Talk:Utah War

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This article is part of WikiProject Utah, a WikiProject related to the U.S. state of Utah.

Contents 1 Mountain Meadows Massacre 2 NPOV issues with links 3 Expansion possibilities: "Response in Utah" 4 Removal of NPOV & Cite templates

[edit] Mountain Meadows Massacre

B said: "mountain meadows victims are not casualties of the Utah War" Why do you say that?

• The Mormons were organized militarily
• The indians clearly believed they were assisting the Mormons to fight the "Americans (Mericats)"
• The Massacre is listed on this page in the war sequence

What evidence or sentiment could lead to a different POV? Tom (hawstom) 19:48, 19 May 2004 (UTC)

The tragedy was related to (incidental, tangential), but not part of the Utah War; it was not an attack on or by a military unit. —B|Talk 19:53, May 19, 2004 (UTC)

Why do you say the attack was not by a military unit? All (Well, not all. Much of) the language of the participants and commanders was in terms pointing to and leaning on their military organization.  ????? Tom (hawstom) 20:42, 19 May 2004 (UTC)

State the orders (verbal or written) for such and such military unit to do such and such. It doesn't exist. The participants were not acting in an official capacity as a military unit. —B|Talk 21:37, May 19, 2004 (UTC)

This is confirmed by American Massacre (a decidedly non-NPOV source, but whatever), FWIW. As much as Sally Denton tried, she could find no direct orders from Salt Lake (let alone from Brigham Young himself) to the militias at Parowan and Cedar City ordering the attack on the Fancher train. The letter from Young to Lee supposedly ordering the MMM turned out to be a Mark David Hoffman forgery.

Hey, B. I sure appreciate your helping me understand this event better. What an event to try to catalog! I think we should back up a step or two. Were the Fanchers and company casualties of the Utah War? Was Nick Berg a casualty of the Iraq War? Do we have to show paper orders to assign casualties? There was ecclesiastical pressure on the men who participated in MMM (including Lee), but there was about equal military pressure used. How is it possible to be respectful to the Fancher and company dead and not list their numbers as Utah War casualties? Would we deny Nick Berg the respect of being listed as an Iraq War casualty? Sorry for the shotgun of questions. You don't have to answer them point by point of course. I really want to understand what drives you to remove the Fancher Company from the count. I need to understand your point of view on this. Thanks. Tom (hawstom) 22:04, 19 May 2004 (UTC)

In reply to your questions above: 1)As implied by me earlier, the Fanchers are not casualties of the Utah war. 2) Nick Berg is not a casualty of the Iraq War. The Iraq War is over. It has been for some time now. What is going on in Iraq now is peace-keeping, not war. 3) For you to say, "Do we have to show paper orders to assign [war] casualties?" mischaracterizes my comments. I did not limit orders to "written", as you imply. I would think that good sense would lead someone to believe that generally a war casualty only occurs when one military unit engages another military unit. As I already stated above, MMM "was not an attack on or by a military unit". Even if it was fair to characterize the attackers as a military unit, it is still arguable that the Fanchers were not war casualties because an intentional attack on civilians is generally an illegitimate action for a military unit. As it stands, there were no verbal nor written orders authorizing a military unit to engage civilians. period. It's not like any of the Mormon attackers were sort of full-time regular soldiers. 4) The respect for the Fanchers is given by recognizing them as victims of MMM, not the Utah War. 5) Your comparison with Nick and MMM/Utah War is problematic, but anyway: Nick is not being disrespected by not being listed as an Iraq War casualty. He is a civilan victim of insurgent-rebel-terrorists, not military units. —B|Talk 15:06, May 20, 2004 (UTC)

The two are interconnected events, but not part of the same issue. The Utah War was very much a northern Utah "Mormons versus US Govt" deal. The Fancher party were not the government, they had nothing to do with the removal of Mormons from political office (one of the major issues of Mormon's fighting back). The MMM was a completely seperate, albeit, interconnected issue.

