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Censure such sentiments, Christian reader, if you will. Fault- finding is easy, and human nature, the world over, weak and cen- surable. But the provocation, in such cases, should in all fairness be considered.
The foundations of a temple at Far West were likewise laid that day; the Saints thus emphasizing their determination to establish in that place a permanent stake of Zion. Why that temple was not built, nor another temple, projected at Diahman, we have yet in detail to explain.
Among the numerous charges preferred against the Mormon people, by those who seek to justify or extenuate the harsh treatment to which they have at various times been subjected, is that of "med- dling in politics." Parallel with this runs the charge of "voting solidly" for the candidates of their choice.
If by meddling in politics is meant-as we assume it must mean -practicing or participating in politics, the science of government, there is little doubt that the defendant community, if arraigned on such a charge, would promptly plead guilty. Moreover, they would very likely inquire if the right of any class of American citizens, no matter to what creed or church attached, to wield the ballot and peacefully strive to put in office the persons of their choice, could legally or morally be called in question? As to "voting solidly," they would probably plead guilty again, but they might ask who was responsible for it in their case,-for the unity and compactness of an
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oppressed people at the polls? Outside pressure, they would main- tain,-the principle that even in an urchin's hands forms from a few loose feathery flakes the snow-ball and moulds it into a lump of ice,-was so responsible. A common peril, they would argue, will unite and ought to unite any people, any nation, savage or civilized.
To this extent the Mormons would admit having "meddled in politics." They would doubtless freely concede that they had gener- ally "voted solid" to insure the election of their friends and the defeat of their enemies.
But, some will say, it is not the right of the Mormon people, as American citizens, to engage in politics that is questioned. It is the right of their leaders to control their political actions that is disputed. It is believed that their Apostles and Bishops wield undue influence over them in such matters; that there is a union of Church and State among them, and that the people are not left free to vote as they please.
These allegations the Mormons emphatically deny. They main- tain that their leaders have never sought to wield more influence over them in political affairs than prominent men in every community exercise over the masses who naturally look to them for guidance and instruction. They deny that a union of Church and State has ever existed among them, but they affirm that it has practically existed among those who find fault with them on that score,-the priests and politicians who have repeatedly joined hands, on the stump, and even in the halls of Congress, to create anti-Mormon legislation.
They admit that their Apostles and Bishops have sometimes given political advice, though not as Apostles and Bishops, but as American citizens, with a free opinion and the right to voice that opinion. They admit, too, that in Mormon communities Church officials have often been elected to civil offices; yet not because they were Church officials, but simply the best men that could be found in whom the people had confidence; men who knew how to be just and fair, and would separate their civil from their ecclesiastical functions.
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In the Mormon Church, it should be remembered, nearly every man is an Elder, and it would be next to impossible to nominate from among them a man who did not hold some order of priesthood.
They claim that while in communities strictly Mormon, Mor- mons have necessarily held all the offices, that in mixed communi- ties where they predominated they have allowed the minority a fair representation. They admit that in places where they themselves were in the minority they have asked the same privilege, demanding it as a right, and when necessary have banded together to secure that right. They admit having used the balance of power, which at times they have found themselves possessed of, to put in office, regardless of party affiliations, men of capacity and integrity, their friends in lieu of their enemies.
If this be "meddling in politics" the Mormons, like all other American citizens, have undoubtedly so meddled; and they do not deny it.
It was just such an event as this,-their voting or trying to vote for their friends and against their foes,-that formed the prologue to the appalling tragedy, which, beginning with outrage, robbery and rapine, ended in murder, massacre, and the eventual expulsion-a mid-winter exodus-of the entire Mormon community from Missouri.
