The Jeffersonian. [volume] (Stroudsburg, Pa.) 1853-1911, 1859-10-06


ted as predictions of the writing and dis-
covery of this book.
\ The congregaton consisted at either
service OF some fifteen hundred to two
thousand persons-more in the morning
than in the afternoon, A large majori-
ty Of them mot including the Elders and
chief men, Of whom dozen or so were
presen)were evidently of European birth:
think majority of the males were past
the meridian of life. All gaveearnest heed
to the exercises throug bout; in fact, have
seldom seen q M ore devout and intent as
semblages | had been told that the Nor
mons were rem arkably ignorant, supersti-
tious and brutalized; but the aspect of
these congregations did not sustain that
assertion. Very few rural congregations
would exhibit more heads eyincing deci-
ded ability; and l doubt whether any as
semblage so largely European 10 its COM
position would make better appearance.
Not that Europeans are less intellectual
or comely than Americans; but our i'm
migrants are mainly of the poorer classes:
and poverty, privation. and rugged toll
poW hard, forbidding lines in the human
countenanco elswbere than in Utah.
Brigham Young was moi present at either
service.
Do regard the great body of these
Mormons as knaves and hJpocrites AS
suredly not. | do not believe there was
ever religion whereof the great mass of
the adherents were not honest and sincere.
Hypocrites and knaves there are in ell
sects; it is quite possible that some of the
magnates of the Mormon Church regard
this SO called religion with all others) Jas a
contrivance for the eDsla5ement and fee
cling of the many and the aggrandizemeD ut
of the few; but cannot believe that a sect
so considerable and so vigorous as the Nor
Don was ever founded 10 conscious impos-
ture or built up on any other basis than
that of earnest conviction. If the pro-
jector and two or three of his chief con-
federates were knaves, the great body of
their followers were dupes.
Nor do i accept the current Gentle
presumption that the Mormons are an or
ganized baDditti-a horde of rotbers and
assassins. Thieves and murderers N ain
ly haunt the purlieus of great cities or
hide in caverns and forests adjacent to
the great routes Of travel. But when the
Mormon leaders decided to set up their
Zion in these parched mountain wales aud
canons, the said valleys were utterly Sc
cuded and remote from all Gentle ap-
proach-away from any mail-route or
channel of emigration. That the Nor
mons wished to escape Gentle control,
scrutiny. jurisprudence, is evident; that
they meant to abuse their inaccessibility,
to the detriment and plunder of wa yfarers
is not credible.
Do I, then, discredit the tales of Nor
mon outrage and crime-of the murder
of the Parishes, the Mountain Meadow
massacre, &C., &c.-where with the gen.
eral ear has recently been shocked No,
DO not. Some of these may have been
fabricated by Gentle malce-others,
are doubtless exagerated-but there is
some basis of truth for the current Gen.
tile conviction that M0rnOnS haze rOb6el,
manned, and even killed persons az MiS
Territory, under circumstances a0hich
should subject Tie perpetrators to condign
punishment, bit ttat Mormon aoitneSSeS,
grand jurorS, petit .jurOrS and magistrates
determsnedly screen tie gatiAy l deeply
regret the necessity of believing this; but
, tbe facts are incontestable. That large
J party of emigrants-not less than eighty
from Arkansas to California, were foul
: " massacred at Mountain Meadows in
: September, 1857, more Immediately by
} Indians, but uneer the direct inspiration
and direction of the Mormon settlers in
that vicinity-to whom, and not to the
/ savagcs, the emigrants had surrendered.
3 after siege, on the strength of assurances
> that their lives at least should be spared
D is established by evidence that cannot q
think be lidated--the evidence OF
conscience. .smitten partakers in the crime.
0 both Indian and ex. x.mormon, and of chill
q dren of the slaughtered emigrants, who
r were spared as too young to be danger
{ ous even as witnesses, and Of whom the
: great majority have been sent down to
' the States as unable to give testimony;
o but two boys are retained here as witness
: es, who distinctly remember that their
o parents surrendered to white men. and
: that these white men did not attempt to
D prevent their per6dous massacre. These
: children, moreover, were all found in the
possession Of Mormons-not one OF then
: in the hands of Indians; and, though the
: Mormons say they ransomed them from
r the hands of Indians, the children de-
? ny it, saying that they never lived with
J. nor were in the keeping of savages; and
O the Indians bear concurrent testimony
o So in the Parish case: The family had
J. been Mormons, but had apostatized--and
y undertook to return to the States; they
> were warned that they void be killed u
e they persisted in that resolution: they
o did persist, and were killed. OF course
t. nobody will ever be convicted of tbeiI
n murder; but those who warned them o.
their fate on which they were rushing
c know why they wero killed, and could
t discover, if they would, who killed them
4 1I ,ns