Posted on 07/14/2011 2:54:04 PM PDT by Colofornian
ROGERS, Ark. -- For more than 150 years, an important piece of Arkansas and American history has been relegated to obscurity.
In early 1857, a wagon train left Northwest Arkansas and headed west, bound for California.
The Francher-Baker train was made up of 14 large Arkansas families, about 800 cattle and around 30 wagons.
"They were en route to California for a better life and little did they know that Brigham Young had declared war on the United States two weeks before they entered the Salt Lake Valley," said Phil Bolinger, with the Mountain Meadows Monument Foundation.
So without knowing tensions were running high between the U.S. government and Brigham Young, the leader of the Chuch of Latter-Day Saints (also known as the Mormon Church), the families decided to camp in southwest Utah, in a place called Mountain Meadows.
For most of the families, it would be their final resting place.
"They were attacked by a few indians, but mainly Mormon militia men," Bolinger said.
"Under one order -- the order was 'do your duty' -- each man killed his man, in other words, point-blank, execution-style murder. And then the women and children weren't so lucky. They were mainly bludgeoned to death with rocks or gun stocks," Bolinger said.
On September 11, 1857, 121 men, women and children were murdered. Only 17 small children, all under the age of 6, were spared. Two years later, the orphans were reunited with relatives in Arkansas.
"Everyone who lived in Northwest Arkansas at that time, had some blood relatives that were members of this wagon train," said Scott Fancher, a descendant who has 27 relatives who died that day.
For years the Mormon church denied allegations of involvement and blamed local Native Americans for the slaughter.
Descedents of the victims have always wanted the church to own up and have wanted to get federal protection for the massacre site.
In the last 10 years, there has been movies and media coverage and trips to washington to fight for the site of the massacre to become a national historic landmark, and on July 2, it did.
"Finally we have some serious, bonafied, high order federal protection for the site to protect it from development or encroachment. We also have the recognition of the site as a nationally significant historic site," Fancher said.
Francher and Bolinger say the massacre was America's first 9/11.
"Interestingly enough, it was also an act of religious extremism, and that's another sort of eerie parallel between that and are more recent 9/11. But in both cases, religious extremists did basically horrible things to basically innocent people," Fancher said.
But in this case, more than a hundred years later, both sides have been able to reconcile.
"We're 150 years-plus into this story, and it's taken that long for the players to kind of meet in the middle and agree to be civil and both agree we won't get everything that we want but we get something better for everyone that's involved," Fancher said.
The national landmark dedication ceremony will be held in Utah at the site of the Mountain Meadows massacre on September 11.
They executed 7 yo twins Magaret and Sara Fancher for "survival" reasons?
How much of a threat were they, anyway?
How about 7 yo Mary Lavina Baker...shot dead by Mormons...killed for a "survival" purpose, too?
Or what about 9 yo James William Miller...shot dead by Mormons...."survival" reason also?
How about those Fancher twin girls' brother, 10-yo brother, Martin...shot dead by Mormons. Survival demanded his death, too?
Or his 14 yo brother, Thomas...shot dead by Mormons.
Or his 15 yo sister, Mary...shot dead by Mormons.
Or his 17 yo brother, William...shot dead by Mormons.
Or his 19 yo brother, Hampton...shot dead by Mormons.
Or 16 yo Henry Cameron...shot dead by Mormons.
[BTW: Of the Cameron/Miller Group, only three children of Josiah Miller and Matilda Cameron Miller, survived. Malinda Cameron Scott Thurston charged in 1877 that Mormons, under the authority of Brigham Young; killed eleven of her relatives, kidnapped the surviving children, and stole the property of her family. see http://www.legendsofamerica.com/ut-mountainmeadowsvictims2.html]
I'm sure this isn't a full list of child victims.
So, bvw...140 people were already a good portion of the way in and on their way OUT of Utah! Survival!???
You're got some utter nerve trying to justify all of this!!! This is horrid on your part!
The Mormon Church agreed to go along with National Landmark Status (Status being the operative word). The Church should be an actual National Landmark. This will be a little harder for the Church to swallow since it gives the Federal (Gentile) Government the right to interpret the site. After all, the two sides were at war with each other for a time... even though an actual declaration was never issued... from either side. This happened more than two years ago and the Church deserves credit for going along with it.... even though it took them too long to get there. The Mormon Church owns all the land that massacre site is on.
