organization numbers to-
day several hundred thousand souls.
In place of a single hamlet, in the smallest
corner of which the Saints could have con-
gregated, there now over sixty stakes of
Zion and about seven hundred organized
wards, each ward and stake with its full com-
plement of officers and priesthood organiza-
tions. The practice of gathering its prose-
lytes into one place prevents the building up
and strengthening of foreign branches; and
inasmuch as extensive and strong organiza-
tions are seldom met with abroad, very erron-
eous ideas exist concerning the strength of
the Church. But the mustard seed, among
the smallest of all seeds, has attained the
proportions of a tree, and the birds of the


24
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM."
air are nesting in its branches; the acorn is
now an oak offering protection and the
sweets of satisfaction to every earnest pil-
grim journeying its way for truth.
From the organization of the Church, the
spirit of emigration rested upon the people.
Their eyes were from the first turned in an-
ticipation toward the evening sun-not
merely that the work of proselyting should
be carried on in the west, but that the
headquarters of the Church should be there
established. The Book of Mormon had
taught the people the true origin of, and
had shown them indeed part of the destiny
of, the Indians, and to this dark-skinned
remnant of a once mighty people, the mis-
sionaries of “Mormonism” early turned
their eyes, and with their eyes went their
hearts and their hopes.
Within three months from the beginning,
the Church had missionaries among the
Lamanites. It is notable that the Indian
tribes have always regarded the religion of
the Latter-day Saints with favor, seeing in
the Book of Mormon striking agreement
with their own traditions.
The first fully established seat of the
Church was in the pretty little town of
Kirtland, Ohio, almost within sight of Lake
Erie; and here soon rose the first temple of
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM."
25
modern times. Among their many other
peculiarities, the Latter-day Saints are
characterized as a temple-building people,
as they say history proves the Israel of an-
cient times to have been. And in the days
of their infancy as a Church, while in the
thrall of poverty, and amidst the persecu-
tion and direful threats of lawless hordes,
they laid the cornerstone, and in less than
three years thereafter they celebrated the
dedication of the Kirtland temple, a struc-
ture at once beautiful and imposing. But
even before this time, populous settlements
of the Saints had been made in Jackson
County, Missouri; and in the town of Inde-
pendence a site for the great temple had
been selected and purchased, but though
the ground has been dedicated and the
corner-stone laid, the people have not as yet
built thereon.
Within two years of its dedication, the
temple in Kirtland was abandoned by the
people, who were compelled to flee for their
lives before the rage of mobocrats; but a
second temple, larger and more beautiful
than the first, soon reared its spires from
the city of Nauvoo, Illinois. This structure
was destroyed by fire, but the temple-
building spirit was not to be quenched, and
in the vales of Utah to-day are four magnifi-



26
THE STORY OF “MORMONISM.”
cent temple edifices. The last completed,
which was the first begun, is situated in
,
Salt Lake City, and is one of the wonders
and beauties of that city by the great salt
sea.
To the fervent Latter-day Saint, a temple
is not simply a church building, a house for
religious assembly. Indeed the “Mormon"
temples are rarely used as places of general
gatherings. They are in one sense educa-
tional institutions, regular courses of lec-
tures and instruction being maintained in
some of them; but they are specifically for
baptisms and ordinations, for sanctifying
prayer, and for the most sacred ceremonies
and rites of the Church, particularly in the
vicarious work for the dead which is a char-
acteristic of "Mormon” faith. And who
that has gazed upon these palaces of praise
can say that the people who can do so much
in poverty and tribulation are insincere?
Bigoted they may seem to those who be-
lieve not as they do; fanatics they may be to
multitudes who like one of old thank God
they are not as these; but insincere they
cannot be, even in the judgment of their
bitterest foe, if he be a creature of reason.
The clouds of persecution thickened in Ohio
as the intolerant zeal of mobs found frequent
expression; numerous charges, trivial and
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM.'
27
serious, were made against the leaders of the
Church, and they were repeatedly brought
before the courts, only to be liberated on
the usual finding of no cause for action. And
the march to the west was maintained.
Soon thousands of converts had rented or
purchased homes in Missouri-Independ-
ence, Jackson County, being their centre;
but from the first, they were unpopular
among the Missourians. Their system of
equal rights with their marked disapproval
of every species of aristocratic separation
and self-aggrandizement was declared to be
a species of communism, dangerous to the
state. An inoffensive journalistic organ, THE
STAR, published for the purpose of prop-
erly presenting the religious tenets of hte
people, was made the particular object of
the mob's rage; the house of its publisher
was razed to the ground, the press and type
were confiscated, and the editor and his fam-
ily maltreated. An absurd story was circu-
lated and took firm hold of the masses that
the Book of Mormon promised the western
lands to the people of the Church, and that
they intended to take possession of these
lands by force. Throughout the book of
revelations, regarded by the people as law
specially directed to them, they are told to
save their riches that they may purchase



28
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM.”
the inheritance promised them of God.
Everywhere are they told to maintain
peace; the sword is never offered as their
symbol of conquest. Their gathering is to
be like that of the Jews at Jerusalem-a
pacific one, and in their taking possession
of what they regard as a land of promise,
no one previously located there shall be
denied his rights.
A spirit of fierce persecution raged in
Jackson and surrounding counties of Mis-
souri. An appeal was made to the executive
of the state, but little encouragement was
returned. The lieutenant-governor, Lil-
burn W. Boggs, afterward governor, was a
pronounced "Mormon”-hater, and through-
out the period of the troubles, he mani-
fested sympathy with the persecutors.
One of the circuit judges who was asked
to issue a peace warrant refused to do so,
but advised the “Mormons” to arm them-
selves and meet the force of the outlaws
with organized resistance. This advice was
not pleasing to the Saints, whose religion
enjoined tolerance and peace; but they so
far heeded it as to arm a small force; and
when the outlaws next came upon them, the
people were not entirely unprepared. A
"Mormon "rebellion was now proclaimed.
The people had been goaded to desperation.
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM.”
29
the oppressor.
The militia was ordered out, and the “Mor-
mons" were disarmed. The mob took re-
venge. The “Mormons” engaged able law-
yers to institute and maintain legal pro-
ceedings against their foes, and this step, the
right to which we would think could be
denied no American citizen, called forth
such an explosion of popular wrath as to
affect almost the entire state.
It was winter; but the inclemency of the
year only suited the better the purpose of
Homes were destroyed,
men torn from their families were brutally
beaten, tarred and feathered; women with
babes in their arms were forced to flee half-
clad into the solitude of the prairie to es-
cape from mobocratic violence. Their
sufferings have never yet been chronicled
by human scribe. Making their way across
the river, most of the refugees found shel-
ter among the more hospitable people of
Clay County, and afterward established
themselves in Caldwell County, therein
founding the city of Far West. County
and state judges, the governor, and even
the President of the United States, were ap-
pealed to in turn for redress. The national
executive, Andrew Jackson, while express-
ing sympathy for the persecuted people,
deplored his lack of power to interfere with


30
THE STORY OF “MORMONISM."
the administration or non-administration of
state laws; the national officials could do
nothing; the state officials would do nought.
But the expulsion from Jackson County
was but a prelude to the tragedy soon to
follow. A single scene of the bloody drama
is known as the Haun's Mill massacre. A
small settlement had been founded by
“Mormon” families on Shoal Creek, and
here on the 30th of October, 1838, a company
of two hundred and forty fell upon the hap-
less settlers and butchered a score. No
respect was paid to age or sex; grey heads,
and infant lips that scarce had learned to
lisp a word, vigorous manhood and imma-
ture youth, mother and maiden, fared alike
in the scene of carnage, and their bodies
were thrown into an old well.
In October, 1838, the Governor of Mis-
souri
, the same Lilburn W. Boggs, issued his
infamous exterminating order, and called
upon the militia of the state to execute it.
The language of this document, signed by
the executive of a sovereign state of the
Union, declared that the "Mormons” must
be driven from the state or exterminated.
Be it said to the honor of some of the officers
entrusted with the terrible commission,
that as they learned its true significance
they resigned their authority rather than
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM."
31
have anything to do with what they desig-
nated a cold-blooded butchery. But tools
were not wanting, as indeed they never
have been, for murder and its kindred
outrages. What the heart of man can con-
ceive, the hand of man will find a way to
execute. The awful work was carried out
with dread dispatch. Oh, what a record to
read; what a picture to gaze upon; how
awful the fact]-an official edict offering
expatriation or death to a peaceable com-
munity with no crime proved against them,
and guilty of no offence other than that of
choosing to differ in opinion from the
masses. American school boys read with
emotions of horror of the Albigenses, driven,
beaten and killed, with a pope's legate
directing the butchery; and of the Vaudois,
hunted and hounded like beasts as the
effect of a royal decree; and they yet shall
read in the history of their own country of
scenes as terrible as these in the exhibition
of injustice and inhuman hate.
In the dread alternative offered them, the
Saints determined again to abandon their
homes; but whither should they go? Al-
ready they had fled before the lawless op-
pressor over well nigh half a continent;
already were they on the frontiers of the
country that they had regarded as the land of



