LDS

What I read.

     Some people hate Mormons. Some Mormons hate Mormons. Some of my family members hate Mormons. My dad's side of the family is Mormon. There is much that I have heard as far as speculation is concerned. There is much I have read as far as why people loathe them. 

     What people say is that Mormons are child molesters. They say they are all polygamists. Because of negative beliefs in Mormons, they were chased from state to state by lynch mobs. So, they finally find Zion in Idaho and Utah where they reside today. The hatred never stopped there.

     When I was sixteen, my Grandpa Maughan passed away on Christmas Eve. I went to my first open casket funeral, but I never went in to view it. I was too afraid of seeing a dead body for the first time. I noticed how controlling some of the family members were no matter if I knew who they were or not. 

    I overheard a story about a massacre that happened in Preston, Idaho. This was where I heard confusion about what really happened. I realize that nobody will ever have the story straight. The land that the massacre happened on was supposedly owned by my great grandfather Maughan. He was ripped off by someone who bought it and this individual happened to be a Mormon. 

     When my Grandma Maughan passed away years later, I heard more information about Preston and this was where my journey began. For about twenty years, I have been studying the Latter Day Saints and the Bear River Massacre. This has been quite a long journey. 

     What my father told me was that the Mormons were sent by my great, great grandpa Maughan to save the Native Americans from the confederates. I also heard stories about how the Mormons were the ones who went to murder the Shoshone or the other story was that the Mormons sent the confederates to kill them. 

     I decided that it was time for me to conduct research and see if there was any information that I could debunk. At the time, I thought that Mormons were in-breeders who are hypocritical and drunk. 

     I searched high and low for any information that I could find about the Bear River Massacre, why people hate Mormons, and Preston, Idaho. I was disappointed with what I found, but not surprised because I could not research Nefertiti. 

     At the time, the only information online was a family tree and a couple of short stories that mentioned Peter Maughan. Peter was from England and traveled to America when he converted to the Latter Day Saints. He lost his wife on the way here and married Mary upon arrival. 

     I began to read about how the railroad was being built through Idaho. This brought me to a book called The Anti-Mormon Movement. I found this book while searching for Peter Maughan at the library. Sometime during the 1870's, there was an anti-Mormon movement in Idaho where the railroad was being built. 

     The Mormons were segregated from the non-Mormons. There were Mormon and non-Mormon stores. The Mormon stores charged more than the other stores did. An individual who was a Mormon went to a non-Mormon store and made a purchase. William Maughan had lectured her on what a terrible thing she had done. Not too long after the incident, William turned around and made a purchase from a non-Mormon store. I do not know what happened next, but I think that was a double standard. 

     My research continued and gradually more information had turned up. I finally located a couple of books about the Bear River Massacre. These books were difficult to locate. I finally found a copy of each book at Barnes and Noble. 

     I found a few books about Utah and the tourist books had a paragraph about the massacre. This is strange since the tragedy happened in southern Idaho. I traveled to Preston to see what I could find. There is a cliff overlooking the site about two miles north of Preston. The attraction is small and difficult to locate, but there is a little bit of information about what occurred.

     I toured the flooded site of Fort Hall, but it only contained information about the gold miners. The Fort Hall Indian Reservation is in Pocatello, which is two hours north of Preston. There is a museum dedicated to the Shoshone named Sacajawea. She was the one who helped Louis and Clark on their expedition. I asked the museum if they knew anything about the massacre, but it is not their culture to speak of such tragedies. The trip to Preston was a slight failure, but I had a chance to see the buildings Peter built and the land where 500 Native Americans were murdered. 

     In college, I discovered that most of the information I had found was fiction. I wrote a paper about how President Lincoln was racist. I wrote about this because I thought he was responsible for the attack on the Shoshone. It turns out that he had absolutely nothing to do with it.

     The massacre of the Shoshone had nothing to do with land. The Mormons did not send anyone to murder them nor was it their fault. In fact, nobody was sent there at all to massacre the natives. It was all the decision of one person who thought it was in the interest of President Lincoln. 

     Once the land was bountiful and the indigenous people had plenty to eat. When the trappers arrived, the natives were reduced to eating roots and berries. When the farmers came, the natives had no place to sleep. The Shoshone did what they could to survive and that was either by stealing or depending on the Latter Day Saints to feed them. 

     As more emigrants traveled through the valley, the more problems had escalated. Emigrants were being murdered and attacked. People believed that all of the Native Americans were committing these heinous acts. Most of these attacks were committed by white people and some of them did it disguised as a Native American. 

     Supposedly, Lincoln was having issues with the Latter Day Saints. The only thing they were doing was keeping peace with the natives and trying to survive. I read that there were two occasions where the residents at Maughan's Fort had to evacuate just to house the troops. 

     When the Civil War began, a boot camp was established in California. Lincoln was trying to communicate with the camp in California through the Pony Express. The natives consistently attacked the Pony Express looking for food. Lincoln grew weary of this and called upon the troops in California to watch the trail.

     Of course, the troops were annoyed because they wanted to fight in the Civil War instead of babysit Native Americans and the Latter Day Saints. So, General Connor devised a battle against the Shoshone thinking this was in President Lincoln's best interest. General Connor led his troops through the cold weather near Preston to set up camp.

     On January 29, 1863, the army charged into the Shoshone's camp as they slumbered. They were rudely awoken by the battle. Their homes were burned down to the ground. Women were raped and brutally murdered. Children were brutally murdered. The chief was captured and was violently murdered. 500 Shoshone perished and never received a proper burial. The 14 soldiers who died are buried in a memorial in Logan, Utah.

     The survivors went to Preston. They had no choice, but to succumb to the ways of the white man. The Latter Day Saints took them in. Peter wrote to Brigham Young the terror he saw in the women’s eyes. The residents of the area saw the soldiers pass though, but they had no idea why they were there. The Latter Day Saints had nothing to do with this carnage.

     General Connor was the one who was responsible for this act. All of this over people who were starving. All of this happened because some immature individual thought that this violence was justified because they were "savages."