Biographies of George Q Cannon, Joseph F Smith provide honest in-depth portrayals

 

Observations by Doug Gibson

Last fall I read two new biographies of 19th century/early 20th century LDS Church leaders Joseph F. Smith, who served as the church's president/prophet, and George Q. Cannon, who reached the first presidency of the church and would likely have been prophet if not for an untimely death in 1901.

I wasn't planning to review either, but they were both so good that I decided to spill some ink. They represent honest biographies that address a subject's totality; the strengths that made the exceptional, committed leader, and the weaknesses, personal and administrative, that sometimes tempered goals and showed human fraility in trying to deal with familial and business pressures.

"Like a Fiery Meteor: The Life of Joseph F. Smith," by Stephen C. Tayson (University of Utah Press, 2023), is an exceptional study of the life of the LDS Church's sixth president. "Like a Fiery Meteor" is an apt description. Joseph F. Smith was an impressive man and leader. He was pragmatic, understanding that the loose adherence to the first and second manifestos disallowing polygamy had to be strengthened, even to church disfellowship or excommunication for prominent members. Smith also ushered in the beginnings of church standardization in doctrine and lessons, initiated efforts toward the church becoming an expanded business force. He also weathered harsh testimony and brutal media attacks during Reed Smoot's successful effort to be U.S. senator. And just before his death, his revelation of the afterlife has become canonized as LDS church scripture.

Joseph F. Smith was not the always kind, mellow grandfather type so often portrayed within LDS culture. Indeed, he was a man who bristled with temper and resentments, a harsh taskmaster who could only spare little time with his many children but was excessively interested in shaping their lives. He was a sentimental man, who agonized over the early deaths of children and grandchildren. Still a young child when his father, Hyrum Smith, was murdered with uncle Joseph Smith, Smith crossed the plains with his mother, Mary Fielding Smith. His entire life Smith believed his mother was treated badly by church leaders and others in Utah. She died in 1852 when he was still a young teen, and his resentments and harsh early life left an inner rage that sometimes provoked violence. Due to his temper, which included assaults, LDS church leaders took a task used often then: get the troubled youth involved in church service.

Smith, as a teenager, was sent on a mission to the Hawaiian Islands. He thrived there, learning the language, and working hard. He became the mission leader. On one occasion, the teenage mission president excommunicated nine converts after a church meeting.

The young Smith had a complex relationship, likely rooted in romance, with a Smith cousin who lived in California. She was hostile to the church but they remained in correspondence for a lifetime. Taysom's accounts of this guarded friendship and often-hostile correspondence between the pair is very interesting. She was a sounding board for Smith's bewildered frustration that most of the Nauvoo Smiths had spurned the Utah Mormons. 

Smith's first marriage was a disaster. His wife, Levira, who would likely be classified as with clinical depression and other mental afflictions, needed a husband of extreme patience and empathy. Smith was not capable of dealing with this difficult marriage. His church duties had expanded, including a mission to England. Unable to check his anger, Smith on at least one occasion beat Levira. They eventually divorced. 

F. Smith later married five wives and fathered 48 children. His personal weaknesses aside, he was a valuable administrator and leader within the church, and soon became an LDS apostle. What Taysom notes well in his biography is that despite being an orthodox Mormon who essentially distrusted the media and culture outside Utah, Smith was talented, confident and formidable enough to confront that world, to go out and talk to religious, cultural and political leaders. Smith's' energy, as well as other church leaders of that era, refute the misconception that LDS leaders in the latter half of the 18th century avoided the public eye. 

Smith abhorred any sexual immorality, and defined it like a Puritan. He was the driving force for Apostle Albert Carrington to be excommunicated for adultery while mission leader in England. He was a fierce opponent of masturbation, which must have caused a lot of teens and men heavy guilt after one of his sermons. 

If he were alive today, he'd be thrilled at the scores of temples in the world. Temple work was a particular priority of his. Smith was a magnet of hatred for anti-Mormons in the first part of the 20th century. Ending his life as a successful church president can be considered a triumph for him.

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The second biography is "George Q. Cannon: Politician, Publisher, Apostle of Polygamy," by Kenneth L. Cannon II (Signature Books, 2023). It is one of Signature's recent "short" biographies (fewer than 300 pages). It is a superb book that provides a lot of information on this accomplished man's life. Like Joseph F. Smith, George Q. Cannon was a leader who both embodied the orthodoxy of early Mormonism, yet fully embraced the challenges of moving forward through changes in the latter 19th century. Cannon was a skilled politician, a superb journalist, and an experienced businessman. In the latter part of the 19th century, Cannon was handling many of the duties that the current presidents could not handle, due to their advanced age.

Cannon experienced tragedy early in his life. A native of Liverpool, England, his mother died on the ship taking her and George to Nauvoo. His father later died in Nauvoo. Early church leaders were impressed with the youth, who emigrated to Utah in 1847. Before he was 20 he was sent on missions to the gold regions of California and the Hawaiian Islands. Like Joseph F. Smith, he was a hard-working efficient missionary in Hawaii who mastered the language and amazingly, translated the Book of Mormon into the native language.

Cannon proved to be a natural writer, reporter, editor and publisher. He presided over the British mission and edited The Millennial Star. He also edited The Juvenile Instructor and other pubs. He oversaw the early Deseret News. He was also an accomplished diplomat and politician, serving as a territorial delegate in Washington D.C., and lobbying cultural and political powers to soften their stances against the young Mormon church, particularly on polygamy. 

He would lose on his efforts to soften blows against polygamy. He would lose his territorial seat, and eventually go into hiding as a fugitive. He would serve a short time in prison as a convicted polygamist. Prior to his incarceration, Cannon II relates an escape attempt after Cannon was located by marshals. Cannon jumped off a moving train and was badly injured.

Cannon was a fervent polygamist. He married six wives and fathered 43 children. His oldest sons occasionally caused him great stress. John Q. Cannon, a journalist and general authority, committed adultery with his wife's sister. John Q. Cannon impregnated Louie Wells. This resulted in his excommunication, divorce, and a hasty marriage to Louie. He also faced a criminal charge. Tragically, Louie, largely ignored by John Q., died soon after birthing a stillborn child. Cannon's' eldest son was later rebaptized and remarried to his former wife.