32
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM.”
promised liberty. Thus far every move had
carried them westward, but farther west
they could not go unless they went entirely
beyond the land of their birth, and gave up
their hope of protection under the Constitu-
tion, which to them had ever been an in-
spired instrument, the majesty of which, as
they had never doubted, would be some
day vindicated, even to giving them the
rights of American citizens. This time their
faces were turned toward the east; and a
host numbering from ten to twelve thou-
sand, including many women and children,
abandoned their homes and fled before their
murderous pursuers, reddening the snow
with bloody footprints as they journeyed.
They crossed the Mississippi and sought
protection on the soil of Illinois. There
their sad condition evoked for a time gener-
al commiseration.
The press of the state denounced the
treatment of the people by the Missourians
and vindicated the character of the "Mor-
mons” as peaceable and law-abiding citizens.
College professors published expressions of
their horror over the godless crusade; state
officials, including even the governor, gave
substantial evidence of their sympathy and
good feeling. This lull in the storm of out-
rage that had so long raged about them

THE STORY OF "MORMONISM.'
33
offered a strange contrast to their usual
treatment. Let it not be thought that all
the people of Illinois were their friends;
from the first, opposition was manifest, but
their condition was so greatly bettered that
they might have thought the advent of
their Zion to be near at hand.
I stated that professional men, and even
college professors raised their voices in
commiseration of the "Mormon” situation
and in denouncing the “Mormon” oppres-
sors. Prof. Turner of Illinois College wrote:
Who began the quarrel? Was it the “Mor-
mons?” Is it not notorious on the contrary
that they were hunted like wild beasts from
county to county before they made any resist-
ance? Did they ever, as a body, refuse obed-
ience to the laws, when called upon to do so, un-
til driven to desperation by repeated threats
and assaults by the mob? Did the state ever
make one decent effort to defend them as fellow-
citizens in their rights or to redress their wrongs?
Let the conduct of its governors and attorneys
and the fate of their final petitions answer!
Have any who plundered and openly insulted
the “Mormons” ever been brought to the pun-
ishment due to their crimes? Let boasting mur-
derers of begging and helpless infancy answer!
Has the state ever remunerated even those
known to be innocent for the loss of either their
property or their arms? Did either the pulpit
or the press through the state raise a note of re-
monstrance or alarm? Let the clergymen who

34
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM.”
abetted and the editors who encouraged the mob
answer!
As a sample of the press comments against
the brutality of the Missourians I quote a
paragraph from the Quincy ARGUS, March
16, 1839:
We have no language sufficiently strong for
the expression of our indignation and shame at
the recent transaction in a sister state, and that
state, Missouri, a state of which we had long
been proud, alike for her men and history, but
now so fallen that we could wish her star stricken
from the bright constellation of the Union. We
say we know of no language sufficiently strong
for the expression of our shame and abhorrence
of her recent conduct. She has written her own
character in letters of blood, and stained it by
acts of merciless cruelty and brutality that the
waters of ages cannot efface. It will be observed
that an organized mob, aided by many of the
civil and military officers of Missouri, with Gov.
Boggs at their head, have been the prominent
actors in this business, incited too, it appears
against the “Mormons” by political hatred,
and by the additional motives of plunder and
revenge. They have but too well put in exe-
cution their threats of extermination and ex-
pulsion, and fully wreaked their vengeance
a body of industrious and enterprising
men, who had never wronged nor wished to
wrong them, but on the contrary had ever com
ported themselves as good and honest citizens,
living under the same laws, and having the same
right with themselves to the sacred immunities
of life, liberty and property.
on
III.
SETTLING in and about the obscure village
of Commerce, the "Mormon” refugees soon
demonstrated anew the marvelous recuper-
active power with which they were endowed,
and a city seemed to spring from the earth.
Nauvoo—the City Beautiful-was the name
given to this new abiding place. It was
situated but a few miles from Quincy, in a
bend of the majestic river, giving the town
three water fronts. It seemed to nestle
there as if the Father of Waters was encir-
cling it with his mighty arm. Soon a glorious
temple crowned the hill up which the city
had run in its rapid growth. Their settle-
ments extended into Iowa, then a territory.
Governor Lucas, the chief executive of Iowa,
and later a governor of Ohio, both testified
to their worthiness as citizens, and pledged
them the protection of the commonwealth.
The city of Nauvoo was chartered by the
state of Illinois, and the rights of local self-
government were assured to its citizens.
A military organization, the “Nauvoo
Legion,” was authorized, and the estab-
lishment of a university was provided for;


36
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM.”
99
both these organizations were successfully
effected. It was here that a memorial was
prepared and sent to the national govern-
ment, reciting the outrages of Missouri, and
asking reparation. Joseph Smith himself,
the head of the delegation, had a personal
interview with President Van Buren, in
which the grievances of the Latter-day
Saints were presented. Van Buren replied
in words that will not be forgotten, “Your
cause is just, but I can do nothing for you.
The peaceful conditions at first character-
istic of their Illinois settlement were not to
continue. The element of political influ-
ence asserted itself and the “Mormons”
bade fair to soon hold the balance of power
in local affairs. The characteristic unity, so
marked in connection with every phase of
the people's existence, promised too much, ;
immigration into Hancock county was con-
tinuous, and the power of the Saints seemed a
likely to be soon of formidable proportions.
With this as the true motive, many pretexts t
for annoyance were found; and arrests,
trials, and acquitals were common experi-
ences of the Church officers.
t
A charge, which promised to prove as
devoid of foundation as had the excuses for
the fifty arrests preceding it, led Joseph
Smith, president of the Church, and Hyrum

THE STORY OF "MORMONISM.”'
37
Smith, the patriarch, to again surrender
themselves to the officers of the law. They
were taken to Carthage, Joseph having de-
clared to friends his belief that he was
going to the slaughter. Governor Ford gave
to the prisoners his personal guarantee for
their safety; but mob violence was supreme,
more mighty than the power of the state
militia placed there to guard the prison,
and these men were shot to death, even
while under the governor's plighted pledge
of protection. Hyrum fell first; and Joseph,
appearing at one of the windows in the sec-
ond story, received the leaden missiles of
the besieging mob, which was led by a recre-
ant though professed minister of the gospel.
But the brutish passion of the mob was not
yet sated: propping the body against a
well curb in the jail-yard, the murderers
poured a volley of bullets into the corpse,
and fled. Thus was the unholy vow of the
mob fulfilled, that as law could not touch
the "Mormon” leaders, powder and ball
should. John Taylor, who became years
afterward president of the Church, was in
the jail at the same time; he received four
bullets, and was left supposedly dead.
Joseph Smith had been more than the
ecclesiastical leader; his presence and
personality had been ever powerful as

38
THE STORY OF “MORMONISM."
8?
W
er
m
ni
W
stimuli in the people's hearts; none knet de
his personal power better than the mem
hi
bers of his own flock, unless indeed i
fr
were the wolves who were ever seeking
to harry the fold. It had been the boast oil
anti-“Mormons” that with Joseph Smith
removed, the Church would crumble to
pieces of itself. In the personality of thei
leader, it was thought, lay the secret ofth
people's strength; and like the Philistine
th
the enemy struck at the supposed bond hi
power. Terrible as was the blow of th
fearful fatality, the Church soon emerge
from its despairing state of poignant grie
and rose in power mightier than before.
is the faith of this people that while th
work of God on earth is carried on by me
yet mortals are but instruments in the
Creator's hands for the accomplishment oo
Divine purposes. The death of the presi
dent disorganized the First Presidency
the Church; but the body next in authority
stepped to the front, and the progress a
the Church was in no way hindered.
work of the ministry was not arrested; th
people paused but long enough to bury their
dead and clear their eyes from the blint
ing tears that fell.
Let us take a retrospective glance at the
unusual
Though his opponen
ta
0
The
man.

