From Deseret News archives:
Historians tell details of massacre
So it was in the spirit of truth-telling and frankness that LDS Church historians led dozens of people to the monument on Monday, laying out in minute detail how men who had devoted their lives to God laid a plan and carried out the Mountain Meadows Massacre on Sept. 11, 1857.
The premeditated slaughter of 120 people that day was so horrific that many in southern Utah some of whose ancestors participated in the killing refuse to talk about the events to this day.
Historian Richard Turley acknowledged the "collective burden they have carried for many, many years," detailing how Issac C. Haight then the mayor of Cedar City and the stake president of the LDS Church there spearheaded a drive to kill the Arkansas immigrants.
He and others schemed to involve Paiute Indians so the killing could later be blamed on them. A few Paiutes were involved at some point, Turley said, but it is clear from the evidence that "white men did most of the killing."
The book is now with Oxford University Press, and the authors hope to have "Tragedy at Mountain Meadows" published by year's end.
"We hope by looking at these events squarely in the face that we can bring details" of the massacre to light so the descendants "don't have to labor under that sense of collective guilt any more," Turley said. The events have been clouded in controversy for decades, and several different writers have pieced together various versions of what happened and published books about the event.
Some including local historian Will Bagley have placed the blame squarely on then-church president Brigham Young, who Turley said did send letters to leaders in southern Utah in the months before the massacre as federal troops were approaching the state warning of interlopers who may cause harm and urging the LDS faithful to defend themselves.
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