Another son, Frank, while possessing political and journalism talents, was an alcoholic and a rake. Frank, who served in political positions, was at times shielded by his father's power. Once George Q. Cannon died, Frank saw his influence diminish considerably. He later became a fierce antagonist against the LDS Church, and later President Joseph F. Smith, writing a book and lecturing against the LDS Church across the nation.

Cannon's heavy influence with church presidents Woodruff and Snow led to some criticism, although it may have been just jealousy. He was impulsive on business dealings for the church and himself. Not all succeeded, and he took criticism for some dealings. In his defense, it was a time of great anxiety. The LDS Church was in peril of financial obliteration due to legislation punishing the church for polygamy. 

Statehood was a goal for Cannon, and one way he helped was taking the LDS Church's political party, and moving members into conventional party politics, rather than the clannish LDS church party. 

In 1900, the elder statesman Cannon returned to Hawaii, 50 years after his mission. As Cannon II notes, he was greeted warmly, with love and respect. But his health was failing, and he died soon afterward in 1901.

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A postscript: In his introduction to "Like a Fiery Meteor ...," author Tayson says there are two previous biographies of Joseph F. Smith. Both, he notes, are hagiographies, "written for a casual LDS audience seeking faith-promoting portraits of LDS leaders." Taysom contrasts those two biographies with a biographical essay titled, "Before the Beard: Trials of the Young Joseph Smith." Taysom says that essay falls under the spectrum "described by biographer Oleg V. Khlevniuk as 'archival exposes.'" As Taysom notes, this is the practice of using newly released, less favorable historical documents "in such a way that only the sensationally negative aspects of the figure are revealed." As Tayson writes, "Both hagiographies and archival exposes suffer from the same malady: they tend to be one-dimensional and deeply invested in the 'morality' rather than than 'humanity' of their subjects."

Fortunately, the above biographies of Smith and Cannon avoid the tags of hagiography or archival expose. Readers are awarded with insights into their lives, their times, the families, their careers, and their humanity.

A 'Utah Camelot' scandal led to the death of an early-Mormon 'princess'

I’m haunted by a ragged PDF-copied photograph, courtesy of the Utah State Historical Society, of Louisa “Louie” Wells, who 130 years ago was a princess in Mormon Salt Lake City. The poor quality of the reproduced photo does not hide that she was a beautiful young woman. “Louie” Wells was the daughter of Mormon elitist Daniel Hamner Wells, Salt Lake City mayor, and Emmeline Blanche Wells, Mormon feminist and magazine editor.

Besides being favored with beauty, and a steady, esteemed Mormon suitor, journalist Robert W. Sloan, Louie was as accomplished as a Jane Austen heroine. She sang beautifully, she performed in Salt Lake City plays and operas, including “The Mikado,” was an early leader of the LDS ladies Mutual organization, and was an excellent essayist, writing accounts of her travels to the eastern United States and Europe for the LDS journal Women’s Exponent. She was groomed to be a Mormon woman icon, perhaps as well known today as Eliza R. Snow.

Today, in a corner of the Salt Lake City cemetery, a tombstone, well over a century old, bears the name “Louie,” and nothing else. Louie Wells died an agonizing death at 24, far from home, with her mother at her side, helpless to save her. In less than a year, her bright future and presumed happiness was extinguished. The events that led to her death roiled Salt Lake City and nearly destroyed the kinship between two prominent families, the Wells and the Cannons. 

Historian Kenneth Cannon III’s article, “The Tragic Matter of Louie Wells and John Q. Cannon,” is must reading if one wants to learn more after reading this blog. In 1886, in the Salt Lake Tabernacle, John Q. — the eldest living son of Mormon elder George Q. Cannon, and a former Ogden Standard editor, Deseret News reporter, counselor in the LDS Church Presiding Bishopric, and husband of Annie Wells Cannon, Louie’s sister   — shocked a crowd gathered to worship by confessing to adultery. He was immediately excommunicated, promptly divorced from Annie, and then married to Louie.

Although John Q. Cannon did not mention the “other woman,” the hasty marriage to Louie made it easy to guess whom he had slept with. Try to imagine an LDS general authority today confessing to adultery during a stake conference and one understands how shocked Mormons were at the time. On the other hand, the anti-Mormon Salt Lake Tribune was delighted. It had, in 1884, published gossip that John Q. and Louie had secretly married. At the time, John Q. had tracked down the reporter, and beat him up.

After his 1886 confession to adultery, divorce and new marriage, federal marshals — always on the lookout for polygamists — arrested John Q., claiming his quick divorce from Annie was illegal. Louie, already pregnant, went into hiding but was located by authorities. She spent a humiliating time in court denying she was a plural wife.

The case against John Q. eventually lost steam. Long before its resolution, Louie was sent to San Francisco by her family to have the baby. It was not the first time that she had been made pregnant by her brother in law. John Q. confessed to an intimate that he had impregnated Louie in 1885 and that she had miscarried.  This news seems to lend partial credibility to the controversial Tribune article, although no marriage occurred. The source for that article, according to Kenneth Cannon’s piece, was Angus Cannon Jr., the despised, “scoundrel” son of Angus Cannon Sr., polygamist and stake president, who had accompanied John Q. when he confessed in 1886.

Louie Cannon Wells died six weeks after suffering her second miscarriage. Her death at 24 was due to dropsy, and she suffered terribly. Mom Emmeline was unable to help ease her pain, which must have been exacerbated due to stress, hiding and traveling. During their short marriage, Louie and her husband were likely never together. He was not at her side when she died. Shortly after Louie’s death, John Q. and Annie Wells were remarried. Several years later, Louie was sealed to John Q. in a temple ceremony.

At Louie’s funeral, an already bad situation was dangerously increased when stake president Angus Cannon publicly identified Louie as the adulterous partner of John Q. This created a feud between the Cannons and Wells that eventually led to Angus Cannon physically striking Louie’s sister, Mell, and threatening to tell more about the affair. Later, John Q. threatened to kill Angus Cannon. Tensions were finally eased thanks to the Wells family matriarch, Emmeline. Tolerant, and a peacemaker at heart, she reached out to the Cannons, and the situation calmed. However, the rift never died, as Emmeline Wells’ diary entry of May 17, 1898, footnoted by Kenneth Cannon, reads, “Angus is 64 years old today. ... He has seen much sorrow and as he has been unkind and ungenerous to others harsh in his judgment one need not be surprised that it comes back upon him — As ye mete it out to others so shall it be unto you, and therefore he should expect it.”