THE STORY OF “MORMONISM."
2
39
deny him the divine commission with which
"his friends believe he was charged, they all,
friends and foes alike, admit that he was a
great man. By the testimony of his life's
work and the sanctifying seal of his mar-
tyrdom, thousands have come to acknowl-
edge him all that he professed to be a
messenger from God to the people. He is
not without admirers among men who deny
the truth of his principles and the faith of
his people.
A historical writer of the time, Josiah
Quincy, a few weeks after the martyrdom,
wrote:
t It is by no means improbable that some future
text book for the use of generations yet unborn,
will contain a question something like this:
"What historical American of the nineteenth
century has exerted the most powerful influence
upon the destinies of his countrymen?"; and it
is by no means impossible that the answer to
that interrogatory may be thus written-"Joseph
Smith, the Mormon Prophet.” And the reply,
"
absurd as it doubtless seems to most men now
living, may be an obvious commonplace to their
descendants. History deals in surprises and
paradoxes quite as startling as this.
A man
who established a religion in this age of free de-
I bate, who was and is to-day accepted by hundreds
of thousands as a direct emissary from the Most
High-such a rare human being is not to be dis-
posed of by pelting his memory with unsavory
I epithets. * The most vital questions
*

40
THE STORY OF “MORMONISM."
*
*
Americans are asking each other to-day, have to
deal with this man and what he has left us.
* Joseph Smith, claiming to be an in-
spired teacher, faced adversity such as few men
have been called to meet, enjoyed a brief season
of prosperity such as few men have ever attained,
and finally * * * went cheerfully to a mar-
tyr's death. When he surrendered his person to
Governor Ford, in order to prevent the shedding
of blood, the Prophet had a presentiment of what
was before him. "I am going like a lamb to th
slaughter,” he is reported to have said, “but
am as calm as a summer's morning. I have
conscience void of offense, and shall die innocent
The “Mormon” people regarded it as
duty to make every proper effort to brin
the perpetrators of the foul assassination o
their leaders to justice; sixty names were
presented to the local grand jury, and of
the persons so designated, nine were in-
dicted. After a farcical semblance of a
trial, these were acquitted, and thus was
notice, sanctioned by the constituted author-
ity of the law, served upon all anti-"Mor
mons” of Illinois, that they were safe in any
assault they might choose to make on the
subjects of their hate. And the mob proved
to be composed of apt pupils in the learning
of this lesson. Personal outrages were fol
every-day occurrence; husbandmen wer
captured in their fields, beaten, torture
until they bara vhyladeiil tty left to pro

THE STORY OF "MORMONISM."
41
en
50
ng
to mise compliance with the demands of their
assailants, viz:. that they would leave the
state. Houses were fired while the tenants
n were wrapped in uneasy slumber within;
4. indeed, one entire town, that of Morley,
was by such incendiarism reduced to ashes.
Women and children were aroused in the
night, and compelled to flee unclad, or per-
ish in their burning dwellings.
But what of the internal work of the
Church during these trying periods? As
the winds of winter, the storms of the year's
deepest night, do but harden and strengthen
the mountain pine, whose roots strike the
deeper, whose branches thicken, whose
twigs multiply by the inclemency that
would be fatal to the exotic palm, raised by
man amid artificial surroundings, with hot-
house nursing, so the new sect continued its
growth, partly in spite of, partly because
of, the storms to which it was subjected.
It was no green-house growth, struggling
for existence in a foreign clime, but a fit
plant for the soil of a free land; and there
existed in the minds of unprejudiced ob-
servers not a doubt as to its vitality. The
Church soon found its equilibrium again
after the terrible shock of its cruel experi-
ence. Brigham Young, who for a decade
had been identified with the cause, who had

42
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM.”'
received his full share of persecution a
mobocratic hands, now stood at the head i
of the presiding body in the priesthood
of the Church. The effect of this man's
wonderful personality, his surprising natu-
ral ability, and to the Saints, the proofs of
his divine acceptance, were apparent from
the first.
Migration from other states and from
foreign shores continued to swell the “Mor
mon” band and this but angered the op-
pressors the more. The Saints, recogniz
ing the inevitable long before predicted by
their murdered prophet, that the march of
the Church would be westward still, re-
doubled their efforts to complete the grand
temple upon which they had not ceased to
work through all the storms of persecution.
This structure, solemnly dedicated to their
God, they entered, and there received their
anointings and their blessings; then they
abandoned it to the desecration and self-
condemning outrages of their foes. For the
mob's decree had gone forth, that the "Mor-
mons” must leave Illinois. After a few san-
guinary encounters, the leaders of the peo-
ple acceded to the demands of their assail-
ants, and agreed to leave early in the follow-
ing spring; but the departure was not
a

THE STORY OF "MORMONISM.”
43
speedy enough to suit, and the lawless per-
secution was waged the more ruthlessly.
Soon the soil of Illinois was free from
"Mormon” tread; Nauvoo was deserted, her
20,000 inhabitants expatriated. Colonel
Thomas L. Kane, a conspicuous figure at this
stage of our country's history, was traveling
eastward at the time, and reached Nauvoo
shortly after its evacuation. In a lecture
before the Historical Society of Pennsyl-
vania, he related his experience in this some-
time abode of the Saints. I paraphrase a
portion of his eloquent address.
Sighting the city from the western shore
of the mighty Mississippi, as it nestled in the
river's encircling embrace, he crossed to its
principal wharf, and, there to his surprise,
found no soul to meet him. The stillness
everywhere prevailed was painful,
broken only by an occasional faint echo of
boisterous shout or ribald song from a dis-
tance. The town was in a dream, and
the warrior trod lightly lest he wake it in
affright, for he plainly saw that it had not
slumbered long. No grass grew in the pave-
ment joints; recent footprints were still
distinct in the dusty thoroughfares. The
visitor made his way unmolested into work-
shops and smithies; the tools lay as last
used; on the carpenter's bench was the un.
that

44
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM.''
finished frame, on the floor were the shav-
ings fresh and odorous; the wood was piled
in readiness before the baker's oven; the
blacksmith's forge was cold, but the shop
looked as though the occupant had just gone
off for a holiday.
The soldier entered
gardens unchallenged by owner, human
guard, or watchful dog; he might have sup-
posed the people hidden or dead in their
houses; but the doors were not fastened,
and he entered to explore; there were fresh
ashes on the hearth; no great accumulation
of the dust of time on floors or furniture;
the awful quiet compelled him to tread
a-tip-toe as if threading the isles of an
unoccupied cathedral. He hastened to the
graveyard, though surely the city had not
been depopulated by pestilence; no; there
were a few stones newly set, some sods
freshly turned in this sacred acre of God,
but where can you find a cemetery of a living
town with no such evidence of recent de-
parture? There were fields of heavy grain,
the bounteous harvest rotting on the
ground; there were orchards dropping their
plump and rosy fruit to spoil beneath; not
a hand to gather or save.
But in a suburban corner, he came across
the smoldering embers of a barbecue fire,
with fragments of flesh and other remnants
а.

THE STORY OF "MORMONISM."
45
of a feast. Hereabout houses had been de-
molished; and there around the great tem-
ple that had first attracted his attention
from the Iowa shore, armed men were
bivouacked. This worthy representative
of our country's service was challenged by
the drunken crowd, and made to give an
account of himself. and to answer for hav-
ing crossed the river without a permit from
the head of the band. Finding that he was
a stranger, they related to him in fiendish
glee their recent exploits of pillage, rapine,
and murder. They conducted him through
the temple; everywhere were marks of their
brutish acts; its altars of prayer were
broken; the baptismal font had been so
"diligently desecrated as to render the
apartment in which it was contained too
noisome to abide in.” There in the steeple
close by the "scar of divine wrath” left by
a recent thunderbolt, were broken covers
of liquor and drinking vessels.
Sickened with the sight, disgusted with
this spectacle of outrage, the colonel re-
crossed the river at nightfall
, beating up-
ward, for the wind had freshened. At-
tracted by a faint light near the bank, he
approached the spot, there to find a few
haggard faces surrounding one who seemed
to be in the last stages of fever. The
>
46
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM.”
sufferer was partially protected by some-
thing like a tent made from a couple of
bed sheets; and with such surroundings, the
spirit was pluming itself for flight. Making
his way through this camp of misery, he
heard the sobbings of children hungry and
sick; there were men and women dying
from wounds or distress, without a semblance
of shelter or a single physical comfort; wives
in the pangs of maternity, ushering into the
world innocent babes doomed to be mother-
less from their birth. and at intervals, to the
ears of those outcasts, the sick and the
dying, the wind brought the soul-piercing
sounds of the reveling mob in the distant
city; the scrap of vulgar song, the shocking
oath, shrieked from the temple tower in the
madness of brutal orgies.
This, however, was but the rear remnant
of the expatriated Christian band. The van
was already far on its way toward the in-
viting wilderness of the all but unknown
west. But the wanderers were not wholly
without friends; certain Indian tribes, the
Omahas and the Pottawattamies, welcomed
them to their lands, inviting them to camp
within their territory during the coming
winter. “Welcome,” said these children of
the forest, "we too have been driven from
our pleasant homes east of the great river,