It was the 6th of August, 1838, and the state election was in progress. To Gallatin, the principal town of Daviess County, went twelve Mormon citizens for the purpose of casting their ballots. Colo- nel William P. Peniston was a candidate in that district for represen- tative to the Legislature. Having been prominent in the anti-Mormon agitation, preceding the moderate action of the mediators, in Clay County, he had good reason to believe that the people whom he would have driven from their homes did not design aiding him with their suffrages. He had therefore organized a mob, and now haran- gued them at the polls, to prevent the Mormons from voting. Mounting a barrel, he poured out upon them a torrent of abuse, styling them " horse-thieves and robbers" and proclaiming his oppo- sition to their settling in that region or being allowed to vote. He
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admitted having headed a mob to drive them from Clay County, and declared that he would not now interfere to prevent a similar fate befalling them. He also attacked their religion, denouncing as "a d-d lie" their profession of healing the sick by the laying on of hands.
What all this had to do with the right of the Mormons to vote, and to vote if they wished against William P. Peniston, is not very apparent at this time, nor was it, we opine, even then. But the tirade had its desired and designed effect. The Mormons, pronounc- ing his charges false, insisted upon their right to vote. Immediately Peniston's party, crazed with drink and furious with rage, set upon them. The twelve Mormons, attacked by over a hundred men, stoutly defended themselves. Clubs, stones and fists were freely used, and even knives were unsheathed by some of the assailants. In the melee, though no lives were lost, some on both sides were wounded, and several mobocratic heads were broken. The Mormons withdrew from the scene. and the election proceeded.
This event, supplemented by incendiary speeches and articles in the local press, caused a general anti-Mormon uprising. All Daviess County was aroused, and even in parts adjacent, as ran the exaggerated rumor of the riot at Gallatin, the Missourians began arming and organizing. For what? They scarcely knew,-ignorant dupes as most of them were, tools of designing demagogues, of men without principle, who saw, as such characters quickly see, in a pop- ular movement against an unpopular people, opportunities for plun- der and promotion.
Social and religious as well as political lines were sharply drawn. Old charges, oft-denied, were reiterated, and new ones brought forth and made to do yeoman service in the cause of the coming crusade. The priest, the politician and the apostate again joined hands, like the three weird sisters in Macbeth, each putting in his quota of terri- ble tales to make the cauldron of the people's hatred "boil and bubble."
As the excitement grew and hostilities began, hordes of red-
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handed desperadoes, refugees from justice,-a class commonly found on the frontier,-scenting the conflict from afar, came pouring into Daviess and Caldwell counties, like vultures flocking to the shambles. Some of these painted and disguised themselves as Indians,-the better, no doubt, to escape detection for past and future crimes. The leader of these pseudo savages was Cornelius Gilliam, formerly sheriff of Clay County, who styled himself "the Delaware chief."
Efforts were early made to avert the bloody crisis that was felt to be approaching. Good and wise men on both sides met and signed a covenant of peace, agreeing to maintain the right and use their influence to atlay the unwarrantable agitation. Among these were Lyman Wight, John Smith, Vinson Knight and Reynolds Cahoon, who signed for the Mormons of Daviess County ; and Joseph Morin, senator-elect, John Williams, representative-elect, James P. Turner, clerk of the circuit court, and others representing the older settlers.
But all in vain. The Missourians, misled and thoroughly preju- diced, were for war, not peace. The excitement continued to increase, until finally nothing but bloodshed or the banishment of the hated Mormons would suffice.
Adam Black, an illiterate politician, though a justice of the peace for Daviess County, was visited on the 8th of August, two days after the election, by Joseph Smith and Lyman Wight. and requested, as other prominent men had been, to sign an agreement of peace. He acceded to their request, writing and signing a docu- ment amicable in tone, if well-nigh illegible in character, and imme- diately afterwards circulated the report that his signature had been secured by threats of violence.
On the complaint of Colonel Peniston, the mob leader at Galla- tin, Joseph Smith and Lyman Wight were arrested, charged not only with intimidating Judge Black, but with collecting a large body of armed men in Daviess County, to drive out the older settlers and despoil them of their lands. Tried before Judge Austin A. King, at Gallatin, early in September, nothing was proven against the
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two defendants. Judge King, they claimed, admitted as much to them in private, but deemed it politic to bind them over in the sum of $500.