As with any tragedy, there are “why” questions. Why didn’t John Q. make Louie a plural wife, and avoid church punishment? One answer may be that plural marriage for younger LDS scions was being subtly discouraged at a time when Utah leaders wanted statehood. More likely is that John Q. could not control his lust for a beautiful, younger sister in law living in the home, particularly when his own wife was pregnant. In his article, Kenneth Cannon points out that despite being the favored older son, (John Q. had been called to be an apostle long before the adultery was revealed, only to have that blocked by LDS Church President John Taylor), John Q. was a dysfunctional man. He was prone to drinking, gambling and carousing. It’s possible that inebriation fueled his lust. Also, one two occasions, John Q. embezzled thousands of dollars while held positions of trust. He was bailed out both times by his family’s influence.

Time, and staying alive, returned John Q. to society’s esteem. After his remarriage, he was restored to membership to the LDS Church and was a Deseret News editor. He and Annie had 12 children. John Q. is buried in the Cannon family plot next to his wife Annie. Elsewhere, in the Wells family plot, sits the stone with the sole word, “Louie,” on it.

-- Doug Gibson

A previous version of this column was published at StandardBlogs.

An historical novel on the affair is also available.

Review: Vengeance is Mine: The Mountain Meadows Massacre and Its Aftermath

 

Review by Doug Gibson

In “Vengeance is Mine: The Mountain Meadows Massacre and Its Aftermath” (Oxford University Press, 2023), authors Richard E. Turley Jr., and Barbara Jones Brown relate, 19 years after the massacre, the second trial of John D. Lee, the only man convicted.

It was a quick trial. One that easily garnered a conviction from a jury comprised entirely of Mormon men. As the book relates, this was in direct contrast to an earlier trial of Lee – before a jury of Mormons and non-Mormons – that resulted in a hung jury.

The reason for Lee’s conviction was simple. In this second trial, prosecutor Sumner Howard focused solely on the evidence against Lee, and did not waste time, and taxpayer dollars, attempting to convict LDS leaders Brigham Young, George A. Smith, and the faith itself. The first trial was a semi farce, with prosecutors, a newspaper (the Salt Lake Tribune), and a Utah political party hoping that failure to secure a conviction would lead to federal action that would crush the Mormon faith and its political power.

To get a hung jury, prosecutors in the first trial openly insulted the faith of the Mormon jurors during the trial. With a more mature prosecutor, Howard, actively working with Mormon cooperation -- something the previous prosecution had refused to do – testimony against Lee from participants and observers clearly established Lee’s guilt of truly horrible crimes.

There is truth that Lee, executed on the site of the massacre, was a scapegoat. The slaughter of 100-plus emigrants involved dozens of conspirators. William Higbee, Nephi Johnson, Philip Klingensmith, Isaac Haight, are examples of those who escaped court justice. But Lee was guilty. He deserved to be shot for his crimes.

“Vengeance is Mine …” is a follow-up to the 2008 book “Massacre at Mountain Meadows,” of which Turley was one of the authors. The follow up provides a thorough recap of the years after the massacre, including how the Civil War put the issue aside for a while.

The book describes a period of rhetorical “fire-and-brimstone” eras leading to the massacre – the Mormon Reformation of the mid 1850s, the assassination of apostle Parley P. Pratt, and the movement of federal troops to Utah. Speeches from Young, Smith and others promised violence -- and alliance with Native Americans -- if the federal government threatened the Mormon faith. It’s not difficult to imagine a gross over-response to a perceived threat to settlers, given the harsh rhetoric from ecclesiastical leaders.

I’ve read just about every book published on the Mountain Meadows Massacre. For some reason the horrors of the massacre hit hardest while reading “Vengeance is Mine ...”. Perhaps it’s the book’s narrative approach. The authors are very effective in conveying the horror of what occurred.

Offered a white flag of truce from Lee, the emigrants surrendered their weapons, with a promise of being led to safety. Shortly into the march, the men were shot – most in the head – by the supposed Mormon protectors.

As awful as that is, there was a worse fate for woman, infirm men, and nearly all children 7 or over. They were knifed and clubbed to death by Native Americans and settlers. Seventeen children were spared, only because Lee and other conspirators felt they wouldn’t be able to remember. There was a very young survivor, about 1, being brought to a home with her arm essentially hanging by a thread; a bone was shattered. The descriptions of the aftermath are sickening. They include Mormon participants laughing hysterically as they (unsuccessfully) tried to bury massacre victims. There’s an account of Lee – during an LDS church address – saying the massacre was the fulfilment of a revelation from God that he had received in a dream. I can’t get that out of my head – fast and testimony thanksgiving for killing.

An iconic presence through the book are bones, hair, and clothing littering the once-beautiful  site of the massacre. Repeatedly, wolves and other predators uncover meager efforts to bury the massacred. Even 19 years later, as Lee meets his fate, bones still litter the site.

The historian Hannah Arendt described evil as banal. The Mountain Meadows Massacre was banal evil. It was so stupid. Vicious men, full of prejudices and hate – motivated by unwise speeches -- tried to get Paiute Indians to kill emigrants from Arkansas.  That failed. When Mormon settlers shot at two emigrants, with one killed and the other fleeing to the wagons, the fate of the entire party was sealed. Lee and others were worried that survivors would relate their crimes once they arrived in California. It was ridiculous to think that killing 100-plus more people would hide a crime.

So, everyone had to die. No one waited for a messenger dispatched to Salt Lake City to get Brigham Young’s advice. He said to let the emigrants pass through. But it was too late. The cover up began. “It was all the Paiute’s fault.” … “Those emigrants killed were comprised of prostitutes and former tormenters of the faith in Missouri.” “They poisoned a cow and killed Indians and a young settler boy.” All lies; the ringleaders knew it.

But these false rationalizations endured for scores of years.

As mentioned, Lee – while guilty – served as a scapegoat for the massacres. It’s a compliment to the authors’ writing skills that one can feel a small measure of sympathy for Lee as over time he is abandoned by his faith, many of his wives, most of his church colleagues, and even the man he arguably loved most in the world, Brigham Young.

However, those most culpable did suffer, as the authors relate. Isaac Haight lived a nomadic, rough life. Every time he tried to settle into conventional Mormon life, outrage eventually sent him fleeing. He died of pneumonia. William Stewart  had a lonely, nomadic, running-away life. He died in Mexico due to gangrene in his leg. John Higbee eventually became insane before his death. His life “was a living hell,” a former Mormon is quoted as saying.