THE STORY OF "MORMONISM."
47
>
to these damp and unhealthful bottoms;
you now, white men, have been driven forth
to the prairies; we are fellow-sufferers.
Welcome, brothers.”
And in return much assistance was ren-
dered by the white refugees to their, shall
I say savage friends? If it was civilization
the wanderers had left, then indeed might
the red men of the forest have felt proud
of their distinction. But the Indian agent,
a Christian gentleman, ordered the "Mor-
mons” to move on and leave the reservation
which a kind government had provided for
its red children. An order from President
Polk, who had been appealed to by Colonel
Kane, gave the Saints permission to remain.
The government of Iowa had courteously
assured them protection while passing
through that territory. As soon as the peo-
ple were well under way, a thorough or-
ganization was effected. Remembering
the toilsome desert march from Egypt to
Canaan, the people assumed the name,
“Camp of Israel.” The camp consisted of
two main divisions, and each was sub-divided
into companies of hundreds, fifties, and
tens, with captains to direct. An officer
with one hundred volunteers went ahead of
the main body to select a route and prepare
a road. At this time, there were over one



48
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM.”'
thousand wagons of the “Mormons” rolling
westward, and the line of march soon
reached from the Mississippi to Council
Bluffs. There were in the company not
half enough draft animals required for the
arduous march, and but an insufficient num-
ber of able-bodied men to tend the camps.
The women had to assist in driving teams
and stock, and in other labors of the march.
Yet with their characteristic cheerfulness
the people made the best, and that proved
to be a great deal, out of their lot. When
the camp halted, a city seemed to spring as
if by magic from the prairie soil. Concerts
and social gatherings were usual features of
the evening rests.
But another great event disturbed the
equanimity of the camp. War had broken
out between Mexico and the United States.
General Taylor's victories in the early stages
of the strife had been all but decisive; but
the Republic was on its march to the west-
ern ocean and the provinces of New Mexico
and California were in her path. These
two provinces comprised in addition to the
territory now designated by those names,
Utah, Nevada, portions of Wyoming and
Colorado, as also Arizona; while Oregon,
then claimed by Great Britain, included
Washington, Idaho, and portions of Mon-
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM."
49
tana and Wyoming. It was the plan of the
national administration to occupy these
provinces at the earliest moment possible;
and a call was made upon the “Mormon”
refugees to contribute to the general force
by furnishing a battalion of five hundred
men to take part in the war with Mexico.
The surprise which the message of the gov-
ernment officer produced in the camp
amounted almost to dismay. Five hundred
men fit to bear arms to be drafted from
that camp! What would become of the
rest? Already women and boys had been
pressed into service to do the work of men;
already the sick and the halt had been neg-
lected; and many graves marked the path
they had traversed, whose tenants had pass-
ed to their last sleep through lack of care.
But how long did they hesitate? Scarcely
an hour; it was the call of their country.
True, they were even then leaving the
national soil, but not of their own will. To
them their country was and is the promised
land, the Lord's chosen place, the land of
Zion. “You shall have your battalion,”
said Brigham Young to Captain Allen, the
muster officer, "and if there are not young
men enough, we will take the old men, and
if they are not enough; we will take the
women.” Within a week from the time

>

50
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM.”
over
President Polk's message was received, the
entire force, in all five hundred and forty-
nine souls, was on the march to Fort Leaven-
worth. Their path from the Missouri to the
Pacific led them
two thousand
miles, much of this distance being
measured through wildernesses, which
prior to that time had not been trodden by
civilized foot.
Colonel Cooke, the commander of the
"Mormon" Battalion, declared, “History
may be searched in vain for an equal march
of infantry.” Many were disabled through
the severity of the march, and many cases
of sickness and death were chronicled. Gen-
eral Kearney and his successor, Governor
R. B. Mason, as military commandants of
California spoke in the highest praise of this
organization, and in their official reports de-
clared that they had made efforts to pro-
long the battalion's term of service; but
most of the men chose to return as soon as
they could secure their honorable discharge.
But to return to the Camp of Israel: A
pioneer party, consisting of a hundred and
forty and four, preceded the main body; and
the line of the emigrating hosts soon stretch-
ed from the Missouri to the valley of the
Great Salt Lake. Wagons there were, as al-
so some horses and men, but all too few for
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM.'
51
the journey; and a great part of the company
walked the full thousand miles across the
great plains and the forbidding deserts of
the West. In the Black Hills region, the
pioneers were delayed a week at the Platte,
a stream, which, though usually fordable at
this point was now so swollen as to make ford-
ing impossible. Here, too, their provisions
were well nigh exhausted. Game had not
been plentiful, and the “Mormon” pioneers
were threatened with the direst privations.
In their slow march they had been passed
by a number of well-equipped parties, some
of them from Missouri bound for the Pa-
cific; but most of these were overtaken on
the easterly side of the river. Amongst
the effects of the "Mormon” party was a
leathern boat, which on water served the
legitimate purpose of its maker and on land
was made to do service as a wagon box.
This, together with rafts specially construct-
ed, was now put to good use in ferrying
across the river not alone themselves and
their little property, but the other com-
panies and their loads. For this service
they were well paid in camp provisions.
Thus, the Saints found themselves re-
lieved from want with their meal sacks re-
plenished in the heart of the wilderness.
Many may call it superstition, but some



52
THE STORY OF “MORMONISM."
will regard it as did the pioneers—an in-
interposition of Providence, and an answer
to their prayers—an event to be compared,
they said, to the feeding of Israel with
manna in the wilderness of old.
After over three months journeying, the
pioneer band reached the valley of the
Great Salt Lake; and at the first sight of it,
Brigham Young declared it to be the halt-
ing place—the gathering centre for the
Saints. And what was there inviting in
this wilderness spread out like a scroll-
barren of inviting message, and empty but
for the picture it presented of wondrous
scenic grandeur? Looking from the Wasatch
barrier, the colonists gazed upon a scene
of entrancing though forbidding beauty.
A barren, arid plain, rimmed by mountains
like a literal basin, still occupied in its low-
est parts by the dregs of what had once
filled it to the brim; no green meadows, not
a tree worthy the name, scarce a patch of
green-sward to entice the adventurous
wanderers into the valley. The slopes were
covered with sage brush, relieved by patches
of chapparal oak and squaw bush; the wild
sunflower lent its golden hue to intensify
the sharp contrasts. Off to the westward
lay the lake, making an impressive, unin-
viting picture in its severe, unliying beauty;
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM."
53
from its blue wastes sombre peaks rose as
precipitous islands, and about the shores of
this dead sea were saline flats, that told of
the scorching heat and thirsty atmosphere
of this parched region. A turbid river ran
from south to north athwart the valley,
“dividing it in twain," as a historian of
the day has written, “as if the vast bowl in
the intense heat of the Master Potter's fires,
in process of formation, had cracked as-
under.” Small streams of water started in
joyful enthusiasm from the snow-caps of
the mountains toward the lake, but most of
them were devoured by the thirsty sands of
the valley before their journey was half
completed.
Such was the scene of desolation that
greeted the pioneer band. A more forsaken
spot they had not passed in all their wan-
derings. And is this the promised land?
This is the very place of which Bridger
spake when he proffered a thousand dollars
in gold for the first bushel of grain that could
be raised here. With such a Canaan spread
out before them, was it not wholly pardon-
able if some did sigh with longing for the
leeks and flesh-pots of the Egypt they had
left, or wished to pass by this land and seek
a fairer home? Two of the three women
who belonged to the pioneer party were

