The Mountain Meadows massacre (includes exclusive chapter)

Nevada in general, and Las Vegas in particular, might look entirely different today - if not for Mormon fears and actions in 1857.

Quintus Hopper of Nevada, published in January 2022, is a historical novel that follows the epic and peculiar life of a frontier newspaper typesetter. As part of my research I made extensive use of newspaper archives and, in this series, I’ll share some of my often surprising findings. Here are history, commentaries and contemporary newspaper articles as they relate to my latest novel. This time, a look at the horrific Mountain Meadows massacre.

The Mountain Meadows massacre ended up not making into the final draft of the novel - but it still pertinent in showing how the white population, in this case Mormons (who played a significant part in the history of Nevada before it became a territory in its own right), used American Indians for their nefarious purposes. Come to think of it, I may eventually republish the novel as an extended edition - I’m just hesitating because it would have the wordcount of Moby-Dick. Well, all of that’s for another day - on with the story!

The timing for the Baker-Fancher emigrant wagon train, on their way to California through Mormon territory, couldn’t have been worse. In Utah, the church was the law – and every attempt by the United States to make Utah a proper part of the Union, was ignored by Mormons in general, and by Brigham Young in particular. Washington was also increasingly unnerved about Mormons’ continued practice of polygamy. In 1857 President James Buchanan sent the army to Utah.

Mormons, who had been persecuted before, saw the sending of troops as an act of open aggression. This time they would not be beaten, this time they would not be mobbed and cursed and driven away once again. This time they would defend themselves against the Americans. By September of 1857, Mormons were in a state of fear and fury, had grain and weapons stockpiled, and were eager to stand their ground once and for all.

The movement of Mormons in 1857, from the many settlements back to Salt Lake City, had a sizeable impact on history of Nevada – and thus on the novel. When Quintus arrives on the Nevada side of the Sierra Nevada mountains at a place called Genoa, a place previously known as ‘Mormon Station’, the balance of power has shifted. While some Mormons are still there in Carson Valley, many have heeded Brigham Young’s call. The new balance eventually led to the creation of the Nevada Territory – a stepping stone to statehood. Equally, the departure of the Mormons from their settlement at the Las Vegas oasis, opened the door to non-Mormons taking possession. Nevada in general, and Las Vegas in particular, might look entirely different today, if not for Brigham Young’s call to action that led to the return of many to the Mormon heartland.

After the Mountain Meadows massacre, Mormons spread the news that it had been perpetrated by the Indians – but, as the below article in the Daily Alta California shows, even then there were those questioning the story of the Mormons. In fact, the massacre was executed by Mormon settlers. ‘Executed’ is the right word. Mormons disguised themselves as Indians, and asked/forced Southern Paiute Indians to ride along.

After a siege of several days, Mormons – by then undisguised – approached the circled wagon train with a white flag and offered to lead the settlers securely away from the ‘dangerous Indians’. They said they had been able to negotiate with the Indians, but that the settlers needed to leave their arms and all possessions behind.

Then they led the settlers, each one accompanied by an armed Mormon, away. When the signal was given, they shot and killed all adults and older children (one hundred and twenty in total). They only spared seventeen children under the age of seven, as they would not be able to tell the story. The many possessions of the murdered settlers were distributed amongst the Mormons, and the surviving children were brought up in Mormon families.

October 12, 1857

Daily Alta California, San Francisco

MASSACRE OF EMIGRANTS

Since the 1st inst., we have been receiving accounts of diabolical massacres upon the emigrant trail from Salt Lake. These accounts are still vague, and should be received with allowance for exaggeration or prejudice. The latest account states that a train of twenty-five families embracing more than a hundred persons, were massacred at the Vegas of the Santa Clara, about one hundred miles this side of the last Mormon settlement. Those who are known to have escaped are children, 10 or 12 in number, who are too small to give any account of the scene, and who were picked up near the spot and brought into San Bernardino by some parties who passed the spot afterwards.