Philip Klingensmith became a loner, trying to avoid the stigma of his mere existence. Reports seem to indicate that he died in the same manner as Loyal Blood, the character on the run in E. Annie Proulx’s novel, “Postcards.”

And Nephi Johnson, while living a long life, never escaped the personal hell that his participation in the massacre brought him. Prior to his death, trying to speak to a young Juanita Leavitt (Brooks), all he could utter was “Blood! BLOOD! BLOOD!”

This is an excellent, well-researched history book by two talented historians. Both “Vengeance is Mine …” and “Massacre at Mountain Meadows” belong together as must-reads to learn the story, beginning to end, of the 1859 atrocity in Southern Utah.

Ron Ormond, Estus Pirkle and those hellfire and damnation films

 

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I like the Mormon definition of hell. It’s called Sons of Perdition, which to me has always sounded like a sequel to the Laurel & Hardy film “Sons of the Desert.” We keep the criteria for Sons of Perdition very vague. To get in there, someone has to fight against the gospel while having a clear knowledge of the truth. That sort of closes the gates of Mormon hell to everyone who has lived on earth except for Cain and Judas.

Originally published at StandardNET

What hell is like is an obsession for a lot of us out there. My brain is fried from watching a bunch of southern evangelical films of the early 1970s from the late Ron Ormond, who went from making cheap science fiction films in the 1950s, to making tame “adult” films in the 1960s to make “hell, fire and brimstone” evangelical films in the 1970s.

Dig these titles: “The Burning Hell,” “The Grim Reaper,”(with a young, buttery Rev. Jerry Falwell!)  and “If Footmen Tire You What Will Horses Do?” (The last one also includes commies as well as Christian-haters). It’s easy to ridicule these films. They basically have the same plot: Some people, mostly young, scorn Christianity and the warnings of real, burning hell that resembles Jonathan Edward’s “Sinners in the Hands of An Angry God.” One of the unbelievers has the bad luck to die — usually in a wreck. The camera then lingers lovingly for scores of minutes on the eternal tortures and miseries of the good old boy(s) who were earlier scorning God. Eventually, one of the unbelievers who is still alive wanders into a church. He listens to a Southern-fried preacher (in two of the films the preacher is played by a real preacher, the delightfully named Estus W. Pirkle). The climax of the film involves the disbeliever being so swayed by the Reverend Pirkle, and so afraid of hell, that he/she is born again and saved. It’s too late for the dead sinners, though, they keep burning forever.

The idea of the hell envisioned by Ormond and Pirkle still carries a lot of strength. The “Left Behind” series of books, which has sold 70 million-plus copies, imagines a post-Rapture where millions are consigned to a burning hell after prolonged suffering on earth. Today’s Islamic radicals consider the victims of their terrorism as “infidels,” and consign them to an eternal hell of suffering. And I recall watching a feature film on one of the SLC area TV evangelical channels, “Final Exit,” in which a woman murdered by a serial killer burns eternally in hell due to her promiscuous lifestyle. Her killer, however, due to a pre-execution conversion to Christ, is welcomed into heaven.

These depictions of hell, and what some people believe God will do to his children, are appalling. It is a doctrine in opposition to God’s love for his children and, in regards to Christianity, it also mocks the suffering of Jesus Christ. This point merits expansion. Though Mormons are taught that Jesus Christ suffered far more in the Garden of Gethsemane than on the cross being crucified, the traditional viewpoint is that Christ’s, or God’s, atonement was achieved in part through the pain he experienced being crucified.

However, in these movies a mortal’s post-earthly existence in hell is forever, which includes eternal suffering, usually by burning, that of course never ends. The obvious question: why would God wish his children to suffer more pain than Christ himself suffered on the cross? To take this doctrine is to worship a vengeful God, the opposite of love and charity.

The absoluteness of this doctrine is evil. If one does not accept Christ in the same manner of someone else, that individual is consigned to an eternal punishment in hell. Taken to its absurd conclusions, the vengeful God that hell-believers worship would consign to eternal torture an infinite amount of devout Mormons, Jews, Muslims, Seventh Day Adventists, Buddhists, and so on, who reject the entreaties of those who see only a narrow passage to heaven and a vengeful God punishing those who don’t “dot their i’s or cross their t’s.”

To sum up, to teach of any ‘hell’ with endlessly burning sinners is misguided. This doctrine hangs around still (has anyone been to an evangelical “hell house” for Halloween?) and it will always hang around. But as time goes, there are less adherents fooled, frightened by it.

(If anyone wants to watch those bizarre evangelical southern films from Ron Ormond and the Rev. Estus W. Pirkle, they’re available on that repository of culture, YouTube.  ”The Grim Reaper” is here and “The Burning Hell” is here. “If Footmen Tire You What Will Horses Do is here.)

-- Doug Gibson

Review: Convicting the Mormons: The Mountain Meadows Massacre in American Culture

 

Review by Doug Gibson

The Mountain Meadows Massacre of 1857 was a horrific atrocity. It was unfortunately not an uncommon occurrence in the western United States. Slaughters of innocents and the defenseless happened. Often the victims were Native Americans, or foreigners.

The Mountain Meadows Massacre was distinct. It involved white Americans orchestrating the slaughter of other white Americans. The guilty attempted to recruit Native Americans, but with limited success. A plot to blame the massacre on a tribe was unsuccessful.

The killers were located in southern Utah. Youngsters deemed too young to be murdered were kidnapped and assimilated among residents. Eventually, they were freed and returned to relatives. Yet despite many investigations, massive media and popular culture coverage of the massacre, it took nearly 20 years for only one man, John D. Lee, an active participant in the massacre, to be tried -- twice -- and executed. Why did it take so long? 

In "Convicting the Mormons: The Mountain Meadows Massacre in American Culture" 2023 The University of North Carolina Press (Amazon link here), Brigham Young University lecturer and historian Janiece Johnson argues that popular culture defined the massacre as an atrocity committed by the Mormons, and later the church's leadership, rather than by a group of individuals in southern Utah.

This near-complete focus of Mormonism as the villain, and guilty party in the Mountain Meadows Massacre, hampered the quality and success of the investigations. It was easier, and sold more print, to cast a religion, and a people, as the guilty, rather than to keep the focus secular and on the actual suspects.