That the Mormons in Daviess County had been arming them- selves, was doubtless true. True also that they had been receiving reinforcements from other places. The Missourians, their neighbors, had been doing precisely the same things, and threatening them daily with attack. Already had they driven some Mormons from their homes and compelled them to seek safety with their friends at Diah- man. Remembering their experience in Jackson County, when, being unarmed, they were trampled on without mercy by the mob, the Saints, as Sidney Rigdon had declared, did not propose to tamely submit to a repetition of such outrages. They were determined to maintain their rights, and defend to the death, if need be, their hard earned homes and the peace and safety of their families.
But this was their only purpose-self-defense; a fact subse- quently affirmed by the chief officers of the State militia, sent to sup- press the insurrection. To say that the Mormons contemplated wholesale robbery and expulsion-the infliction upon their fellow settlers of wrongs similar to what they themselves had suffered in Jackson County, and for which they were still hoping redress, and that too, at a time when confronted by foes eager for an excuse to attack and annihilate them, is to accuse them, not of criminal intent, but of madness, sheer idiocy.
Lilburn W. Boggs was now governor of Missouri. He was Lieutenant-Governor, the reader will remember, during the troubles of 1833, at which time he espoused the cause of the mob which drove the Saints from Jackson County. He was a rank Mormon-hater, as were nearly all the residents of that county, and probably owed to that, in part, his elevation to the executive chair. Learning of the situation in Daviess County, the Governor directed Major-General Atchison and other officers of militia to muster and equip men to put down the insurrection.
While this order was being executed, the mob army was making
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,
ready to attack Diahman. For this purpose reinforcements and sup- plies were being forwarded to them from other points. On the 9th of September a wagon load of guns and ammunition, on its way from Richmond, Ray County, to the mobocratic camp, was captured with those in charge of it by Captain William Allred and his men,-Mor- mons belonging to the State militia.
Notifying Judge King of his capture, and asking what disposi- tion should be made of the prisoners, Captain Allred was ordered by that official to treat them kindly and set them at liberty. Whether or not they were promptly released does not appear. The probability is that Captain Allred, surprised at receiving such an order, still held them. At any rate Judge King, on the same day, wrote to General Atchison to send two hundred or more men to force the Mormons to surrender.
The militia of Ray and Clay Counties, commanded by Brigadier- Generals Parks and Doniphan, now came upon the scene. Parks proceeded to Gallatin, the county seat of Daviess, to survey the sit- uation, while Doniphan went via Far West to Millport and Diahman. At Far West, which place he visited with a single aide, leaving his troops on Crooked River, General Doniphan was the guest of the Prophet, who was favorably impressed with his frank and friendly manner. This was the same General Doniphan who subsequently played a notable part in the Mexican War. He and his superior, General Atchison, were Joseph Smith's attorneys in the legal troubles following the military episode of the autumn of 1838. Under them also the Prophet and Elder Rigdon studied law.
Marching to the camp of the mobocrats near Millport, Doniphan ordered them to disperse. They protested that they were merely act- ing in self-defense. He then went to Diahman and conferred with Colonel Wight, commanding the Mormon force, "Host of Israel." He found them willing to disband, provided the enemy threatening them would disperse, and willing also to surrender any of their num- ber accused of offenses against the laws to be dealt with by legal authority. The prisoners and weapons taken by the Mormons were
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delivered up at the demand of General Doniphan, who, on the 15th of September joined Generals Atchison and Parks at Gallatin.
The report of these officers to the Governor was substantially as follows : that affairs in Daviess County were not so bad as rumor had represented, and that his Excellency had been deceived by designing or half-crazy men; that the Mormons, so far as could be learned, had been acting on the defensive, showing no hostile intent, and evincing no disposition to resist the laws; that the officers, on their arrival there, had found a large body of men from other counties, armed and in the field, to assist the people of Daviess against the Mormons, without being called out by the proper authori- ties ; and that the Daviess County men were still threatening, in the event of the failure of a certain committee on compromise to agree, to drive the Mormons with powder and lead.
Colonel Wight and a score of others, accused of various offenses, had previously given themselves up and been pledged to appear for trial on the 29th of September. It is noticeable that no Missourians were arrested, though many of them were guilty of riot and moboc- racy, and that even those captured by the Mormons had been set at liberty. During the excitement of the past several weeks overt acts had doubtless been committed on both sides. The wonder is not that such was the case, but that the Mormons were the only ones called to account.