However, they were part of the same retrenchment/reformation era. Both events likely contributed to the other's issues - in a similar way as the war in Afganistan and the War in Iraq are related (although that is a bad comparison), but totally seperate issues. -Visorstuff 00:14, 20 May 2004 (UTC)

Would it be fair to say then that the Utah War never really happened--only threatened? It seems to me that if there was a war at all, MMM was what you might call a war crime of it. Tom (hawstom) 02:12, 20 May 2004 (UTC)

Utah "War" is a misnomer; it's more like the "Utah standoff". AFAIK, there were no casualties resulting from the few engagements between the Mormons and the US Army. War crime? That's getting too ananchronistic, don't you think? MMM is not a war crime. Lee was convicted in civilian court, not a courts-martial. —B|Talk 14:13, May 20, 2004 (UTC)

A civilian court. I was wondering about that myself. I have to say I have immersed myself deeply in MMM, and the only way I can make sense of it is in the context of the Mormons having written off the USA and having sworn vengeance for the wrongs of Missouri and Nauvoo and for the blood of the Prophet and Hyrum, which was of course the attitude that got them in trouble and brought on the "standoff" in the first place. Tom (hawstom) 21:53, 20 May 2004 (UTC)

Suppose you had hired a bunch of mercenaries to help defend your family against my family. Suppose some innocents of my family happened along the path of your mercenaries and got trapped, and some of them killed. Suppose a small army from my family was on its way, and a huge army from my family was available should your family become a real problem.

Now suppose your mercenaries insisted they had claim on the goods of the party from my family, and suppose some of the party from my family were very poorly behaved and violent. Suppose shots were fired and in a heated week of desperation, your family decided the only way to save its skin was to annhilate the party from my family and keep the whole affair a secret, lest the story should get out to my family that your family was in open, bloody rebellion and I come annhilate your whole family.

I might say my poor family were victims of bloodthirsty fanatics, or I might say they were casualties of the conflict. Which would you prefer? Tom (hawstom) 21:53, 20 May 2004 (UTC)

B is right that "an intentional attack on civilians is generally an illegitimate action for a military unit." And that is part of what is so horrific about MMM. Here is a mainstream view that clearly sees MMM as a military action:

Juanita Brooks, a noted Utah historian, is famous for the integrity with which she insisted upon recounting the saga of the Mountain Meadows Massacre. <snip> Two books elevated Brooks to fame: The Mountain Meadows Massacre (1950) and John Doyle Lee: Zealot, Pioneer Builder, Scapegoat (1961). The books demonstrated that Mormon militia, acting upon prior orders, assisted Indians in the treacherous massacre of California-bound emigrants in 1857 and that John D. Lee, tried and executed for the massacre, was unfairly singled out from a number of responsible officers. Characterized by impeccable research and deep compassion, these works showed that the massacre was a tragedy for the Mormons as well as for the emigrants who died at their hands. [1](emphasis added)

MMM was ordered by Colonel William H. Dame, directed by Lieutenant Colonel Isaac C. Haight, and executed by John D. Lee. Tom (hawstom) 20:30, 1 Jun 2004 (UTC)

I've added a section titled Consequences (which could be changed, if anyone has something better). Would a brief mention of the MMM be appropriate there rather than the one sentence recently added to the topic paragraph? Comment please. WBardwin 07:06, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] NPOV issues with links

I really take issue with the uncommented inclusion of a Utah Lighthouse Ministries link here. At least a remark should be made about the source. --Slightlyslack 04:09, 22 May 2005 (UTC)

It looks like the link is good and useful notwithstanding the source. Tom Haws 23:10, May 24, 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Expansion possibilities: "Response in Utah"

The article has some strong areas, but LDS/Utah perspective on these events are really only included in the timeline and in scattered bits and pieces. I would suggest a section on the Utah/LDS activities, including the activitie of the Nauvoo Legion, the global move to Provo and points south, the recall of European and American missionaries, the buildup of fear and tension, the MMM, and Kane's intervention to settle the matter. Comments and ideas?? WBardwin 05:48, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Removal of NPOV & Cite templates

At this point, these generic templates are next to useless for an article this evolved. If someone contests specific statements or specific sources, use the appropriate tags in the actual article:

• {{fact}} produces [citation needed]
• {{who}} produces [attribution needed]
• {{vc}} produces [this source's reliability may need verification]
• {{POVassertion}} produces (Neutrality disputed — See talk page)
• {{POV-statement}} produces [neutrality disputed]

Sections which are totally unsourced can be pulled intact to the talk page to be discussed or re-added later. Drive-by editors slapping templates on articles is not conducive to actual progress or consensus. Rather than raging against the wiki, why not contribute to the article? - WeniWidiWiki 00:52, 15 January 2007 (UTC)