Johnson has dug deep into 18th century archives and includes about two dozen reprints of then-contemporary media treatment of the LDS faith. The church was already unpopular due to its embrace of polygamy. The massacre was used to provide evidence that polygamy, and other Mormon mores -- including its "king-like" leadership, encouraged atrocities.

After news of the massacre was heard in California, Johnson notes, newspapers were quickly casting Mormons as the killers. Calls were made for the Mormons to be expelled from their territory. The suggested use of military force, or vigilantism, were met with approval. Going beyond periodicals, the Mountain Meadows Massacre was used to vilify Mormons in penny novels, more "respectable" literature, wild west shows, and "non-fiction" exposes of authors who claimed life experience among the Mormons, or had "witnessed" the massacre.

Few people today truly comprehend the power of print in the 19th century. It moved slowly but with a longer and deeper reach than digital has today.

Lest I give the wrong impression, Johnson is no apologist for the massacre. It is chilling that 120 innocents were slain, most after a white flag of truce was offered them in desperate straits. It was an evil act.

What makes this book so interesting is learning how the Mormon church became the de-facto defendant after the massacre, rather than the killers. Johnson explains how all Mormons were placed as failing 18th century conceptions of civilized behavior, citizenship, savagery, masculinity, manhood, and even whiteness. These assumptions, some recognized today as steeped in racism and misogyny, guided conventional thought, or respectability. Mormons failed to meet respectable mores, and the massacre provided the public evidence.

Mormons failed tests of citizenship; they were considered savage; this savagery was enhanced by the racist ideal that Mormons, being white, chose to be savage. There were even risible theories that the breeding of Mormons contributed to a deterioration in their physical and cognitive states.

Johnson writes how popular culture defined Mormons as failing the manhood, or masculinity, test. There were two preferred types of masculinity; the more violent "martial" southern version, or a more "restrained" "home and hearth" type of masculinity. Mormons failed both, because they allowed polygamy, and also because they failed to protect women and children killed at the massacre.

The focus through this 18th-century media was not to accuse just the actual killers of lacking masculinity, but the members of an entire religion. An interesting irony is included in which the killer of defenseless Mormon apostle Parley P. Pratt was widely lauded as a virtuous example of masculinity. The key to the killer's virtuous "masculinity" was that Pratt has married his wife. He was entitled to kill him any way he preferred.

Johnson points out the contradictions of masculinity assumptions and how they were fostered in bigotry. One example is boxer Jack Johnson deemed a savage, but his white challenger James J. Jeffries deemed noble. Another example was Chinese men in 1870s California having their masculinity maligned due to the number of Chinese women prostitutes.

As the popular culture obsession with Mormonism continued, the actual legal machinations of the Mountain Meadows Massacre moved very slowly. John D. Lee's first trial ended in a hung jury. As Johnson notes from the transcript, prosecutors acted as if the defendant was the Mormon Church, more than Lee. LDS jurors were fed a long litany of supposed Mormon evil, many of the "evidence" gathered from popular media offerings. The Mormon jury members were essentially told they could redeem their "sins" with a conviction.

In a smaller, more subdued second trial, Lee was convicted and later executed. The iconic pictures of him sitting on his coffin just prior to being shot are powerful. As Johnson notes, by this time, prosecutors and media had moved toward wanting Mormon leader Brigham Young punished for the massacre. The evidence wasn't there, and Lee, to his credit, did not falsely implicate Young, despite heavy pressure: this despite Lee being thoroughly disillusioned with his one-time adopted father.

Yet, the idea that Young was the mastermind behind the massacre is one assumption that still lingers. Books and films published within the past generation push this theory.

In "Convicting the Mormons," Johnson notes predictions that the Mormon Church would eventually wither away. Some thought the extinction of Mormonism would occur as children rejected their parents' faith. Others thought the death of Brigham Young -- soon after Lee's execution -- would hasten the church's demise. It did not happen. Once the church officially ended polygamy, it soon became a state. As the book notes, this could be construed as Mormons ironically benefitting from white privilege. Mass violence, or expulsions did not occur. Establishment avenues were available for the church to gain respectability.

From Juanita Brooks on, there are several excellent books on the massacre. Even though I disagree with the late Will Bagley's contention Brigham Young was involved, his "Blood of the Prophets" is a valuable read. A new book on the massacre is being released. I'll be reading it with interest, eager to learn more. Transparency is always the best solution.

"Convicting the Mormons" provides valuable context on how the massacre influenced the popular culture. It's a must read.

John Corrill was an older Christian convert to the early Mormon church

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The early years of the Mormon Church are distinct for its young converts, with 20-something apostles embracing the progressive, radical-for-its-time distinctions between Joseph Smith’s Mormonism and the traditional Protestant Christianity. However, there was another type of early LDS convert; an older generation who embraced Christian primitivism, which encompassed a desire to return to strict Biblical principles, disdained “priestcraft,” and had a libertarian streak, mixed with republican ideals, that opposed a centralized church leadership dictating to local church groups. Most importantly, this type of convert would never place a prophet’s opinion over his own personal beliefs.

Given the direction the Mormon Church took over its 14-plus years with Smith solely at its helm, it’s not surprising that a substantial number of the older-generation converts did not stick with Mormonism. Perhaps the best example of this type of early Mormon convert who enjoyed prominence in the young church but later abandoned it is John Corrill, who is mentioned a couple of times in the Doctrine of Covenants. In the book “Differing Visions: Dissenters in Mormon History,” University of Illinois Press, 1994, historian Kenneth H. Winn provides an interesting recap of Corrill’s life and tenure in Mormonism. A Christian primitivist, Corrill, who turned 36 in 1831, initially investigated Mormonism with a determination to expose its follies. However, Corrill, who admired the primitivist teachings of Alexander Campbell, was shocked when he heard Sidney Rigdon, a former Campbell advocate he admired, pitching Mormonism enthusiastically.

As Winn notes, Corrill, a Massachusetts native, read The Book of Mormon and decided he could not declare it a fraud. Also, Mormonism appealed to specific primitivists such as Corrill in that it contained a certainty of belief that they sought, whether with the Book of Mormon or a yearning for “a prophet who could speak for God.” He, as well as his wife and family, joined the church in 1831 in Ohio.

