The Story of the Mormons, from the Date of Their Origin to the Year 1901 Part 62

On October 18 Colonel Alexander, acknowledging the receipt of Young's letter, said in his reply that no one connected with his force had any wish to interfere in any way with the religion of the people of Utah, adding: "I repeat my earnest desire to avoid violence and bloodshed, and it will require positive resistance to force me to it. But my troops have the same right of self-defence that you claim, and it rests entirely with you whether they are driven to the exercise of it."

Finding that he could not cajole the federal officer, Young threw off all disguise, and in reply to an earlier letter of Colonel Alexander, he gave free play to his vituperative powers. After going over the old Mormon complaints, and declaring that "both we and the Kingdom of G.o.d will be free from all h.e.l.lish oppressors, the Lord being our helper," he wrote at great length in the following tone:--

"If you persist in your attempt to permanently locate an army in this Territory, contrary to the wishes and const.i.tutional rights of the people therein, and with a view to aid the administration in their unhallowed efforts to palm their corrupt officials upon us, and to protect them and blacklegs, black-hearted scoundrels, wh.o.r.emasters, and murderers, as was the sole intention in sending you and your troops here, you will have to meet a mode of warfare against which your tactics furnish you no information....

"If George Washington was now living, and at the helm of our government, he would hang the administration as high as he did Andre, and that, too, with a far better grace and to a much greater subserving the best interests of our country....

"By virtue of my office as Governor of the Territory of Utah, I command you to marshal your troops and leave this territory, for it can be of no possible benefit to you to wickedly waste treasures and blood in prosecuting your course upon the side of a rebellion against the general government by its administrators.... Were you and your fellow officers as well acquainted with your soldiers as I am with mine, and did they understand the work they were now engaged in as well as you may understand it, you must know that many of them would immediately revolt from all connection with so unG.o.dly, illegal, unconst.i.tutional and h.e.l.lish a crusade against an innocent people, and if their blood is shed it shall rest upon the heads of their commanders. With us it is the Kingdom of G.o.d or nothing."

To this Colonel Alexander replied, on the 19th, that no citizen of Utah would be harmed through the instrumentality of the army in the performance of its duties without molestation, and that, as Young's order to leave the territory was illegal and beyond his authority, it would not be obeyed.

John Taylor, on October 21, added to this correspondence a letter to Captain Marcy, in which he ascribed to party necessity the necessity of something with which to meet the declaration of the Republicans against polygamy--the order of the President that troops should accompany the new governor to Utah; declared that the religion of the Mormons was "a right guaranteed to us by the const.i.tution"; and reiterated their purpose, if driven to it, "to burn every house, tree, shrub, rail, every patch of gra.s.s and stack of straw and hay, and flee to the mountains."

"How a large army would fare without resources," he added, "you can picture to yourself."*

* Text of this letter in House Ex. Doc. No. 71, 1st Session, 35th Congress, and Tullidge's "History of Salt Lake City."

The Mormon authorities meant just what they said from the start.

Young was as determined to be the head of the civil government of the territory as he was to be the head of the church. He had founded a practical dictatorship, with power over life and property, and had discovered that such a dictatorship was necessary to the regulation of the flock that he had gathered around him and to the schemes that he had in mind. To permit a federal governor to take charge of the territory, backed up by troops who would sustain him in his authority, meant an end to Young's absolute rule. Rather than submit to this, he stood ready to make the experiment of fighting the government force, separated as that force was from its Eastern base of supplies; to lay waste the Mormon settlements, if it became necessary to use this method of causing a federal retreat by starvation; and, if this failed, to withdraw his flock to some new Zion farther south.

In accordance with this view, as soon as news of the approach of the troops reached Salt Lake Valley, all the church industries stopped; war supplies weapons and clothing were manufactured and acc.u.mulated; all the elders in Europe were ordered home, and the outlying colonies in Carson Valley and in southern California were directed to hasten to Salt Lake City. A correspondent of the San Francis...o...b..lletin at San Bernardino, California, reported that in the last six months the Mormons there had sent four or five tons of gunpowder and many weapons to Utah, and that, when the order to "gather" at the Mormon metropolis came, they sacrificed everything to obey it, selling real estate at a reduction of from 20 to 50 per cent, and furniture for any price that it would bring.

The same sacrifices were made in Carson Valley, where 150 wagons were required to accommodate the movers. In Salt Lake City the people were kept wrought up to the highest pitch by the teachings of their leaders.