The last report states that those immigrants were all from Arkansas and Missouri. They had been troubled by the Indians, who frequented their camps in great numbers; and they resolved to get rid of them. An ox was killed and strychnine put into the meat, which was left where the Indians would find it. It is also said that they poisoned the water, and that several Indians, among them several chiefs, died from the effects of the poison. The Indians were greatly enraged and followed the train several days, watching for an opportunity to avenge themselves. At the Vegas, where there is a good deal of thick brush, they came up with the train in large numbers, and their hostile attitude impelled the emigrants to make a stockade of their wagons for self-defense. They were cut off from water, and the only supply they received for themselves and animals was brought in by the little girls, who alone were permitted by the Indians to go out and fetch it. At the end of three days the little girls became so worn out by constant labor as to be obliged to desist. A man was then sent with a flag, but he was immediately shot, and the attack commenced The Indians did not cease until every person except the children was killed. This was done with comparative ease, as the siege and privations they had endured had weakened and dispirited them.

It is further said that the Indians took the animals and wagons, together with a large number of children, and returned back to the Mormon settlements to sell them, and that this account is derived from the Indians themselves, who reported the reason for, and manner of, the slaughter, on their arrival at the settlements.

This is the Mormon account of this horrible butchery. It was brought in by the mail rider, and also by some gentlemen who saw the bodies lying upon the ground. It may be as asserted, but there are many who do not believe it, and they charge the Mormons with the crime, or at least instigating it. It is well known that all the Indians in the Territory are baptized “Saints,” and that the chiefs have taken an oath to “obey council.” They are allies of the church, ready to act in its defense. The mail rider says that were he to deny that he is a Mormon, his life would not be worth defending, and that those Indians are instructed to kill all who oppose the church. I have been told by men from Salt Lake that on their recent visit to the Mormon settlements, Young saw many of the chiefs of tribes, and exchanged pledges of mutual assistance and defiance to the United States Government. In his contest with the government, if he stands out for a fight, he counts on those Indians as messengers of divine wrath to exterminate the ungodly.

We shudder at such wholesale butchery, and are almost incapable of expressing the sentiments that animate us. But we were prepared to expect such deeds, and more of them, because everyone who comes from Salt Lake repeats the imprecations that are breathed out against those are under the ban. A large portion of our new population for a year past are of those who have fled from Salt Lake, and almost every one of them has a tale of escapes from the pursuing Indians or angels. How long shall these murdering bands infest the highways of the nation? For years it has been asserted that it was not safe to travel over that uninhabited country, and that the danger was no more from Indian than Mormon vengeance. And there is no more protection today than there was when the first murder was committed.

Here an exclusive chapter I had planned to use in connection with the Mountain Meadows massacre. A mystical moment of Owl Woman at the site of the massacre - and meeting there with the legendary Coyote. The chapter did find its way into the final novel, in altered form, in connection with the Mud Lake massacre (entirely misnamed in Wikipedia as ‘battle’ at Mud Lake):

Owl Woman wept. She allowed the tears, and the shivers that ran through her. The high grass gently played around her knees and here and there sagebrush grew in thick bushes no more than waist-high. Wide open terrain, surrounded by ridges of rolling hills. No place to hide. The perfect place for a massacre.

There was no one near, because no one wanted to be near. This was now a place of death and sorrow. Taking one slow step after another, the old woman felt, and saw, and even heard the faint echoes of rifle volleys and piercing screams. It had been two weeks since the Mountain Meadows massacre. Owl Woman felt the agony in the earth, saw the blood on the grass und bushels of women’s hair caught in the sage. One hundred and twenty had lost their lives where she stood. White men, white women, white children.