Soon after his baptism, Corrill, after serving a mission, was sent to Missouri to help develop the church’s growth there. He served under Bishop Edward Partridge. It was here that Corrill first clashed with Smith’s leadership. Both he and Partridge favored a more local control than Smith wanted, and both were criticized by the Mormon prophet. Also, Corrill foresaw the problems that would develop with mass migration of poor Mormon converts to land long dominated by non-Mormon Missourians. The combination of religious bigotry among Missourians as well as unwise boasting by saints of establishing a religious and political kingdom led to violence and conflicts that the Mormons would always lose over the years.

Despite the conflict with church leadership, Corrill mended his problems with Smith and according to Winn, had a very strong ecclesiastical relationship with the young prophet through the mid-1830s. In 1836, Winn notes, Corrill was appointed by Joseph Smith to head the completion of the Kirtland Temple. Corrill also developed a reputation of being the Mormon leader who was best able to negotiate with anti-Mormon elements in Missouri. By 1837, Corrill was a leading Mormon settler in Far West, Missouri, ”selected ... as the church’s agent and as the ‘Keeper of the Lord’s Storehouse,’” writes Winn.

But that was the peak that preceded the fall of Corrill’s tenure in the church. As tranquil as events in Far West were, an ill-fated banking endeavor in Kirtland by Smith and other church leaders was leading to apostasy and tense disputes between church leaders and native Missourians. Corrill, Winn writes, regarded the Kirtland monetary failure with “revulsion.” He saw the lust for wealth, and the subsequent fall, as evidence of “suffered pride.” Yet he was as critical of Smith’s dissenters as he was of the banking effort. Also, Corrill still believed that the overall church, with auxiliaries serving as checks and balances, could reform itself and maintain the better relations between Mormons and non-Mormons that still existed in Far West.

That was not to be. The turmoil of Kirtland followed the church to Far West. To cut to the chase, a speech by Rigdon, called the “Salt Sermon,” appalled Corrill. In it, Ridgon, comparing apostates to salt having lost its savor, argued that they could be “trodden under the foot of men.” In short, Rigdon said that the dissenters “deserved ill treatment.”

Corrill warned the dissenters that their safety was in danger. Later, the Danites, a Mormon vigilante group, was organized. The militant group frightened Corrill, who began to work against it in secret. As Winn explains, “The crisis that began in Kirtland and eventually swept Corrill up in Missouri marked a major turning point in early Mormon history, pitting the theocratically minded devotees of the prophet, who regarded opposition to the church leadership as opposition to God, against more libertarian minded dissenters, who rejected the First Presidency’s claim over their temporal affairs and the authoritarian demand for blind obedience.”

Corrill saw the Danites and Ridgon’s call for conflict in direct opposition to the Biblical belief that God is responsible for divine retribution. From this point on, 1838, Corrill was basically in wait to be excommunicated, no longer trusted by the Smith/Ridgon leadership of the church. Nevertheless, church leaders acknowledged Corrill’s reputation for honesty by electing him — with the Danites’ support — to the Missouri legislature. The final break between Smith and Corrill was over the church leadership’s call for a communal structure, which included church leaders being paid for work other than preaching. The communal structure was, Winn notes, allegedly voluntary, although pressure was exercised on members to contribute. “In any event,” Winn writes, “Corrill deeply disapproved of the revelation and readily shared his opinion with others.”

Despite his church status, Corrill worked without success in the Missouri legislature to push Mormon interests and even donated $2,000 of his own money to help the beleaguered saints. By the time his term ended, most of his constituency had fled the area. Ridgon’s rhetoric, and the Danites’ actions, had led to militias overwhelming the church and Smith, Rigdon and others being jailed. Corrill, now without a church and due to be excommunicated in early 1839, left his religion. He wrote a book, “A Brief History of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints” in late 1839. It is an interesting read for its historical value. At the time though, it sold poorly and Corrill spent the last few years of his life in poverty. He died in 1842, leaving an estate of only $265.86. As Winn writes, “His integrity and basic decency were overshadowed by charges that he had betrayed the prophet and the church.” 

Corrill did offer testimony against Smith to Missouri court hostile to the Mormons. Richard Lyman Bushman, in his 2005 biography of Joseph Smith,also describes Corrill as a “the steady, clear-headed Missouri leader” who conflicted over how much free will he had to surrender to stay a faithful Mormon, and witnessing defeat after defeat, finally decided he had been deceived..

-- Doug Gibson

Originally published at StandardNet

Mormon Thunder recaps the life of Jedediah Morgan Grant

 

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Review by Doug Gibson

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Jedediah Grant was possessed of looks reserved for movie matinee idols, the counselor to Brigham Young was a major player in mid-1850s Utah ... and then he died.

One reason Grant may not get the same publicity as his peers is that he was a fiercely devoted advocate of the Mormon reformation, and spoke favorably of now-taboo doctrines such as blood atonement. Nevertheless, he had a fascinating life. Soon after his conversion, he became brother in law to William Smith, prodigal brother to the Prophet Joseph Smith. He served many missions for the church, worked closely with the Mormons’ non-Mormon ally Thomas Kane, and self taught himself to becoming a powerful speaker.

More than a generation ago, Gene A. Sessions, Ogden scholar, wrote a strong biography, “Mormon Thunder: A Documentary History of Jedediah Morgan Grant” (I have a 2008 edition published by Greg Kofford Books). Sessions captures the personality of this early-Mormon leader, and how a tender familial side could go to a bowery pulpit and strike fear in the hearts of the faithful.

Sessions writes: “Apparently believing that the bloodstream of the body of the Saints needed purification, he (Grant) openly fought dangerous notions that Restoration had lost its way under its new leadership. The Church, he maintained, could and ought to change, but only under the laws set down by the rule of the priesthood. That must be the unchanging order of the universe.”

Many of Grant’s discourses are in “Mormon Thunder,” and they are treasures. Here’ just one excerpt I enjoyed, particularly Grant’s use of slang for a cat: “... I know some of our milk and water folks thought all the fat was in the fire. ’Brother Brigham has gone rather too far; he might have spoken a little milder than he did. I think it would have been much better,’ &c. This was the language of some hearts; and I feel to say, damn all such poor pussyism. ...”

Sessions includes a major tragedy of Grant’s life, losing his wife and infant child on the Pioneer trail. The account includes his return to gather the infant’s body, only to discover the corpse had been picked apart and scattered by wild animals. Overall, “Mormon Thunder” is an interesting account of a remarkable church leader.

