It was a rather one-sided gun battle: hundreds of fully armed militiamen launched an unprovoked attack again four men armed with two pistols and a couple of sticks. It hardly deserves the grand title of "gun battle."
From the article: The mob pushed their rifles through the partially opened door and the prophet Joseph Smith aimed and began firing a six-shooter pistol, but only three barrels fired. The mob fired back.
Yup. "The mob fired back." (Ya better believe that ANY prisoner in ANY jail with a loaded weapon is likely to be fired upon!!!)
Nope. The mob did not "fire back." The mob was already firing and had, in fact, killed his brother Hyrum. It was Joseph Smith who "fired back."
Your observation about an armed prisoner being fired upon is beside the point. The mob did not murder Joseph and Hyrum Smith because the prisoners had loaded weapons; I doubt any of the murderers even knew that.
No, the mob came to the jail with the intent to lynch the Smiths and their companions, and would have done so had the prisoners been unarmed. And indeed, the mob also shot John Taylor, who had no weapon but his walking stick.
so...he kind of died like Che????
Well, first of all, that's actually coming a long way for a Mormon just to admit a gun-battle happened at all. To read normal Lds accounts, or to be in Nauvoo where the Mormons give accounts of what happened to tourists, you'd never ever hear the words "gun battle." I mean, how white washed is that of history?
Secondly, "hundreds of militiamen" were indeed present outside the jail -- but hundreds didn't storm the jail. [That's a bit overkill of a descriptor on your part]
Nope. The mob did not "fire back." The mob was already firing and had, in fact, killed his brother Hyrum. It was Joseph Smith who "fired back." Your observation about an armed prisoner being fired upon is beside the point. The mob did not murder Joseph and Hyrum Smith because the prisoners had loaded weapons; I doubt any of the murderers even knew that. No, the mob came to the jail with the intent to lynch the Smiths and their companions, and would have done so had the prisoners been unarmed.
Logo, you can't even get your own story straight...first you indicate they came in w/blazing rifles, shooting Hyrum & then the others. Then you say the mob wasn't intent upon shooting anyone (lynching somebody instead). Which is it? (Or were they planning on lynching somebody with a rifle or two?)
Even if they were intent upon lynching them, and saw one of them with his six-shooter in hand, then, of course, they'd open fire.
And as, for Joseph Smith, yes, they fired back at him -- it appears he got a couple of shots off at 2-3 before they shot anything at him. That would indeed make it relevant that Smith was an armed prisoner -- another little "nugget" often missing from Lds history recounts & tourist presentations.
You can see the Mormon agenda often by what they deliberately leave out of the discussion.
What's "untold" is what the Lds tour guides seem to always leave out @ the Carthage Jail. He says he's been through the tour several times since the 1980s -- and not once do the guides EVER volunteer that the Smith brothers had smuggled guns brought into them by visitor Cyrus Wheelock (J. Smith had a six-shooter; H. Smith had a derringer).
McKeever talks about how on his first tour of the Carthage Jail, Elder Salt (of all names) gave this dramatic story and three times emphasized that the "only defense" the four Mormons had was to block the door with their bodies and fight off the attackers with their walking sticks. (McKeever says indeed, they blocked the door with their bodies & indeed, John Taylor had a walking stick, but "only defense?")
When McKeever asked about the smuggled guns, the tour guide first tried to deflect the question about how "you can't believe everything you read" -- but when McKeever pointed out that the book was the Lds Documentary History of the Church and that the statement came from later-to-be Lds "prophet" Taylor -- the guide could only look at the floor with great chagrin.
According to Taylor's account -- as recounted by McKeever -- Hyrum Smith took a bullet through the door...Lds historian Richard Bushman (p. 550) of his bio of Smith says Hyrum Smith was shot through his left nose...and BTW a bullet through the brain isn't going to result in the Mormon folk tale response from Hyrum where, upon being shot, he was somehow able to utter, "I am a dead man."
Joseph Smith then reacts by pulling his gun out of his pocket, opens the door and attempts to unload all 6 shots -- 3 misfire, he shoots 3 and kills 2. He then leaps up on the window ledge to try to cry the Masonic signal for help ("Oh lord my God, is there no help for the widow's son?") -- but falls in a hail of bullets -- at least one from the door & at least one from the windows outside...hit 4 times he dies...only being able to get out the initial part of the Masonic distress signal, "Oh lord my God..."
McKeever points out that this is a big difference -- someone screaming a distress signal trusting in a fellow Mason to rescue him -- than the film that romanticizes the death of Smith shown at the Joseph Smith Memorial Building, where they have him utter this phrase as the camera pans upward and into the blue sky -- as if it was a direct greeting to God.
How 'unknowing' is one when a PISTOL is stuck out the door and fired in YOUR direction?
If they justify the murders at Carthage and Hawn’s mill, they have to call the murders at Mountain Meadows justified. You can’t have it both ways.