The atrocity marked a moment when long-oppressed members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, fearful of outsiders disturbing their hard-won peace, resorted to violence against civilians, slaughtering all but the youngest children. Below are excerpts of that conversation, edited for clarity. The series was very confusing to me. In it, the massacre seemed to take place just a few miles outside of Fort Bridger, in modern-day Wyoming. In fact, the attack took place hundreds of miles away in southwest Utah, near what is today St.
The perpetrators of the massacre did not wear hoods. In the show, it looked like the KKK, but wearing potato sacks on their heads. In reality, they did not need to wear hoods because they wiped out all the witnesses who were adults. The only people who survived the massacre were 17 young children ages 6 and under, most of whom were babies and toddlers. There was an initial attack by the Mormons, who were intending to run off their cattle. So they kind of got into a skirmish and the Arkansas immigrants quickly circled their wagons.
A five-day siege set in. Ultimately, on Sept. So not a single Mormon was killed or even hurt in the massacre. And they did loot the bodies. There is a story of one of the perpetrators pulling a gold watch off the body of one of the victims as depicted in the show. So that part was accurate. And so, unfortunately, the Paiute Nation has unjustly borne blame for this, when the focus needs to be put on the white perpetrators who actually orchestrated this.
There would have been plenty of Shoshone. I loved the storytelling around the Shoshone and their culture. They were really honored by the series in a good way. The language was spot-on. It showed that small village where they had a matriarch, who pretty much was the ruler of the small group of Shoshones that were there. And that makes perfect sense to us. We live in a matriarchal society. Our women were our leaders and strong. And so to have a woman who showed strength like that was really one of the highlights for me.
But did he contribute to a scenario and environment in which the massacre could take place? Young comes up with all kinds of resistance strategies, one of which was to burn the supply trains and just keep the Army so they cannot make it into Utah settlements before the snow sets in.
