John D. Lee was the only person ever tried and convicted for his role in the massacre, and he was eventually executed in the same meadow where he helped orchestrate the murders, Turley said.

Though their accounts of many details surrounding the massacre differ — often widely — Turley acknowledged the role that Will Bagley's book has played "to reopen and advance the conversation" about the massacre.

Bagley was part of the tour group and said he considers Turley "a friend and an honest historian. But he will soon go through the fire," he said.

Turley described the book's likely impact as "major surgery and not just a Band-Aid" for an event that has been a sore spot not only with local descendants but for Latter-day Saints as a whole.

The story repeatedly surfaces among historians and researchers seeking to explain the church's history, as an entire segment of the recent PBS documentary "The Mormons" illustrates.

"We hope to get to a place where people can acknowledge it and deal with it."

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