Most of the troops were now disbanded, it being supposed that the trouble was over. Only a few companies remained under arms to quell, if necessary, any further demonstrations of disorder.
The scene now changes to Dewitt, in Carroll County. Enraged at being thwarted in their designs upon Diahman, the mob army, a portion of which had previously threatened Dewitt, appeared in force before that place, and in the beginning of October began lo bombard the town. A party from Jackson County, with a six- pounder, assisted in the assault. The besieged, compared with the besiegers, were a mere handful. Colonel George M. Hinkle was their commander. The leaders of the attacking force-which was partly
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composed of militia men lately disbanded-were a Doctor Austin. Major Ashley, a member of the Legislature, and Sashiel Woods, a Presbyterian clergyman. Later came Captains Bogart and Houston, the former a Methodist preacher, with two companies of militia. These, instead of operating against the mob, united with them against the Mormons. General Parks came also, but did nothing to restore order remaining a silent and apparently a helpless spectator of the scene. His troops were evidently in sympathy with the mob.
The first gun was fired upon Dewitt on the 2nd of October. Colonel Hinkle waited forty-eight hours, and then ordered the fire returned. The bombardment continued at intervals for nine days. During its progress the Prophet made his way through much diffi- culty and danger from Far West to the beleaguered settlement. He found his people there hemmed in by their foes, their provisions exhausted, their cattle and horses stolen, their houses burned, and themselves threatened with death if they attempted to leave the town.
Through the agency of non-Mormon friends in that vicinity an appeal was made to Governor Boggs, in behalf of the beleaguered Saints. He replied that the quarrel was between the Mormons and the mob, and that they might "fight it out."
Finally the Mormons were permitted to evacuate Dewitt, which they did on the 11th of October. Under the treacherous fire of their foes the homeless and plundered refugees fled to Far West.
Eight hundred strong the mob army now marched upon Diah- man. General Doniphan informed the Prophet of this movement, and stated that no protection could be hoped for from the militia. Said he : "They are d-d rotten hearted." They were certainly in sympathy if not in league with the lawless element that now concen- trated from every direction against Diahman. It was under these circumstances that General Doniphan advised the Mormon militia at Far West to organize and march to the relief of their friends in Daviess County. His advice was taken, the command of the Cald- well regiment being given to Colonel George M. Hinkle.
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About this time was brought to Diahman the news of house- burnings, drivings and other depredations committed by Gilliam's guerillas upon some scattered families of Saints beyond Grand River. Women, children and even the sick were dragged from their beds and thrust out into the night, some wandering for days through a pitiless storm that prevailed in that region about the middle of October. One of these refugees was Agnes, wife of Don Carlos Smith, the Prophet's brother, who was then absent in Tennessee. Her house being burned she had fled with two babes in her arms and waded Grand River to get beyond the reach of her ruffian pursuers.
The Mormon blood was now thoroughly up. The Prophet no longer counseled peace and submission. He bade his followers arm and defend themselves; to die, if need be, protecting their homes, the virtue of their wives and daughters, and the lives of their little ones. General Parks, arriving at Diahman, against which the mob was fast gathering, permitted Colonel Wight, who held a commission under him in the 59th regiment of the militia, to organize his command and proceed against the robbers and house- burners.
Here apparently was the beginning of retaliative measures on the part of the Mormons in Missouri. Smarting under their wrongs they made vigorous war upon the marauding bands that now fled precipitately before them, and ceased not their efforts until Daviess County was well clear of them. If they went further, as alleged by the Missourians, and burned the towns-or hamlets-of Millport and Gallatin, it was not to be wondered at after the provocation given.
The Mormons, however, do not admit having burned the property of the Missourians; but allege that the mob set fire to the houses of their own friends, and then fled, scattering the false report that the Mormons were the incendiaries. Be this as it may, there is at least one Missourian now living who, while claiming that the Mormons did the burning, concedes that
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they were justified in what they did, as the Missourians had set the example .*
It was asserted by those who spread these reports that the design of the Mormons was next to sack and burn the town of Rich- mond. This rumor, being generally believed, or feared,-all the more readily since the Mormons had suffered just such outrages, and the law of retaliation is a recognized rule of human nature,-served to augment the reigning agitation and swell the discord of the hour.