-- Originally published at StandardNET

H. Dean Thompson was a teacher, historian, comedian, marimba player

 

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(Originally published on April 22, 2011. I am rescuing from archive oblivion this great Cal Grondahl cartoon that went with original post.) 

I attended the funeral today of H. Dean Thompson, 79, of Ogden. A retired Ben Lomond High School teacher, he had a remarkable life. I only got to know Dean six or seven weeks ago. We swapped several e-mails that involved a shared love of LDS history. He sent me two family history books, fascinating, detailed biographies of his family stretching 200-plus years, with many anecdotes. 

I wanted to meet Dean. I was invited to his home. Two Saturdays ago, while packing his marimba equipment (Dean entertained at senior centers), he had a heart attack that would claim his life. He wrote several history books and an autobiography. After reading two, I’ll always regret only having the chance to see him in his coffin.

I want to share some of the history Dean recounted in his books, not only because it’s interesting but also because I suspect many longtime local families have similar histories. Perhaps it will inspire others to do what Dean did — preserve the memories of how our grandparents, great grandparents and earlier ancestors laid the foundation for the lives we enjoy today. The following is from “History of Heber Charles Gibson and Mary Amanda Bitton Gibson and their Pioneer Ancestors.”(Likes Publishing, Orem, Utah):

Dean’s grandmother, Mary Amanda Gibson, traced her LDS roots as far as her great-great grandparents, who joined the church in New England in the 1830s. Erastus Bingham, for example, was baptized with his wife Lucinda in 1833 in Vermont. Years later, when the couple and their family lived in Nauvoo, Brigham Young told them that an early church council held in their home in Vermont was the only meeting where are 12 Apostles were together during that era.

Now switch to the union of Wheatley Gibson and Selena Gibson, parents of Dean’s grandfather, Heber Charles Gibson. (The H. before Dean’s name is for Heber). Wheatley and Selena were born in England, and made their way over the plains to settle in the Weber area. He was 21, she was 16, when they met and fell in love immediately.

As Dean recounts from the sources he painstakingly researched, Wheatley and Selena fought “the cricket wars” of 1867 to 1872, where grasshoppers ate more up to three-quarters of the crops. Millions of crickets were fought with prayers, fires and little more.

Soon after the “the grasshopper wars,” black diphtheria struck the community, and Wheatley and Selena’s family was not exempt. Between 1877 and 1878, the couple watched helplessly as their children struggled. Two died and Selena barely escaped dying. Dean writes, “These epidemics must have been very frightening because so many died and because of the primitive state of medical care.” From his research, we learn that our Top of Utah ancestors used as medicine golden seal, bayberry, sulfur and molasses, cayenne pepper, etc.

I move forward to Dean’s grandfather, Heber Charles Gibson, farmer, bank board of director, faithful Mormon, and staunch Republican. Heber lived almost 90 years until the mid 1970s. His wife, Mary Bitton, died 10 years earlier. She was very active in the West Weber Relief Society. But I digress: In his research, Dean learned from former Democrat and U.S. congressman Gunn McKay that bishops used to go door to door in Huntsville assigning political parties to ward families. But these chosen political ideologies often stuck.

Dean recounts a relative’s assertion that Heber himself had had his family chosen Republicans. In an amusing anecdote, Dean recounts in the book that within the family assigned Republicans married assigned Democrats, which “caused a few heated discussions at family gatherings.”

What Dean saved for future generations with his painstaking, well-researched, detailed family histories is priceless, and of more value than any material wealth. He’s gone from the Earth, but I don’t for a moment think Dean Thompson is without many friends. What a great time he must be having right now with Wheatley, Selena, and the others.

-- Doug Gibson

C.S. Lewis, The Great Divorce, and the LDS Spirit World

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A couple of times a year, usually on a Sunday after church, I re-read C.S. Lewis’ marvelous post-mortal novella/fable “The Great Divorce.” It relates a journey of diminutive spirits (referred to as ghosts) to the outskirts of Heaven, where they are greeted by much larger, more powerful exalted spirits, eager to help them take a painful journey beyond the mountains to Heaven. The journey, and its accompanying pain, is a metaphor for repentance and shedding of sins.

Most of the “ghosts,” despite the mild persuasion of loved ones, friends and acquaintances who greet them, refuse the trip to Heaven. They prefer Hell because it allows them to retain their earthly passions and sins, obsessions, earthly pride, angers resentments, self-pity, manipulation, and narcissism. That is the foundation of what Lewis is teaching in his novella; that one must surrender the earth for Heaven.

As Lewis writes, “There are only two kinds of people in the end: those who say to God, ’Thy will be done,” and those to who God says in the end, ’Thy will be done.’“

”The Great Divorce“ can be called Dante-like. It’s a journey with many experiences, with a narrator and a teacher. Understand, I make no claim that C.S. Lewis saw any similarities between ”The Great Divorce“ and the Mormon concept of the post-mortal spirit world. In fact, Lewis — on more than one occasion — reminds readers that his story is a fantasy, and says, ”The last thing I wish is to arouse factual curiosity about the details of the after-world.“

Personally, I think Lewis had his tongue in his cheek with that remark, because of course ”The Great Divorce“ ”arouse(s) factual curiosity about the details of the after-world.“ And the concept of spirits retaining their weaknesses and more exalted spirits zealously attempting to teach them ”the right“ is a central tenant of Mormonism. But let me backtrack: From my earliest years in the LDS Church, I was taught that after we die, we either go to paradise or ”spirit prison.“ (For many childhood years, I envisioned ”spirit prison“ as a clean jail with bars, where orderly ”wicked“ spirits waited for good spirits to teach them the Gospel ...)