What’s so ridiculous about it? It happened on 9/11 (144 years prior). But that’s not the important part. The perpetrators were religiously motivated. They believed they were doing the will of their Prophet by killing the Gentiles in that wagon train. The evidence is strong that their Prophet ordered it done. Were the 9/11/01 hijackers not doing the will of Mohammed by engaging in Jihad against the Infidels? What’s hyperbolic about that?
Only 80 of the 120+ killed are known by name. Bagley’s book has the most comprehensive list of named victims. Most were from around Harrison and Fayetteville... although several had recently immigrated from Tennessee before they embarked for California.
“That’s strange, I’ve known about this massacre since I was a child (read it in a history book).”
I’m surprised to hear that. Only one state (Arkansas) has included the Mountain Meadows Massacre in it’s school text State History book. To my knowledge even that one was only recently added (a couple years back) by Dr. Burr Fancher. I’d be interested to know what history book you’re referring to.
Very good point. Many Americans are so eager to condemn what the U.S. citizenry did to Native Americans, they completely overlook the viciousness of some of the tribes.
THX 1138
William Lin also wrote a good book “All About The Mormons” published in 1903. He interviewed a lot of people who had first hand knowledge of the event. And Mark Twain wrote a pretty accurate piece on the Massacre in “Roughing It”... Appendix 11, I believe. So did Jack London in “Star Traveler”.
You’re mostly accurate, but Joseph Smith, Jr. was not alive when the Mountain Meadows Massacre occurred. Joseph never made it across the Rockies. However, the evidence is strong that Brigham Yong ordered the massacre.
Any Mormon prophet could turn into another Brigham Young. Even call for a return to ‘blood atonement’ and many of the mind numbed robots in the LDS would follow it.
The orders of their prophet come before ANYTHING else, even the US. Constitution.
9/11/1777 Battle of Brandywine
9/11/1814 Battle of Lake Champlain
9/11/1842 Mexican expedition captures San Antonio
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The kid forgot the Battle of Lake George in 1755
The French/Indian Wars
My 6th great grandfather was wounded at the Battle of Bloody Pond on 8/11 and died on 9/11
There were 3 battles that day the “Pond” was the last in the evening
Surely that was more important than the ones he came up with...
A marker for Captain Timothy McGinnis is right there by Lake George...
However he was a well seasoned volunteer member of the provincial army from the Mohawk Valley, and not a non-combatant being stalked and murdered by religious fanatics...
“That is not an act of war - it was flat out cold blooded murder and terrorism.”
Given the relative poverty of the LDs in the MMM area, what of the fact that the wagon train represented a chance to obtain tools, livestock, cash, etc. Getting rich while getting revenge, so to speak.
The issue of plain old theft/murder may deserve some discussion.
Where’s the humility in those here digging up the dead to raise a stench?
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and yet you are kind too Brighamm Young who truly did dig up the dead and desecrate the mass grave/cairn of his 9/11 victims..
Tearing down the cross and destroying the sign that read “”Revenge is mine saith the Lord”...
and saying “No, revenge is mine and I took some...”
]
Except the one who benefitted most from the theft of all those cattle and horsses and money and possessions was the already wealthy Brigham Young
Most of the valuable items had be be brought to Salt lake City and impounded in the “storehouse carroll”
Even the bloody clothes were stolen of the backs of the victims and their bodies left naked on the praire UNBURIED FOR TWO YEARS
Brigham Young drove around in an expensive fancy carriage that one of the wagon party was taking to CA...
The only way the US Army could rescue 17 of the kidnapped children was for the US government to pay $10,000 (1859 money) in ransom to Brigham Young...
The children were mostly in starved neglected condition and very little had been spent to board and feed them...
Some of the children were able to tell the US Army of seeing their mothers and fathers murdered by the Mormons..
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NOW you've done it!
The BIBLE is wrong about PI folks will pounce, using their incomplete math skills!
Try being a Hoosier; PROUD of the states highly intelligent politicians of the past!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indiana_Pi_Bill
Try the tongue in cheek poser:
Wow!Jesus is a VERY unique fellow, for what are the odds of being born on Christmas and Dying on Easter?
(Select all for the answer)
About 1/365 * 1/365
If they get THAT; remind them that Jesus did NOT die on Easter!
Hee hee!
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