The old woman sighed as she sat down in the high grass. She closed her eyes and listened to the stories told by the grass and the soil. As she sat there, unmoving, a kit fox slunk through the grass. He sat down next to the old woman and told her what he knew. After the fox there came the badger, and after the badger there followed the chipmunk. Then a mountain cottontail peered from her hole and came to sit next to Owl Woman. She gave the rabbit a nod and the rabbit told her that she had been afraid to look – but she had heard everything, the screams, the rifle and pistol shots, the Bowie knives, slashing, the weeping, the begging, the stillness that followed. In time they were joined by a jumping mouse and this one jumped onto Owl Woman’s knee and told her what he had seen and heard from the men when all was done. Both animals vanished in a flash when a coyote came trotting along.

He sat, and said nothing.

“They are blaming it on my people,” Owl Woman said.

“Not every trickery succeeds,” Coyote mused.

“You know what happened?”

“It is of no concern to me.”

“Sometimes I wish I would not care the way you do not care,” Owl Woman said. Then her voice darkened. “But I do – and you should, too.”

Coyote smiled.

“All right then, Owl Woman, tell me.”

Owl Woman pushed herself off the ground and clambered to stand. When she spoke, she saw what she spoke and all around her the wind and the dust showed what had been.

“It was the Mormons,” she said, the words hard and dry, as if a ravenous bobcat were tearing at her throat. “Painted like Paiutes, and using some of them to aid in their treachery.” She pointed to large fading circle a stone’s throw away. “The settlers circled their wagons over there, built trenches. They held out for five days. Starving. Dying of thirst. Burying their dead in the middle of the circle. When the Mormons became fearful that their disguise had been noticed, they decided to leave none alive. They rode off as Indians, and they returned as whites, a white flag held high.”

“A clever ruse,” Coyote said approvingly.

“Whose side are you on?” Owl Woman asked angrily.

“Mine, of course,” Coyote said. “Then what happened?”

“The Mormons pretended to have just arrived and that they had spoken to the Indian attackers. That the Indians would let them go, on foot, but that they had to leave everything behind. All the weapons, all their belongings, wagons, horses, cattle, everything.”

“And I bet the Mormons kept the loot for themselves, right?”

“They did,” the old woman said, increasingly annoyed with Coyote who seemed to enjoy the story. “But not before marching the settlers, all of them, out in single file. They said they would protect them from the Indians. Armed Mormon militia members walked next to them – and when the signal came, they turned and shot all the men. Women and children were screaming and trying to get away. They were picked off one by one, until one hundred and twenty lay dead. It happened here, all around us,” Owl Woman added as she angrily wiped away her tears.

“They spared seventeen little ones, those too young to identify them. And now I hear they’re busy covering it all up. They buried the bodies, they sold the settlers’ property, and up and down the trail they’re telling falsehoods about the settlers poisoning Indians and the Indians out for revenge. It’s one giant-sized lie after another and there you have your story. I hope you like it!”

Coyote said nothing for a long time. He rose and walked in widening circles around the old woman, sniffing the grass here, and pawing the ground there. When he came to stand next to the old woman again, he answered.

“No, I do not like your story … White man is full of tricks, but there is no joy in his tricks. His deceit is as cold as the death he leaves in his wake.”

“Will you help the tribes in the years to come?”

“They have you, Owl Woman. I have other things to do.”

Owl Woman turned to face Coyote. He seemed to have grown and they stood eye to eye. His eyes were yellow pools in the evening sun. These were the world’s eyes of eternal mischief, of laughter, of song and dance. She remembered being caught in those eyes, feeling the warmth of family emanating from them … there was no warmth and no mischief in them now. Swirls of black consumed the yellow that had been. Coyote looked to the sky. He asked for rain and in a moment the downpour washed across the Mountain Meadows plain.

“This place, it will be a good place once more,” Coyote said when he finally spoke again. “It will soon be washed clean of the evil that still lingers. For the Mormons who have done this, there will be no rain. Their evil will stain them to their death, and death will deliver them into eternal darkness … and in that darkness, I will be waiting for them.”