Thus, Amasa W. Lyman told them, on October 8, that they would not be driven away, because "the time has come when the Kingdom of G.o.d should be built up."* Young told them the same day, "If we will stand up as men and women of G.o.d, the yoke shall never be placed upon our necks again, and all h.e.l.l cannot overthrow us, even with the United States troops to help them."** Kimball told the people in the Tabernacle, on October 18: "They [the United States] will have to make peace with us, and we never again shall make peace with them. If they come here, they have got to give up their arms." Describing his plan of campaign, at the same service, after the reading of the correspondence between Young and Colonel Alexander, Young said: "Do you want to know what is going to be done with the enemies now on our border? As soon as they start to come into our settlements, let sleep depart from their eyes and slumber from their eyelids until they sleep in death. Men shall be secreted here and there, and shall waste away our enemies in the name of Israel's G.o.d."***

* Journal of Discourses, Vol. V, p. 319.

** Ibid., Vol. V, p. 332

*** Ibid., Vol. V, p. 338.

Young was equally explicit in telling members of his own flock what they might expect if they tried to depart at that time. In a discourse in the Tabernacle, on October 25, he said:--

"If any man or woman in Utah wants to leave this community, come to me and I will treat you kindly, as I always have, and will a.s.sist you to leave; but after you have left our settlements you must not then depend upon me any longer, nor upon the G.o.d I serve. You must meet the doom you have labored for.... After this season, when this ignorant army has pa.s.sed off, I shall never again say to a man, 'Stay your rifle ball,'

when our enemies a.s.sail us, but shall say, 'Slay them where you find them."'*

* Ibid, Vol. V, p. 352.

Kimball, on November 8, spoke with equal plainness on this subject:--

"When it is necessary that blood should be shed, we should be as ready to do that as to eat an apple. That is my religion, and I feel that our platter is pretty near clean of some things, and we calculate to keep it clean from this time henceforth and forever .... And if men and women will not live their religion, but take a course to pervert the hearts of the righteous, we will 'lay judgment to the line and righteousness to the plummet,' and we will let you know that the earth can swallow you up as did Koran with his hosts; and, as Brother Taylor says, you may dig your graves, and we will slay you and you may crawl into them."*

* Journal of Discourses, Vol. VI, p. 34.

The Mormon songs of the day breathed the same spirit of defiance to the United States authorities. A popular one at the Tabernacle services began:--

"Old Uncle Sam has sent, I understand,

Du dah,

A Missouri a.s.s to rule our land,

Du dah! Du dah day.

But if he comes we'll have some fun,

Du dah,

To see him and his juries run,

Du dah! Du dah day.

Chorus:

Then let us be on hand,

By Brigham Young to stand,

And if our enemies do appear,

We'll sweep them from the land."

Another still more popular song, called "Zion," contained these words:--

"Here our voices we'll raise, and will sing to thy praise,

Sacred home of the Prophets of G.o.d;

Thy deliverance is nigh, thy oppressors shall die,

And the Gentiles shall bow 'neath thy rod."

When the Mormons found that the federal forces had gone into winter quarters, the Nauvoo Legion was ma.s.sed in a camp called Camp Weber, at the mouth of Echo canyon. This canyon they fortified with ditches and breastworks, and some dams intended to flood the roadway; but they succeeded in erecting no defences which could not have been easily overcome by a disciplined force. A watch was set day and night, so that no movement of "the invaders" could escape them, and the officer in charge was particularly forbidden to allow any civil officer appointed by the President to pa.s.s.

This careful arrangement was kept up all winter, but Tullidge says that no spies were necessary, as deserting soldiers and teamsters from the federal camp kept coming into the valley with information.

The territorial legislature met in December, and approved Governor Young's course, every member signing a pledge to maintain "the rights and liberties" of the territory. The legislators sent a memorial to Congress, dated January 6, 1858, demanding to be informed why "a hostile course is pursued toward an unoffending people," calling the officers who had fled from the territory liars, declaring that "we shall not again hold still while fetters are being forged to bind us," etc. This offensive doc.u.ment reached Washington in March, and was referred in each House to the Committee on Territories, where it remained. When the federal forces reached Fort Bridger, they found that the Mormons had burned the buildings, and it was decided to locate the winter camp--named Camp Scott--on Black's Fork, two miles above the fort. The governor and other civil officers spent the winter in another camp near by, named "Ecklesville," occupying dugouts, which they covered with an upper story of plastered logs. There was a careful apportionment of rations, but no suffering for lack of food.