Book Review: Massacre at Mountain Meadows by Walker, Turley, and Leonard

The other book I read over the Xmas break after the Dark Elf Trilogy was the newly published book on the Mountain Meadows Massacre. I was at Costco with my sister-in-law when I saw all three of the Jason Bourne movies for $20. I resisted the temptation to buy them because I don’t like impulse buying. Then I saw this book and immediately bought it. So much for not impulse buying. The next day my friend Chris was over and he picked it up. “MASSACRE!!” he intoned, and then paused. “Oh, this is a serious book.” It is, indeed.

More than the book itself, which I found to be adequate, I like what the publication of this book heralds. Many times we LDS haven’t been exactly honest with ourselves with regard to our history. One of the major anti-Mormon tactics is to simply tell the truth, that Brigham said such-and-such, or that such-and-such an event happened. Since that event or saying doesn’t fit into most Latter-day Saints preconceived notion of how things are (infallible prophets, mostly) it can be quite damaging. I have multiple friends who have left the church over these issues much to my dismay. The solution, in my opinion, is to get rid of the false preconceived paradigm. When the PBS documentary on Mormons was aired a few years ago many of the people in my old ward were shocked and amazed to learn that that the Mountain Meadows Massacre took place. That is not helpful, because in an environment of ignorance like that anti-Mormon propaganda can work wonders in causing doubt and fear. And getting rid of that preconceived notion is something that this book heralds—the continuation of our quest to be honest with our past in a way that is still faithful. In that vein this book stands with Rough Stone Rolling, Richard Bushman’s wonderful biography of the Joseph Smith that shows the prophet warts and all.

This book does a good job of describing the lead-up the massacre. Let’s just say I’m glad I was not a Mormon in Utah during the year 1857 with Johnston’s army marching towards us and the federal government silent. “Army? We’re not sending an army.” With the persecutions of Missouri and Illinois relatively fresh in the minds of the saints and a last-days mentality, it’s easier for me now to see the conditions that led to the massacre, conditions that allowed generally good people to commit such an atrocity. It’s an interesting thought experiment to put yourself in their shoes and ask yourself what you would have done in their situations. You see, the perpetrators, as the book says, pretty much lived good lives before and after.

I have two major complaints about the book. First, that the modern religious violence psychology the authors bring to play is not used very consistently. It seems to show up and random times or places. What would have been better would have been to have an entire chapter dedicated to the modern discussion of religious violence and its bearing on the Mountain Meadows Massacre, instead of a page there, a paragraph here.

I also didn’t like the fact that the narrative ends the day after the massacre and then picks up the day John Lee is executed, a gap of over a decade. There is no discussion of the aftermath, trials, cover-ups (to whatever extent there were any, various aspects of the conver-ups, like blaming the Indians, are interspersed through the book but never discussed in detail), or how the surviving children were eventually taken back from the LDS settlers. This lack of discussion in a relatively short book will probably come across as yet more LDS attempts to hide from their own history to anti-Mormons, which is unfortunate. What is apparent is that while Brigham Young may have contributed to the atmosphere the massacre took place in with some of his speeches, he did not have any direct contribution to the massacre itself, and ordered the train released once he discovered what was happening. Sadly, the messenger arrived the day after the massacre, having run a number of horses almost to death.

This is a good book. It’s not a great book, but it does demonstrate how difficult it is to pin down things that happened a long time ago. In the end, however, I must conclude with the authors that we are all human, even Mormons sometimes “do not live up to their lofty ideals.” In this case, the Mormons who directly participated in the massacre utterly failed to do so. In reading the accounts of the actual shooting, I almost cried. Such a terrible tragedy. And while I can now more readily understand the atmosphere that produced it, an atmosphere even contributed to by the victims themselves, I do not think that it in any way excuses the cold-blooded murder of all those innocent people. But God will be the judge; I’m just glad it’s not my job.

Edit: I later found out that there is going to be a second book by these authors from OUP that covers the aftermath and cover-up of the massacre. So I withdraw the criticism of this book that it doesn't cover that portion of the story. It's a different story. I look forward to reading that book too.