Your editorial about Cinco de Mayo (May 4) points out that it is a Mexican holiday of little interest or importance to Americans. Not so. Mormon leader Brigham Young, who brokered a loan for a visiting delegation from Mexican President Benito Juarez from Samuel Brannan (the richest man in California), was responsible for getting Juarez the money to buy the rifles that enabled the Chapultepec cadets to repulse the French invaders, saving Mexican independence when the United States was involved in the Civil War and unable to enforce the Monroe Doctrine.

The story was told to me 20 years ago by a Mexican secondary school principal, well-read in Mexican and Southwestern American history, who — as a longtime member of the LDS Church — had the privilege of knowing and talking to church old-timers.

David Timmins
Salt Lake City