Author takes on 'Utah War'
Now at the war's 150th anniversary, William P. MacKinnon has the first of his new two-volume history of that war, "At Sword's Point," appearing in bookstores this month. He said documents discovered regarding the conflict will challenge some long-held views.
"It was not the stainless, righteous federal government putting down rebellion of nasty Mormons, as some think, and not the heroic Nauvoo Legion outwitting an Army sent by a doddering old man in the White House, as others think," he said. "It was not a one-dimensional, cartoonish, good guys vs. bad guys story."
For example, he says he found that Brigham Young ordered his troops to kill approaching U.S. Army officers and guides in some circumstances, contrary to tradition that he sought and achieved a largely bloodless war. MacKinnon said those orders, though never carried out specifically, apparently contributed to some murders.
And the Army, filled with future Civil War generals and heroes, may not have been very heroic or smart. Its one-time ranking commander on the trail even admitted in writing he had no idea what his mission was or what he was doing.
"I chose to write a senior essay that would approach the character of a Ph.D. dissertation," he said. In fact, it would exempt him from attending classes his last two years. "About 10 percent of the senior class graduated that way back then."
With much at stake, including graduation, he sought advice from his unofficial Yale mentor, Howard R. Lamar, whose class on Western Americana had thrilled him. Lamar was an authority on Utah's territorial period.
"He suggested the Utah War. I had never heard of it," MacKinnon said, adding that most people still know little or nothing about the "war."
The war occurred when President James Buchanan sent an Army to Utah amid reports that Mormons were in rebellion. From their perspective, Mormons believed old persecution had renewed and the Army would murder its leaders. Mormon raids helped strand the Army in Wyoming until negotiations could forestall major bloodshed.
"Yale had received a treasure trove of Western Americana documents from a donor in the 1940s, and had just finished cataloguing them in the mid-'50s. There was a vast supply of untapped material in there about the Utah War — letters, military orders and newspapers," MacKinnon said.
Recent comments
Having seen parts of the manuscript and knowing Bill MacKinnon'...
Polly Aird | April 14, 2008 at 11:44 a.m.
A very informative article about the "Utah War." He gives...
Don Bennett | April 13, 2008 at 9:45 p.m.
