ONE hundred and twenty men. women, and children were murdered by Mormons and Indians, at the Mountain Meadows, on Friday, September 16, 1857, or thereabouts. The victims were members of a train under command of Captain Fancher, and are generally known as the Arkansas Emigrant Company. At that time Brigham Young was Governor of Utah Territory, and also the head of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. Acting as Governor of the Territory, he and his followers had, for a series of years, violated the laws of the United States, with insulting impunity, and then were standing in hostile attitude towards the government. Brigham Young had the audacity to declare Utah under martial law, and call out his legions of fanatics to oppose the forces of the United States which had been ordered to Utah to enforce obedience to the Government. As leader and head of the Mormon Church, he had taught his followers to believe that he was an inspired man, and as such, receiving orders and revelations direct from the God of Heaven; that the time had arrived when Christ was to come to earth and reign a thousand years, and that all who did not accept the Book of Mormon, and the teachings of Brigham Young, as God's holy religion, were to suffer death, and the wealth of the unbelievers to become the property of the so-called Saints. He also taught the doctrine that all who opposed his orders or refused obedience to his commands should die, and if they had been members of the Mormon Church their blood was to be shed to save their souls. At that time, Brigham Young had the sole control of everything in Utah; his word was law; his orders were given under the pretense that they emanated from God, and to disobey his orders was treason to the Church and punishable by death. The Mormon people were willing followers of their designing leader.

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I claim that Brigham Young is the real criminal, and that John D. Lee was an instrument in his hands. That Brigham Young used John D. Lee, as the assassin uses the dagger, to strike down his unsuspecting victim ; and as the assassin throws away the dagger, to avoid its bloody blade leading to his detection, so Brigham Young used John D. Lee to do his horrid work; and when discovery becomes unavoidable, he hurls Lee from him, cuts him away from the Church, and casts him far out into the whirlpool of destruction. The assassin has no further use for his weapon. I also claim that if religious fanaticism can clear a man from crime, that John D. Lee was guiltless, for he was one of the most intensely fanatical Mormons that infested Utah in 1857. But I do not claim that the fact of his being a fanatic and blinded believer of Brigham Young's so-called revelations excused him — far from it. In place of excusing him, it added to his crime.