Instead, Mormon theology puts the spirits world as being on the earth. In the Book of Mormon, the prophet Alma taught that — like Lewis’ ghosts — what’s learned and appreciated on earth is carried to the spirit world. In the LDS post-mortal spirit world, there is no confirmation of any ”correct Gospel.“ Spirits congregate where they are most comfortable. The ”righteous“ spirits — like Lewis’ spirits — attend to spirits who need to learn the truth. I imagine much of the ”missionary work“ is without success. (As a lifelong Mormon, it’s impossible not to imagine these spirit ”missionaries“ as wearing dark suits and ties, or sisters in dresses, and carrying flip charts and Scriptures as they knock on doors in ”Spirit Prison.“)

In ”The Great Divorce,“ Lewis talks about many ghosts who are so obsessed with their earthly lives that they return to homes, places of work, etc., and ”haunt“ them. (Now, what I’m saying next is ”Doug doctrine“ and not LDS belief, but one reason I flinch at watching LDS football on Sunday is that I have this feeling a host of spirits — all obsessed with the Dallas Cowboys, etc., are also watching the game. If I turn the tube off and put on a CD of church music, they’ll take off! I also wonder about those kitschy reality ghost-hunting shows on TV. Are the malicious spirits having fun with us humans?)

(Yeah, I’m still being tongue in cheek now but what comes next is serious.) Lewis’s relating that the souls of purgatory/hell were handicapped by their earthly attachments parallels the LDS belief that missionary spirits are attempting to teach other spirits to shed those same attachments. A chief distinction, of course, is that Lewis considers his ”Hell and Heaven“ as the end result, while LDS theology sees the ”Spirit World“ as a far earlier part of our eternal existence. It is interesting, though, that ”The Great Divorce“ envisions active efforts to convert unbelievers after death; a concept that Mormonism can relate to. ”The Great Divide“ also places a person’s humility and true charity as more favorable than excessive religion and excessive charity, reminding the reader that these can become earthly obsessions which consume our other responsibilities.

As former Standard-Examiner cartoonist Cal Grondahl says, religion exists in one part to comfort us about our approaching death. C.S. Lewis, as a Christian, believed in life after death. To the righteous, his novella comforts, as the Mormon Spirit World comforts devout Mormons. I have no idea if Lewis regarded Mormons as Christians, but his novella — in which spirits find themselves more comfortable in dim, dreary, contentious surroundings and resist missionary efforts that offer a more exalted state — connects with LDS doctrine.

Also, it’s very interesting that in Lewis’ ”Hell,“ there are ghosts who have strayed so far away from the ”bus station“ that offers ghosts the opportunity to visit ”Heaven.“ As a result, they can’t go to Heaven’s outskirts anymore. This is similar to LDS doctrine, in which spirits in ”spirit prison“ are separated by those who are still teachable and those who are not. I recommend ”The Great Divorce“ to anyone, of course, but also to LDS readers who will find the unintentional similarities very interesting.

-- Doug Gibson

This column was previously published at StandardBlogs.

Secular appeal helped Utah to be a big hit at 1893 Chicago Congress

 

In contrast to the Mormon Church’s bitter rejection at the 1893 Chicago Parliament of Religions, the territory of Utah was warmly received at the Congress of States and Territories, recounts historian Konden R. Smith in his Journal of Mormon History essay, The Dawning of a New Era: Mormonism and the World’s Columbian Exposition of 1893. (Both events were part of the Chicago World’s Fair). As Smith writes, “In contrast to Mormonism’s rejection from the Great all, Utah Territory … was granted the coveted ‘Lot 38’ in the Congress …” Smith adds that Utah was “thrilled.”

“Lot 38” was one of the largest and situated in the middle of the hall. The reason for Utah’s success was simple: Mormons and non-Mormons in the territory — united in a desire to become a state — stayed away from the religious aspects of Utah, and emphasized its secular strengths. As Smith writes, “Its (Utah’s exhibit) central objective was to make a good impression on visitors, creating an image of Utah characterized by its great potential as a valuable future state with exemplary citizens.” 

The successful exhibit focused on “agriculture, mines, manufacturing, fine arts, ethnology and archaeology, education, women’s work, and a bureau of information” from spectators. Ogden Catholic and mineralogist, Dominick Maguire, educated fair attendees on Utah’s minerals. 

The territory promoted its granting of the vote to women as proof of its feminist appeal. Utah’s then-Gov. Caleb W. West, who was not Mormon, dismissed talk of a theological rule in Utah, saying, “In times past there have been struggles and differences, and I mention these only to say that they exist no more. They have been buried and now we bespeak for Utah simply justice,” recounts Smith.

Most notably, the LDS Prophet Wilford W. Woodruff spoke on Utah Day in Chicago, but he spoke not as a religious leader, but as oldest living pioneer, writes Smith. The Congress certainly went a long way toward achieving Utah statehood in three years, and the effort paid off in highly favorable press coverage. The New York Times, for example, dismissing any threats from Mormonism as remants of the now-ended Brigham Young era. 

The Times also derided opponents of Utah statehood as “non-Mormon ministers, who were spouting fears of now-dead policies such as “polygamy,” recounts Smith. Of course, polygamy was not quite gone. It’s amazing that two separate battles were waged by the church; one by itself, the losing effort to include the LDS faith at the Chicago fair; and the other, very successful campaign, with non-Mormons, to promote Utah territory.

As mentioned in the previous post, the Chicago World’s Fair was promoted as the end of the frontier times. In many ways, that is an apt description for the evolution of the Mormon faith. Its determination to be included in national events, its determination to be a state, were in sharp contrast to the church’s anti-government, distrust of external authority it had promoted only a generation or two earlier. 

The current Mormon Church hierarchy is often described — sometimes with admiration, other times less admirably — as having strong public relations skills. Its success at the Congress of States and Territories is proof that today’s promotional skills were inherited from leaders more than 100 years ago. 

The ecuminity between Utah’s Mormons and “gentiles,” Smith explains, was a realization that an end to popular fears and prejudices against the Mormons would benefit all Utah Territory residents.?As Smith also notes, the relatively new Mormon Tabernacle Choir was a big hit in Chicago. The 400-plus members of the Choir performed in Chicago on Sept. 8, 1893, to lots of acclaim, including a favorable review in The Chicago Daily Herald.

It is notable that after the Chicago events were over, Mormon leaders, including George Q. Cannon and Lorenzo Snow, Francis M. Lyman, and Heber J. Grant, at LDS General Conference in October, ignored the repudiation of the church itself and focused on the positive results of Utah’s exposure at the Congress.

As Smith notes, it was a moment of realization for late 19th century Mormons, “that, if they hoped to accomplish their goals as a people — they could not do so when ‘all hell” raged against them. Rather, Mormons by finding acceptance as American citizens who believed in progress and social reform, sought a position of equality rather than marginalization and oppression.”

In short, the secular triumphed over the theological.

-- Doug Gibson

Originally published in 2011 at StandardBlogs.