It may not be what a presidential candidate would want historians discussing, as they did Friday. But exactly 150 years ago, an ancestor of Mitt Romney deserted from U.S. Army troops sent to put down a purported Mormon rebellion in Utah.

Carl Heinrich (Charles Henry) Wilcken, Romney's great-great-grandfather, would give Mormons information about approaching troops, eventually joined the LDS Church and ultimately became a bodyguard and confidant of two church presidents.

The middle name of Romney's father, former Michigan Gov. George W. Romney (also once a presidential candidate), is Wilcken, after that soldier-ancestor.

The little-known soldier in the little-known "Utah War" was a topic Friday at the annual Utah State History Conference. Several seminars focused on the 150th anniversary of that "war," in which President James Buchanan sent troops against Mormons in 1857-58 after ex-officials convinced him that Mormons would not submit to federal law.

Mormons saw that as a renewal of persecution and sent militia to face the army in what was essentially a mini-civil war four years before the real thing between North and South. Little shooting occurred, as Buchanan eventually gave amnesty to Mormons as they accepted a non-Mormon governor and a permanent garrison of U.S. troops.

Amateur historian Steve Richardson presented a paper Friday that discussed Wilcken, who he said had previously been awarded the Iron Cross by the king of Prussia for service in its war against Denmark.

After that war, Denmark attempted to draft former Prussian soldiers living in its acquired regions of Scheswig-Holstein. So Wilcken decided to leave and join friends in Argentina but had only enough money to make it to New York.

Richardson said Wilcken was unable to find work, so he joined the U.S. Army and was sent on the "Utah expedition."

"He was unhappy with the lack of discipline of the soldiers," Richardson said. "He had a low opinion of other soldiers," as they talked about possibly hanging or jailing Mormon leaders and "appropriating" their wives and daughters.

Wilcken saw poor protection by U.S. troops, which allowed Mormon militia to burn forage in front of the approaching army. LDS soldiers also burned many of the federal supply wagons and ran off the army's livestock. Soldiers had little to eat. Their winter camp in Wyoming would be one of the hardest in the history of the U.S. Army.

Wilcken decided to desert and head for Salt Lake City. But, Richardson said, Wilcken reported a spiritual experience that delayed that action for a day and possibly saved him from being jailed or shot.

As he was about to desert, he said he "heard a voice calling his name" — his real name, not the assumed name he used to enlist. Two other times as he was to leave, he heard his name called and stopped. Wilcken later learned that the cavalry had been on patrol all night watching Mormon camps and likely would have caught him.