a

54
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM."
2)
utterly disappointed. “Weak, worn, and
weary as I am,” said one of these heroines,
"I would rather push on another thousand
miles than stay here.”
But the voice of their leader was heard.
“The very place,” said Brigham Young, and
in his prophetic mind there rose a vision of
what was to come. Not for a moment did
he doubt the future. He saw a multitude
of towns and cities, hamlets and villas filling
this and neighboring valleys, with the fair-
est of all, a city whose beauty of situation,
whose wealth of resource should become
known throughout the world, rising from
the most arid site of the burning desert be-
fore him, hard by the barren salt shores of
the watery waste. There in the very heart of
the parched wilderness should stand the
temple of his people, with other similar
shrines in valleys beyond the horizon of his
gaze.
Within a few hours after the arrival of the
vanguard upon the banks of what is now
known as City Creek—the mountain stream
which to-day furnishes Salt Lake City part
of her water supply-plows were put to
work; but the hard-baked soil, never before
disturbed by the efforts of man to till, re-
fused to yield to the share. A dam was
thrown across the stream and the softening
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM."
5
55
liquid was spread upon the flat that had
been chosen for the first fields. The plant-
ing season had already well nigh passed, and
not a day could be lost. Potatoes and other
crops were put in, and the land was again
flooded. Such was the beginning of the ir-
rigation system, which soon became co-ex-
tensive with the lands occupied by the
"Mormon” settlers, a system which under
the blessing of Providence, has proved to be
the veritable magic touch by which the
desert has been made a field of richness and
a garden of beauty; a system which now af-
ter many decades of successful trial is held
up by the nation's wise and great ones to be
the one practicable method of reclaiming
our country's vast domains of arid lands.
It was on the 24th of July, 1847, that the
main part of the pioneer band entered the
valley of the Great Salt Lake, and that day
of the year is observed as a legal holiday in
Utah. From that time to the present, the
stream of immigration to those valleys has
never ceased.


IV.
But the dangers of this company's migra-
tion were surpassed by those of parties who
subsequently braved the terrors of the
plains. In their enthusiasm to reach the
gathering place of their people, many of the
Latter-day Saints set out from Iowa, where
railway facilities had their termination,
with handcarts only as a means of convey-
ance. To-day there are living in the smil-
ing vales of Utah,"men and women who
then as boys and girls trudged wearily
across the prairies, dragging the lumbering
carts that contained their entire provision
against starvation and freezing. Such hand-
cart companies were fully organized; a lim-
ited amount of freight was allowed to each
division; milch cattle and a very few draft-
animals, with wagons for conveying the
heavier baggage and to carry the sick, were
assigned. The tale of those dreary marches
has never yet been told; the song of the
heroism and sacrifice displayed by these pil-
grims for conscience sake is awaiting a singer
worthy the theme. Wading the streams
with carts in tow, or in cases of unfordable
THE STORY OF “MORMONISM."
57
streams, stopping to construct rafts; at
times living on reduced rations of but a few
ounces of meal each per day; lying down at
night with a prayer in the heart that they
wake no more on earth, a prayer which
had its fulfillment in hundreds of cases; the
dying heaving their parting sighs in the
arms of loved ones who were so soon to
follow, they journeyed on.
The inevitable catastrophies and accidents
of travel robbed them of their substance.
Hostile savages stampeded their cattle, or
openly attacked and plundered the trains.
But on they went, never swerving from the
course. These later companies needed no
chart nor compass to guide them over the
desert, the road was plain from the marks
of former camps, and yet more so from
the graves of friends and loved ones who
had started before on the road to the earthly
Zion, and found that it led them to the
martyr's entrance to heaven, graves that
were marked perhaps but by a rude inscrip-
tion cut on a pole or a board. And even
these narrow lodgings had not been left
inviolate; the wolves of the plains had too
often succeeded in unearthing and rending
the bodies. Every company thus made
the course the plainer; each of them added
to the silent population of the desert; oft-


58
THE STORY OF “MORMONISM."
times half a score were interred at one camp,
and of one company over a fourth were thus
left beside the prairie road. Now we trav-
erse the self-same track in a day and a night,
reclining on velvet cushions of ease, cover-
ing fifty miles while dining in luxury, and
we avert the ennui of the journey by berat-
ing the railway company for the slow travel.
Relief trains were continually on the way
between the valley of the Salt Lake and
the Missouri; and the remnants of many a
company were saved from what appeared
to be certain destruction by the opportune
arrival of these rescuing parties. And such
relief came from those who were them-
selves destitute and almost starving. Brig-
ham Young with a few of the chief officials
of the Church, and aids, returned eastward
on such an errand of rescue within a few
weeks after reaching the valley. The re-
gion to which the early settlers came was
in no wise a typical land of promise; it did
not flow spontaneously with milk and honey.
Drought and unseasonable frosts made the
first year's farming experiments but doubt-
ful successes, and in the succeeding spring
the land was visited by the devastating
plague of the Rocky Mountain crickets.
They swarmed down in innumerable
hordes upon the fields, destroying the grain
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM.”
59
as they advanced, devouring all before them,
leaving the land a desert in their track.
The people scarcely knew how to withstand
the assault of this new foe; they drove the
marauders into trenches there to be drowned
or burned; men, women and every child that
could swing a stick, were called to the ranks
in this insect war; and with all their fight-
ing, the people forgot not to pray for deliver-
ance, and they fasted, too, for the best of
reasons.
And as they watched, and prayed, and
worked, they saw approaching from the
north and west a veritable host of winged
creatures of more formidable proportions
still; and these bore down upon the fields
as though coming to complete the devasta-
tion. But see! these are of the color that
betokens peace; they are the ocean gulls,
white and beautiful, advancing upon the
hosts of the black destroyers. Falling upon
the people's foes, they devoured them by the
thousand, and when filled to repletion,
disgorged and feasted again. And they did
not stop till the crickets were destroyed.
Again the skeptic will say this was but
chance; but the people accepted that chance
as a providential ruling in their behalf, and
reverently did they give thanks.
To-day the wanton killing of a gull in



60
THE STORY OF “MORMONISM."
Utah is an offense in law; but stronger than
the legal proscription, more powerful than
the fear of judicial penalties, is the popular
sentiment in favor of these white-winged
deliverers. Every year come these grace-
ful creatures to spend the springtime in the
fields and upon the lakes of Utah; and
right well do they feel their welcome, for
they are habitually so tame and fearless
that they may almost be touched by the
hand before they take flight.
By the fall of 1848, five thousand people
had already reached the valley, and the
food problem was a most difficult one.
The winter was severe; and famine, stark
and inexorable, threw its dread shadow over
the people. There seemed to be an entry
in the book of fate that every possible test
of human endurance and integrity should
be applied to this pilgrim band. Without
distinction as to former station, they went
out and dug the roots of weeds, gathered
the tenderest of the coarse grass, thistles,
and wild berries, and thus did they subsist;
upon such did they feast with thanksgiving,
until a less scanty harvest relieved their
wants.
It was at this time that the gold fever was
at its height, a consequence of the discovery
of the precious metal in California, in which
THE STORY OF “MORMONISM.''
61
discovery, indeed, certain members of the
disbanded “Mormon" Battalion, working
their way eastward, were most prominent.
Some of the "Mormon” settlers, becoming
infected with the disease, hastened west-
ward, but the counsel of the Church author-
ities prevailed to keep all but a few at home.
.
They had not left the country of their
birth or adoption to seek gold; nor bright
jewels of the mine; nor the wealth of seas;
nor the spoils of war; they sought, and
believed they had found, a faith's pure
shrine. But the gold-seekers hastening
westward, and the successful miners re-
turning eastward, halted at the “Mormon”
settlements and there replenished their sup-
plies, leaving their gold to enrich the people
of the desert.
But of what use is gold in the wilderness!
The famishing Arab finding a well filled bag
upon the sand rejoices in the thought of
dates-his bread; and is cast into the depths
of despair when he realizes that he has found
nothing but a bag of costly pearls. The
settlers by the lake needed horses and
wagons, tools, implements of husbandry
and building; and gold was valuable only
as it represented a means of obtaining
these. Gold became so plentiful and was
withall so worthless in the desert colony


