Most Mormons who get indignant that the governor issued an order that the Mormons should be driven out or exterminated are not aware that Sidney Rigdon a few months before had delivered a Fourth of July sermon declaring that the Mormons were going to exterminate their enemies. The sermon was widely reported and even reprinted as a pamphlet.
RPackham Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Most Mormons who get indignant that the governor > issued an order that the Mormons should be driven > out or exterminated are not aware that Sidney > Rigdon a few months before had delivered a Fourth > of July sermon declaring that the Mormons were > going to exterminate their enemies. The sermon was > widely reported and even reprinted as a pamphlet. > > The governor was just responding in kind.
Several years ago I had an opportunity to see the original document, in Missouri. I asked the state archivist just what was meant by the word "exterminate."
The answer I got is that it was a word then commonly applied to Indians who neglected to remain on their designated west side of the Missouri River. Such persons were typically driven back across the river and thus "exterminated," or forced to vacate the prohibited premises.
But extermination could easily involve violence and even death. If the recalcitrant "savages" resisted strongly enough, genocide was a theoretical option.
In the case of the Mormons, late in 1838, there was an option not available to the Indians -- the "Saints" could disperse, renounce their Mormonism, and perhaps remain in Missouri -- which is what members like John Corrill and W. W. Phelps evidently did. Other Mormons simply dispersed, without renouncing their religion. Porter Rockwell moved over to Jackson county and was left alone. The Whitmers moved to Ray county and were not molested.
Still, there was a real danger for the Mormons who remained loyal to Joe Smith and who elected to remain in Caldwell county as long as possible. They generally avoided violent removal, but might well have faced genocide, had they refused to surrender their leaders and vacate Far West.
Rigdon's July 4, 1838 sermon at Far West was generally viewed by the Mormons' Gentile neighbors as an official pronouncement of the LDS First Presidency. Joe and Hyrum were there on the podium when Elder Rigdon made his infamous threats for a war of extermination against the Missourians. His speech was publicized in the newspapers, as well as distributed in pamphlet form as a publication from Joe Smith's own printing press.
The Missourians in surrounding counties understood what the Mormon leaders were threatening, in the summer of '38 and that was war-to-the-knife, to be carried into the Gentiles' homes, and against even babes in arms.
None of which provides a legal excuse for Boggs' order. It could have been phrased in much less provocative language. As it was, the order gave "cover" to Missourian retaliation against the Mormons, even to the excess at Hawn's Mill. It was a bad move on Boggs' part and the State of Missouri has issued a formal apology.
So far as I know, Missouri has never apologized for the various authorized "exterminations" of Native Americans.
Uncle Dale Wrote: --------- >... > Rigdon's July 4, 1838 sermon at Far West was > generally viewed by the Mormons' Gentile neighbors > as an official pronouncement of the LDS First Presidency. > Joe and Hyrum were there on the podium when Elder Rigdon > made his infamous threats for a war of extermination > against the Missourians....
But rainwriter asks what led up to the 1838 Mormon War in Missouri.
The answer is fairly simple -- Mormon over-reach.
In 1836 Alexander Doniphan, John Corrill and other Missouri legislators came up with a solution to the "Mormon problem." Joe Smith's followers would be moved to a reservation, away from the Gentiles, in newly-created Caldwell county.
So long as the Whitmers, W.W. Phelps and Oliver Cowdery were running the show in "Zion," things went rather well. Conflicts with the neighboring non-Mormons were minimal. Far West was built up, as Caldwell's county seat and for a while, it looked as though there would be no more trouble.
Then Joe, Hyrum and Sidney fled Kirtland, relocated themselves at Far West, and kicked out the former leadership there. Joe was paranoid about apostates and formed the Danites to intimidate folks like the Whitmers -- but also the Missouri Gentiles.
Joe neglected to form a political alliance with the non-LDS. In Kirtland he had been allied with the minority Democrats, but in Missouri the Democrats were the majority and had no reason to support the Mormons. The Whigs were weak and pretty much useless as a potential Mormon ally. So Joe decided to go it alone in Missouri.
He moved colonists into Daviess county and into other parts of Missouri adjacent to Caldwell --- which was in blatant violation of the 1836 gentlemen's agreement to keep the Mormons penned up in Caldwell.
Joe attempted to take over Daviess county, but the folks there resisted the non-resident Mormon voters who had been transported in from neighboring Caldwell. Trouble flared, and Joe decided to take Daviess by force.
His troops, under the command of Lyman Wight, burned and sacked Gallatin, the county seat of Daviess. I had ancestors on both sides of the fighting -- Broadhurst defenders at Gallatin and Winegar aggressors at near by "Diamon."
Things soon got out of control and Governor Boggs issued his infamous extermination order. When the Missouri militia surrounded Far West, the game was over. The Mormon plan to grab most of western Missouri ended in disgrace. God did not send the anticipated angelic army to defeat the Gentiles.
diablo Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Seems like the mormons were the first wave of the > communist invasion of the US. > > They sure love their capitalism now though. > > I wish Johnston would have curb-stomped them when > he had the chance.
Johnston had very limited authority, once he got to Utah. President Buchanan strangely limited him and pretty much made sure that Brigham remained in power.
Some think that Brigham either bribed or blackmailed Buchanan. The blanket pardon that Buchanan gave the Mormons -- all Mormons, no matter what they had done -- was held up as justification for not bringing criminals to trial -- for "forgetting" about anything associated with the Mountain Meadows massacre and dozens of other crimes committed in Utah.
In bringing on the 1857-58 "Utah War," Brigham made use of the same audacious doctrine that Sidney Rigdon had spouted at Far West in 1838 -- that the Mormon leaders had the divine right to declare any military force sent against them to be a "mob," with no authority or rights. Even if the "mob" was authorized by Congress and sent by orders of the Commander-in-Chief of US forces.
Brigham should have been tried, sentenced and executed in 1858.