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The 1857 Utah War

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Re: The 1857 Utah War

#11

Is this really "forgotten"? Forgotten by whom? I thought this was part of LDS mythology surrounding the settlement of the Utah territory and was fairly well known. I remember reading about the war in college, and it is definitely part of any history of Buchanan's presidency.

I'm 47 years old, decently educated, and can honestly say I'd never heard of this war and thought this was a great read.

Granted, it's quite possible I was taught about this in some very dry history class in high school while I was barely paying attention to the teacher. But I think it's safe to say this isn't a war that comes up often in popular discourse of US history.

Re: The 1857 Utah War

#13

Is this really "forgotten"? Forgotten by whom? I thought this was part of LDS mythology surrounding the settlement of the Utah territory and was fairly well known. I remember reading about the war in college, and it is definitely part of any history of Buchanan's presidency.

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Re: The 1857 Utah War

#15
There's a historical marker in Echo Canyon about this. It says, essentially, that the army was sent because they thought Utah was in rebellion, but Utah was not actually in rebellion, and therefore it was not right/legal to send the army, and therefore it was legitimate for Utah to resist the army. (It's in Utah, so no surprise, the historical marker is a Mormon-view spin on what happened.)

So, wait, let me make sure I've got this right. It's legitimate for you to fight the US army because you're not in rebellion? Um, hello? The moment you start fighting them, you're in armed rebellion!

Re: The 1857 Utah War

#16
post #2

The article is an interesting take on the time period For one example, I think Porter Rockwell is less considered a lawman, and more of a hitman or enforcer. He's suspected of having a body count somewhere in the 150 range edit: It also completely leaves out the entire Mountain Meadows Massacre incident, where Mormons slaughtered around 120 men women and children in a wagon train headed to California in September of…

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Re: The 1857 Utah War

#18
I find Mormons to be truly remarkable people. We visited Salt Lake City recently, and headed out to the Great Salt Lake. Brigham Young wasn’t kidding about “land nobody wants!” There’s almost nothing there, except swarms of flies. (I have no idea what they eat in the middle of the desert. As an aside, my wife’s family apparently went through Utah on the way to Oregon in the wagon train days. They noped the f—k out of there.) But these Mormons built civilization, a lovely society, in the middle of nowhere.

Re: The 1857 Utah War

#19

This is a Mormon-biased spin on the history.

This was left out of the story:

> At the height of the tensions, on September 11, 1857, at least 120 California-bound settlers from Arkansas, Missouri and other states, including unarmed men, women and children, were killed in remote southwestern Utah by a group of local Mormon militia. They first claimed that the migrants were killed by Natives but it was proven otherwise. This event was later called the Mountain Meadows Massacre and the motives behind the incident remain unclear.

> The Aiken massacre took place the following month. In October 1857, Mormons arrested six Californians traveling through Utah and charged them with being spies for the U.S. Army. They were released but were later murdered and robbed of their stock and $25,000.

> Other incidents of violence have also been linked to the Utah War, including a Native American attack on the Mormon mission of Fort Lemhi in eastern Oregon Territory, modern-day Idaho. They killed two Mormons and wounded several others. The historian Brigham Madsen notes, "[T]he responsibility for the [Fort Limhi raid] lay mainly with the Bannock." David Bigler concludes that the raid was probably caused by members of the Utah Expedition who were trying to replenish their stores of livestock that had been stolen by Mormon raiders.

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utah_War#Overview

Re: The 1857 Utah War

#20

Quoted post unavailable.

I wasn't sure why you were being downvoted so I googled "utah population" and "utah mormon church member count".

2.2M divided by 3.2M --> 70%

LDS seems to at least be a dominating factor in that state.

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