MOUNTAIN MEADOWS MASSACRE, Chapter 8 of Blood Atonement by
OGDEN KRAUT

MOUNTAIN MEADOWS MASSACRE, Chapter 8 of     Blood Atonement by
OGDEN KRAUT

Page 95.

I fear, and I regret to say it, that with certain parties here there is a greater anxiety to connect Brigham Young and other church dignitaries with every criminal offense, than diligent endeavor to punish the actual perpetrators of crime. (Bancrofts History of Utah, p. 56; statement made by Jacob Forney, Supt. of Indian Affairs)

One of the most pathetic incidents in the history of the Utah Territory occurred in the fall of 1857 near Cedar City, Utah. It was an atrocious act of violence known as the Mountain Meadows Massacre. Anti-Mormons and apostates have sent world-wide a billowing mass of pages on this incident in their effort to destroy Mormonism or cast aspersion upon its doctrines. In their determination they have sometimes written the most absurd and wild fantasies imaginable. B.H. Roberts in his History of the Church wrote:

Anti-“Mormon” writers have been determined to fasten the crime upon the Church of the Latter Day Saints, or at least upon her leaders; and also, as a rule, holding that in some way “Mormon” doctrine and “Mormon” church policy was responsible for the crime. On the other hand, church people who in all good conscience, and justly, resent this imputation against their church and its leaders, have been naturally slow to admit all the facts that history may insist upon as inevitable. (C.H.C. 4:139)