62
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM."
that men refused to take it for their labor.
The yellow metal was collected in buckets
and exported to the States in exchange for
the goods so much desired. The merchan-
dise brought in by caravans of "prairie
schooners," was sold as fast as it could be
put out; and strict rules were enforced al-
lowing but a proportionate amount to each
purchaser.
Within a few months after the first settle-
ment of Utah, public schools were estab-
lished; and one of the early acts of the
provisional government was to grant a
charter to the Deseret University, now
known as the University of Utah.
Up to 1849, Utah had no political history.
Settling in a Mexican province, the contest
to determine its future ownership by the
United States then in progress, the people
in common with most pioneer communities
established their own form of government.
But in February, 1848, the treaty of Guada-
loupe Hidalgo gave California to the United
States; months passed, however, before the
of the change reached the west.
Early in 1849, a call was issued to "all the
citizens of that portion of Upper California
lying to the east of the Sierra Nevada moun-
tains” to meet in convention at Great Salt
Lake City; and there a petition was pre-
news
THE STORY OF “MORMONISM."
63
pared asking of Congress the rights of self-
government; and pending action, a tempor-
ary regime was established, under the name
of the Provisional Government of the State
of Deseret.
“Utah” was not the choice of the people
as the name of their state; that word served
but to recall the degraded tribes who had
contested the settlement of the valleys.
Deseret, a Book of Mormon name for the
honey bee, was more appropriate. But
their petition was denied in part, and, in
1850 was established the territorial form of
government in Utah.
Concerning the
period of the provisional government, such
men as Gunnison, Stansbury, and other
federal officials on duty in the west, have
recorded their praises of the people in
official reports. But with the un-American
system of territorial government came
troubles.
At first, many of the territorial officials
were appointed from among the settlers
themselves; thus, Brigham Young was the
first governor; but strangers, who knew not
the people nor their ways, filled with preju-
dice from the false reports they had heard,
came to govern the settlers in the desert.
Of the federal appointees thus forced upon



64
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM.”
the people of Utah, many made for them-
selves most unenviable records.
Some of them were broken politicians,
professional office-seekers, with no desire
but to get the greatest possible gains out of
their appointment. With effrontery that
would shock the modesty of a savage, the
non-"Mormon” party adopted and fla-
grantly displayed the carpet-bag as the
badge of their profession. But not all the
officials sent to Utah from afar were of this
type; some of them were honorable and
up-
right men; and amongst this class the
"Mormon” people reckon a number who
were opposed to their principles, but who
nevertheless were sincere and honest in their
opposition.
In the early part of 1857, the published
libels upon the people received many serious
additions, the principal of which was pro-
mulgated in connection with the resigna-
tion of Judge Drummond of the Utah fed-
eral court. In his last letter to the United
States attorney-general, he declared that
his life was no longer safe in Utah, and that
he had been compelled to flee from his bench;
but the most serious charge of all was that
the people had destroyed the records of the
court, and that they had resented, with hos-
tile demonstration, his protests; in short,
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM.
65
that justice was dethroned in Utah, and
that the people were in a state of open re-
bellion.
With mails three months apart, news
traveled slowly; but as soon as word of this
infamous charge reached Salt Lake City,
the clerk of the court, Judge Drummond's
clerk, sent a letter by express to the attor-
ney-general, denying under oath the judge's
statements, and attesting the declaration
with official seal. The records, he declared,
had been untouched except by official hands,
and from the time of the court's establish-
ment the files had been safe, and were then
in his personal keeping. But, before the
clerk's communication had reached its des-
tination, so difficult is it for stately truth to
overtake flitting falsehood, the mischief had
been done. Upon the most prejudiced re-
ports utterly unfounded in fact, with a care-
lessness which even his personal and polit-
ical friends found no ample means of ex-
plaining away, President Buchanan allowed
himself to be persuaded that a "Mormon"
rebellion existed, and ordered an army of
over two thousand men to proceed straight-
way to Utah to subdue the rebels. Suc-
cessors to the governor and other territor-
ial officials were appointed, among whom
there was not a single resident of Utah;


66
THE STORY OF “MORMONISM.''
and the military force was charged
with the duty of installing the foreign ap-
pointees.
With great dispatch and under cover of
secrecy, that the Utah rebels might be
taken by surprise, the army set out on the
march. Before the troops reached the
Rocky Mountains, the sworn statement
,
from the clerk of the supreme court of Utah
denying the charges made by Judge Drum-
mond became public property; and about
the same time men who had come from
Utah to New York direct, published over
their own signatures a declaration that all
was peaceful in and about the settlements
of Utah. The public eye began to twitch,
and soon to open wide; the conviction was
growing that someone had blundered. But
to retract would be a plain confession of
error; blunders must be covered up.
Let us leave the soldiers on their west-
ward march, and ascertain how the news of
the projected invasion reached the people
of Utah, and what effect the tidings pro-
duced. Certain "Mormon” business agents,
operating in Missouri, heard of the hostile
movement. At first they were incredu-
lous, but when the overland mail carrier
from the west delivered his pouch and ob-
tained his receipt, but was refused the bag
THE STORY OF “MORMONISM.'
67

of Utah mail with the postmaster's state-
ment that he had been ordered to hold all
mail for Utah, there seemed no room for
doubt. Two of the Utahns immediately
hastened westward.
On the 24th of July, 1857, the people had
assembled in celebration of Pioneer Day.
Silver Lake, a mountain gem set amidst the
snows and forest and towering peaks of the
Cottonwoods, had been selected for the fes-
tivities. The Stars and Stripes were stream-
ing above the camp; the bands played, the
choirs sang; there were speeches, and pie-
nics, and prayers. Experiences were com-
pared as to the journeyings on the plains;
stories were told of the shifts to which the
people had been put by the vicissitudes of
famine; but these dread experiences seemed
to them now like a dream of the night; on
this day all were happy. Were they not
safe from savage foes both red and white?
There had been peace for a season; and
their desert homes were already smiling in
wealth of flower and tree; the wilderness
was blossoming under their feet; their con-
sciences were void of offense toward their
fellows. Yet at that very hour, all unbe-
known to themselves, and without the op-
portunity of speaking a word in defense,

68
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM.”
these people had been convicted of insur-
rection and treason.
It was mid-day and the festivities were at
their height, when a party of men rode into
camp and sought an interview with Gover-
nor Young. Three of them had plainly
ridden hard and far; they gave their report;
-an armed force of thousands was at that
hour approaching the territory; the boasts
of officers and men as what they would
do when they found themselves in “Mor-
mon” towns were reported; and these
;
stories called up, in the minds of those who
heard, the dread scenes of Far West and
Nauvoo. Had these colonists of the wil-
derness not gone far enough to satisfy
the hate of their fellow-citizens in this re-
public of liberty? They had halted be-
tween the civilization of the east and that
of the west, they had fled from the country
that refused them a home, and now the
nation would eject them from their desert
lodgings.
A council was called and the situation
freely discussed. Had they not seen,
lo, these many times, organized battalions
and companies surpassing fiendish mobs
in villiany? The evidence warranted their
conclusion that invasion meant massacre.
With a calmness that was painful the plan
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM.'
69
-
of action was decided upon. It was the
conviction that war was inevitable, and
it was decided to resist to the last. Then,
if the army forced its way into the valleys
of Utah on hostile purpose bent, it should
find the land as truly a desert as it was
when the pioneers first took possession. To
this effect was the decision: We have built
cities in the east for our foes to occupy; our
very temples have been desecrated and
destroyed by them; but, with the help of
Israel's God, we will prevent them enriching
themselves with the spoils of our labors in
these mountain retreats.
There seemed to be no room for doubt
that war was about to break upon them;
and with such a prospect, men may
pected to take every advantage of their
situation. Brigham Young was still
governor of
Utah, and the militia was subject to his order.
Promptly he proclaimed the territory under
martial law, and forbade any armed body
to cross its boundaries. Echo Canyon, the
one promising means of ingress, was forti-
fied. In those defiles an army might easily
be stopped by a few; ammunition stations
were established; provisions were cached;
boulders were collected upon the cliffs be-
neath which the invaders must pass if they
held to their purpose of forcing an entrance.