About this time the rumor become current at Far West of a secret organization called Danites, or Destroying Angels, whose alleged purpose was to prey upon the Gentiles and avenge the Saints of their enemies.+ The origin of the movement was accredited to the chiefs of the Church, especially Sidney Rigdon, who, it was said, had authorized the organization. It transpired, however, that the originator of the movement, which was indeed attempted. was Dr. Sampson Avard, a characterless fanatic then numbered among the Saints, whose scheme for blood and plunder, becoming known to the First Presidency, was repudiated and its author severed from the Church. In revenge for the exposure of his villainy, Avard declared that the Church leaders had authorized him to organize the death- dealing society called Danites.
The story of these preyers and avengers, which, barring the above, is a pure myth,-Joaquin Miller and other less reputable romancers to the contrary notwithstanding,-is still perpetuated by anti-Mormon writers and speakers, and has probably done the Saints more harm than any other of the numerous tales uttered
* Messrs. Andrew Jenson and Edward Stevenson, of Salt Lake City, state that dur- ing a visit to Daviess County, Missouri, in September, 1888, they conversed with one Major McGee, an old resident of Gallatin, who spoke to that effect. He said that he thought some of the Mormons were to blame for teasing the other inhabitants with the doctrine that they-the Saints-were the heirs to the whole country, but that he knew of no lawlessness committed by the Mormons prior to the troubles in 1838. He also stated that he was taken prisoner by the Mormons during those troubles and treated kindly. According to Major McGee, Gallatin at that time consisted of about four houses.
+ Genesis xlix-17.
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against them. The Danite Society, according to all but anti-Mor- mon authors, whose assertions against the Saints should be taken cum grano salis, was nipped in the bud, and had no after existence.
The battle of Crooked River was fought on the 25th of October. Captain David W. Patten, of the Far West militia, had been directed by Colonel Hinkle to proceed with a company of men to the ford of the river and disperse a band of marauders under Captain Bogart, who were committing depredations in that vicinity. They had captured three Mormons,-Nathan Pinkham, William Seely and Addison Green,-and had boasted of their intention to put them to death the next night. It was to rescue these men, as well as to put a. stop to Bogart's operations that Captain Patten went forth. Leaving Far West about midnight, he and his company, seventy-five in number, came upon Bogart's band in ambush just at day-break. As the Mormons crossed the bluff above his camp, which was among the brush and willows in the river bottom, the mob leader ordered his men to fire. They obeyed, when young Patrick O'Banion, a Mormon, fell mortally wounded. Captain Patten then ordered his men to charge. Forward they dashed, returning the enemy's fire. After delivering a second volley Bogart's band broke and fled, crossing the river at the ford and abandoning their camp to the victorious Mormons. The three prisoners held by the mob were liberated, though one of them had been shot and wounded by his captors during the engagement.
But the victory had been dearly won. Captain Patten, like O'Banion, was mortally wounded, and Gideon Carter killed. Other Mormons were wounded, but not seriously. Bogart, whose force outnumbered the attacking party, lost one man.
David W. Patten died that night. He was a man much esteemed by his people, and his loss was deeply mourned. The Church regarded him as a martyr.
The excitement among the Missourians, already at fever heat over the troubles in Daviess County, now became intense. The Crooked River battle was heralded abroad as another "Mormon
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atrocity," and the public mind was more and more inflamed against the Saints.
The Mormon-hating Governor of Missouri now saw his oppor- tunity. So long as it was only the Saints who were being worsted, he could afford to sit by, like Xerxes on his mountain throne at Salamis, and see the two sides "fight it out." But when the tables were turned, and the mob began to suffer some reverses, he came to the conclusion that it was high time for him to interfere for their protection. Besides the opportunity to wreak personal spite upon the Mormons, there was a chance to make political capital out of the situation.
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