be ex-

70
THE STORY OF “MORMONISM."
The people had been roused to desperation,
and force was to be met with force. In the
settlements, combustibles were placed in
readiness, and if the worst came, every
“Mormon” house would be reduced to ashes,
every tree would be hewn down.
With an experience of suffering that
would have well served a better cause, this
picked detachment of the United States
army made its way to the Green River
country; and there, counting well the cost
of proceeding farther, went into camp
at Fort Bridger. Many of the troops had
almost perished in the storms, for it was
late in November, and the winter had closed
in early; many horses had frozen to death.
Colonel Cooke reported to the commandant
that half his horses had perished through
cold and lack of food; hundreds of beef
eattle had died; yet the region was so wild
and forbidding that scarcely a wolf ventured
there to glut itself upon the carcases.
In
Cooke's own words we read that for thirty
miles the road was blocked with carcasses-
and “with abandoned and shattered pro-
perty, they mark, perhaps beyond example
in history, the steps of an advancing army
with the horrors of a disastrous retreat."
With the army traveled the new federal
appointees to offices in the territory. Cum-
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM.”
71

ming, the governor-to-be, issued a proclama-
tion from his dug-out lodgings, and sent it
to Salt Lake City by carrier; he signed it as
“Governor of Utah Territory.” This but
belittled him, for by the very terms of the
Organic Act, to uphold which was the pro-
fessed purpose of his coming, he was not
governor until the oath of office had been
duly subscribed to. A few days later he
went before his fellow-sufferer Eckles, the
appointee for chief justice of Utah, and
took an oath; but why did he swear so
recklessly when the one before whom he
swore was no more an official than himself?
The army wintered at a satisfactory dis-
tance from Salt Lake City, and such a winter,
according to official reports, the soldiers of
our land have rarely had to brave. It was
soon apparent that they need fear no "Mor-
mon” attack; orders had been issued to the
territorial militia to take no life except in
cases of absolute necessity; but General
Johnston and his staff had more than their
match in battling with the elements. Com-
munications between Governor Young and
the commandant were frequent; safe con-
duct was assured any and all officers who
chose to enter the city; and if necessary
hostages were to be given; but the governor
was inexorable in his demand that, as an

72
THE STORY OF “MORMONISM.''
organized body with hostile purpose, the
soldiers should not pass the mountain
gateway. In the meantime, a full account
of the situation was reported by Governor
Young to the President of the United States,
and the truth slowly made its way into the
eastern press. President Buchanan tacitly
admitted his mistake; but to recall the
troops at that juncture would be to confess
humiliating failure.
A peace commissioner, in the person of
Colonel Kane, was dispatched to Salt Lake
City; his coming being made known to Gov-
ernor Young, an escort was sent to meet
him and conduct him through the “Mor-
mon” lines. The result of the conference was
that the "Mormon” leaders but reiterated
their statement that the President's ap-
pointees would be given safe entry to the
city, and be duly installed in their offices,
provided they would enter without the army.
This ultimatum was carried to the fed-
eral camp; and to the open chagrin of
the commandant, Governor Cumming and
his fellow-officials moved to Salt Lake City
under ”Mormon” escort, after a five months'
halt in the wilderness.
I believe that strategy is usually allowed
in war, and I am free to say the "Mormons" '
availed themselves of this license. At
a
THE STORY OF “MORMONISM.''
73
short intervals in the course of the night-
passage through the canyon, the party was
challenged, and the password demanded;
bon-fires were blazing down in the gorges,
and the impression was made that the
mountains were full of armed men; whereas
the sentries were members of the escort,
who, preceding by short cuts the main
party, continued to challenge and to pass.
On their arrival, the gentlemen were met
by the retiring officials, and were pleas-
antly installed. The new governor called
upon the clerk of the court, and ascertained
the truth of the statement that the records
were entirely safe. He promptly reported
his conclusions to General Johnston that
there was no further need for the army. It
was decided, however, that the soldiers
should be permitted to march through the
city, and straightway the “Mormons”
began their exodus to the south.
Governor Cumming tried in vain to in-
duce the people to remain, assuring them
that the troops would commit no depreda-
tions. "Not so," said Brigham Young,
"we have had experience with troops in the
past, Governor Cumming; we have seen our
leaders shot down by the demoralized
soldiery; have seen mothers with babes at
their breasts sent to their last home by the


74
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM.”
same bullet; we have witnessed outrages
beyond description. You are now Governor
of Utah; we can no longer command the
militia for our own defense. We do not
wish to fight, therefore we depart.” Leav-
ing a few men to apply the brand to the
combustibles stored in every house, at the
first sign of plunder by the soldiers, the
people again deserted their homes and
moved into the desert anew.
But the officers of the army kept their
word; the troops were put into camp forty
miles from the settlements, and the settlers
returned. The President's commissioners
brought the official pardon, unsolicited, for
all acts committed by the “Mormons” in
opposing the entrance of the army. The
people asked what they had done that
needed pardon; they had not robbed, they
had not killed. But a critical analysis of
these troublous events revealed at least one
overt act some “Mormon” scouts had
challenged a supply train; and, being op-
posed, they had destroyed some of the
wagons and provisions; and for this they
accepted the President's most gracious
pardon.
V.

After all, the “Mormon” people regard
the advent of the Buchanan army as one
of the greatest material blessings ever
brought to them.
The troops, once in Utah, had to be pro-
visioned; and everything the settlers could
spare was eagerly bought at an unusual
price. The gold changed hands. Then,
in their hasty departure, the army disposed
of everything outside of actual necessities
in the way of accoutrements and camp
equipage. The army found the people in
poverty, and left them in comparative
wealth.
And what was the cause of this hurried
departure of the military? For many
months, ominous rumblings had been heard,
-indications of the gathering storm which
was soon to break in the awful fury of civil
strife. It could not be doubted that war was
imminent; already the conflict had begun,
and a picked part of the army was away in
the western wilds, doing nothing for any
phase of the public good. But a word further
concerning the expedition in general. The

76
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM.”'
sending of troops to Utah was part of a
foul scheme to weaken the government in
its impending struggle with the secession-
ists. The movement has been called not
inaptly “Buchanan's blunder,” but the best
and wisest men may make blunders, and
whatever may be said of President Buchan-
an's short-sightedness in taking this step,
even his enemies do not question his integ-
rity in the matter. He was unjustly
charged with favoring secession; but the
charge was soon disproved.
However, it was known that certain of his
cabinet were in league with the seceding
states; and prominent among them was
John Floyd, secretary of war. The suc-
cessful efforts of this recreant officer to dis-
arm the North, while accumulating the
munitions of war in the South; to scatter
the forces by locating them in widely sep-
arated and remote stations; and in other
ways to dispose of the regular army in the
manner best calculated to favor the antici-
pated rebellion, are matters of history. It
is also told how, at the commencement of
the rebellion, he allied himself with the con-
federate forces, accepting the rank of brig-
adier-general. It was through Floyd's ad-
vice that Buchanan ordered the military
expedition to Utah, ostensibly to instal
THE STORY OF “MORMONISM."
77
certain federal officials and to repress an
alleged infantile rebellion which in fact had
never come into existence, but in reality to
further the interests of the secessionists.
When the history of that great struggle
with its antecedent and its consequent
circumstances is written with a pen that
shall indite naught but truth, when preju-
dice and partisianship are lived down, it
may appear that Jefferson Davis rather
than James Buchanan was the prime cause
of the great mistake.
* And General Johnston who commanded
the army in the west; he who was so vehe-
ment in his denunciation of the rebel “Mor-
mons," and who rejoiced in being selected
to chastise them into submission; who, be-
cause of his vindictiveness incurred the ill-
favor of the governor, whose posse comitatus
the army was; what became of him, at one
time so popular that he was spoken of as
a likely successor to Winfield Scott in the
office of general-in-chief of the United
States army? He left Utah in the early
stages of the rebellion, turned his arms
against the flag he had sworn to defend,
doffed the blue, donned the grey, and fell a
,
rebel on the fleld of Shiloh.
Changes many and great followed in be-
wildering succession in Utah. The people


"

78
THE STORY OF “MORMONISM."
were besought to take sides with the South
in the awful scenes of cruel strife; it was
openly stated in the East that Utah had
allied herself with the cause of secession;
and by others that the design was to make
Salt Lake City the capital of an independ-
ent government. And surely such conjec-
tures were pardonable on the part of
all whose ignorance and prejudice still
nursed the delusion of “Mormon” disloyalty.
Moreover, had the people been inclined to
rebellion what greater opportunity could
they have wished? Already a North and a
a
South were talked of—why not set up also
a West? A supreme opportunity had come
and how was it used? It was at this very
time that the Overland Telegraph line,
which had been approaching from the At-
lantic and the Pacific, was completed, and
the first tremor felt in that nerve of steel
carried these words from Brigham Young:
Utah has not seceded, but is firm for the con-
stitution and laws of our country.
The “Mormon" people saw in their terrible
experiences, and the outrages to which they
had been subjected, only the mal-adminis-
tration of laws and the subversion of justice
through human incapacity and hate. Never
even for a moment did they question the
THE STORY OF “MORMONISM.'
79

supreme authority, and the inspired origin
of the constitution of their land. They knew
no North, no South, no East, no West; they
stood positively by the constitution, and
would have nothing to do in the bloody
strife between brothers, unless indeed they
were summoned by the authority to which
they had already once loyally responded, to
furnish men and arms for their country's
good.
Following the advent of the telegraph
came the railway; and the land of “Mormon-
dom” was no longer isolated. Her re-
sources were developed, her wealth became
a topic of the world's wonder; the tide of
immigration swelled her population, con-
tributing much of the best from all the civ-
ilized nations of the earth. Every reader
of recent and current history has learned of
her rapid growth; of her repeated appeals
for the recognition to which she had so long
been entitled in the sisterhood of states; of
the prompt refusals with which her pleas
were persistently met, though other terri-
tories with smaller and more illiterate pop-
ulations, more restricted resources, and in
every way weaker claims, were allowed to
assume the habilments of maturity, while
Utah, lusty, large and strong, was kept in
swadling clothes. But the cries of the

80
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM."
vigorous infant were at length heeded, and
in answer to the seventh appeal of the kind,
Utah's star was added to the nation's
galaxy.
But let us turn more particularly to the
history of the Church itself. For a second
time and then for a third, the Church of
Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was de-
prived of its president, and on each occasion
were reiterated the prophecies of disruption
uttered at the time of Joseph Smith's assass-
ination. Calm observers declared that as
the shepherd had gone, the flock would soon
be dispersed; while others, comparable
only to wolves, thinking the fold unguarded,
sought to harry and scatter the sheep;
but "Mormonism” died not; every added
pang of grief served but to unite the people.
When Brigham Young passed from earth,
he was mourned of the people as deeply as
was Moses of Israel. And had he not proved
himself a Moses, aye and a Joshua, too?
He led the people into the land of holy
promise, and had divided unto them their
inheritances. He was a man with clear
title as one of the small brotherhood we call
great. As carpenter, farmer, pioneer, cap-
italist, financier, preacher, apostle, prophet
in everything he was a leader among
Even those who opposed him in
men.
THE STORY OF “MORMONISM."
81
politics and in religion respected him for
his talents, his magnanimity, his liberality,
and his manliness; and years after his
demise, men who had refused him honor
while alive, brought their mites and their
greater sums to erect a monument of stone
and bronze to the memory of this man who
needs it not. With his death closed another
epoch in the history of his people, and a suc-
cessor arose, one who was capable of leading
and judging under the changed conditions.

But perhaps I am suspected of having
forgotten or of having intentionally omit-
ted reference to what popular belief once
considered the chief feature of “Mormon-
ism,” the corner-stone of the structure, the
secret of its influence over its members, and
of its attractiveness to its proselytes, viz.,
the peculiarity of the "Mormon” institution
of marriage. The Latter-day Saints were
long regarded as a polygamous people.
That plural marriage has been practiced by
a limited proportion of the people, under
sanction of Church ordinance, has never
since the introduction of the system been
denied. But that plural marriage is a vital
tenet of the Church is not true. What the
Latter-day Saints call celestial marriage is


82
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM."
characteristic of the Church, and is in very
general practice; but of celestial marriage,
plurality of wives was an incident, never an
essential. Yet the two have never been
segregated in the popular mind. We be-
lieve in a literal resurrection and an actual
hereafter, in which future state will be re-
cognized every sanctified and authorized
relationship existing here on earth-of
parent and child, brother and sister, hus-
band and wife. We believe, further, that
contracts as of marriage, to be valid beyond
the vail of mortality must be sanctioned by
a power greater than that of earth. With
the seal of the holy Priesthood upon their
wedded state, these people believe implicitly
in the perpetuity of that relationship on
the far side of the grave. They marry not
with the saddening limitation “Until death
do you part,” but “For time and for all
eternity.” This constitutes celestial mar-
'
riage. The thought that polygamy has ever
been the head and front of “Mormon” of-
fending, that to it is traceable as the true
cause the hatred of other sects and the un-
popularity of the Church, is not tenable to
the earnest thinker. Sad as have been the
experiences of the people in consequence of
this practice, deep and anguish-laden as
have been the sighs and groans, hot and
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM.'
83
bitter as have been the tears so caused, the
heaviest persecution, the cruelest treatment
of their history began before plural mar-
riage was known in the Church. There is
no sect nor people that sets a higher value on
virtue and chastity than do the Latter-day
Saints, nor a people that visits surer retribu-
tion upon the heads of offenders against the
laws of sexual purity. To them marriage is
not, can never be, a civil compact alone;
its significance reaches beyond mortality;
its obligations are eternal; and the Latter-
day Saints are notable for the sanctity with
which they invest the marital state. It has
been my privilege to tread the soil of many
lands, to observe the customs and study the
habits of more nations than one; and I have
yet to find the place and hear the people,
where and with whom the purity of man
and woman is held more precious than
among the maligned “Mormons” in the
mountain valleys of the west. There I find
this measure of just equality of the sexes
that the sins of man shall not be visited
upon the head of woman.
At the inception of polygamy among the
Latter-day Saints, there was no law,
national or state, against its practice. This
statement assumes, as granted, a distinc-
tion between bigamy and the "Mormon”


84
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM."
institution. In 1862, a law was enacted
with the purpose of suppressing polygamy;
and, as had been predicted in the national
Senate prior to its passage, it lay for many
years a dead letter. Federal judges and
United States attorneys in Utah, who were
not “Mormons” nor lovers of “Mormonism,”
refused to entertain complaints or prose-
cute cases under the law, because of its mani-
fest injustice and inadequacy.
But other laws followed, most of which,
as the Latter-day Saints believe, were aimed
directly at their religious conception of the
marriage contract, and not at social impro-
priety nor sexual offense.
At last the Edmunds-Tucker law took
effect, making not the marriage alone but
the subsequent acknowledging of the con-
tract an offense punishable by fine or im-
prisonment or both. Under the spell of
unrighteous zeal, the federal judicary of
Utah announced and practiced that most
infamous doctrine of segregation of offenses
with accumulating penalties.
I who write have listened to judges
instructing grand juries in such terms as
these: that although the law of Congress
designated as an offense the acknowledging
of more living wives than one by any man,
and prescribed a penalty therefor, as Con-
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM."
85
a
gress had not specified the length of time
during which this unlawful acknowledging
must continue to constitute the offense,
grand juries might indict separately for
every day of the period during which the
forbidden relationship existed. This meant
that for an alleged misdemeanor-for which
Congress prescribed a maximum penalty of
six months' imprisonment and a fine of three
hundred dollars-a man might be impris-
oned for life, aye, for many terms of a man's
a
natural life did the court's power to en-
force its sentences extend so far, and might
be fined millions of dollars. Before this
travesty on the administration of law
could be brought before the court of last re-
sort, and there meet with the reversal and
rebuke it deserved, men were imprisoned
under sentences of many years duration.
The people contested these measures one
by one in the courts; presenting in case after
case the different phases of the subject, and
urging the unconstitutionality of the meas-
Then the Church was disincorporated,
and its property both real and personal confis-
cated and escheated to the government of
the United States; and although the per-
sonal property was soon restored, real es-
tate of great value long lay in the hands
of the court's receiver, and the “Mormon”


ure.

86
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM."
Church had to pay the government high
rental on its own property. But the peo-
ple have suspended the practice of poly-
gamy; and the testimony of the governors,
judges, and district attorneys of the terri-
tory, and later that of the officers of the
state, have declared the sincerity of the
renunciation.
As the people had adopted the practice
under what was believed to be divine
approval, they suspended it when they
were justified in so doing. In whatever
light this practice has been regarded in the
past, it is to-day a dead issue, forbidden by
ecclesiastical rule as it is prohibited by
legal statute. And the world is learning,
to its manifest surprise, that polygamy and
"Mormonism” are not synonymous terms.
And so the story of “Mormonism” runs
on; its finale has not yet been written; the
current press presents continuously new
stages of its progress, new developments of
its plan. To-day the Church of Jesus
Christ of Latter-day Saints is stronger than
ever before; and the people are confident
that it is at its weakest stage for all time to
It lives and thrives because within
come.
THE STORY OF "MORMONISM."
87
it are the elements of thrift and the forces
of life. It embraces a boundless liberality
of belief and practice; true toleration is
one of its essential features; it makes love
for mankind second only to love for Deity.
Its creed provides for the protection of
all men in their rights of worship according
to the dictates of conscience. It contem-
plates a millennium of peace, when every
man shall love and respect his neighbor's
opinion as he regards himself and his own-
a day when the voice of the people shall be
in unison with the voice of God.


BOUND
DEC13 1946
UNIV. OF MICH.
LIBRARY
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
3 9015 06437 1191