American Experience (1988–…): Season 19, Episode 13 - The Mormons: Part I - full transcript

>> NARRATOR: Tonight, a special

presentation from American

Experience and Frontline.

>> It is one of the world's

fastest-growing religions.

Its members project pride in

their faith and confidence in

their future.

They walk the corridors of

power, leaders in Congress and

even running for President.



But for the Mormons,
it was nt always so.

>> In the 19th century, to call

someone a Mormon was akin to

calling someone a
Muslim terrorist.

>> NARRATOR: Tonight, Frontline

and American Experience join

forces to tell the story of one

of the most powerful, feared and

misunderstood religions
in American history.

>> A column of light appeared in

his room, and then a person came

down, very glowing person.

>> He says he's
the angel Moroni.

And so, he begins to tell Joseph



about the Book of Mormon.

>> NARRATOR: This is the story
of Joseph Smith and the

revelations that gave birth to a

new faith born in America.

>> What outraged the traditional

Christians of the day was that

this guy comes along, and he

says, "I am the prophet
for this new age. "

>> NARRATOR: This story
of religious conflict and

persecution... >>
When that mob stormed

Carthage Jail and shot the

prophet Joseph, they thought
they were finishing off

Mormonism as a movement.

>> NARRATOR: ... and the story of

a people who crossed a continent

to establish their own
spiritual kingdom.

>> Brigham Young is telling the

federal government to back
off from the Utah territory.

"We will take care of ourselves. "

>> NARRATOR: And of a church

that for decades defied society

by embracing polygamy and
then abruptly abandoning it.

>> ♪ Glory, glory
hallelujah glory... ♪

>> How do you go from being
the ultimate outcast to the

embodiment of the mainstream in

two generations?

It's a breathtaking
transformation.

of a modern religion still full

of old missionary zeal... >>
It was, for all intents and

purposes, mandatory for young

men to go on missions.

You go, you go, you go.

Dad went, grandpa went.

>> NARRATOR: ... a culture proud

of its strong communities
and close-knit families...

>> The church and my
family are so intertwined.

It just creates a kind of
aura of love and peace.

>> NARRATOR: ... but a church

that will exile those who
defy its authority and its

teachings...

>> Being gay in that
culture is beyond hell.

I was committing a kind
of spiritual suicide.

>> NARRATOR: ... and yet a faith

that offers its followers
powerful spiritual gifts.

>> The temple exists as a kind

of vehicle through which
we conquer mortality.

Not a single atom or particle of

our bodies will be lost, but

everything will be reconstituted
as fully as it was.

It's almost a kind of
celebration of the totality of

triumph over death.

>> NARRATOR: Tonight, the epic

story of this very American religion...
the history, the

controversies and the
mysteries of the Mormons.

>> American Experience is made

possible by the Alfred P. Slon

Foundation to enhance public

understanding of the
role of technology.

The Foundation also seeks to

portray the lives of the men

and women engaged in scientifc

and technological pursuit.

>> And the Corporation for

Public Broadcasting.

Funding for Frontline and

American Experience is made

possible by viewers like you.

Thank you.

Additional funding for

Frontline is provided by The

Park Foundation.

awareness.

Additional funding for The

Mormons is provided by:

and others.

>> NARRATOR: At a certain point,

every religion must explore its

sacred past.

What shards of history
have survived?

What is myth, what is symbol?

Where does man end
and god begin?

And what is the shadow side?

It took Christianity almost

2,000 years to look at its

founding stories
with modern eyes.

The Mormon sacred stories are so

new they still smell
of the earth.

>> One of the things that many

scholars have said about the

claims of Mormonism is that when

a faith is born in the 19th

century, it's very hard to hide

in the mist of time.

There isn't that patina of

centuries, so that from the

moment of its birth, Mormons

were under a klieg light.

They were the center of

attention in ways that early

Christians just weren't.

>> NARRATOR: Mormon history

begins with Joseph Smith.

He is the alpha and omega of the

Latter-day Saints.

To the Mormons, Joseph Smith is

their prophet, their American

Mohammed who revealed new and

eternal truths.

To the world, he is one of the

most complex figures in

religious history, the enigma at

the core of this religion.

>> Superficially, one thinks of

revealed religions as providing

answers, and Smith provides as

many questions as
he does answers.

Nobody is exempt from struggling

with who he is.

Whether you're an insider or an

outsider, thinking about Smith

causes you to struggle, and that

struggle brings as much of you

into the question as it does

Smith himself.

He's a bit of a religious
Rorschach test.

>> Joseph Smith is one of the

most fulsome figures in 19th

century American history; a

visionary, an organizer, a

schemer, a mover of people, an

inventor of a religion... a

religion that brought polygamy

to American society... someone

who was assassinated.

Smith's claims are, in fact,

extravagant, extraordinary.

He's way out there at the end of

a diving board.

He's claiming a miracle in

America, he's claiming a miracle

having seen an angel, he's

claiming the creation of a new

biblical text that he is

delivering through a revelation.

>> I think behind every great

religious figure there's

probably not a little charlatan.

There's definitely a lot of

shadow, and that's what makes

them interesting.

The people who are unendingly

good and unendingly by the book

hold no interest for history. HÇá

They hold no
interest for people.

I mean, they're not the people

that inspire other people to do

crazy things like trek across

the plains and settle
in the great basin.

Joseph inspired
people to do that.

He inspired women to love him.

He inspired a lot of
women to love him.

( chuckles )

He inspired men, men of the

caliber of Brigham Young,
to love him, to love him

passionately, to devote their

whole life to
accomplishing his vision.

Joseph was a prophet.

He is the equal of Mohammed,

Isaiah, Jeremiah, Josiah, Moses

as the founder of a real,
bona fide, new religion.

>> NARRATOR: Joseph Smith's

story begins quietly enough
on a rural New England farm.

But this seemingly ordinary boy

would go on to a life of such

drama and tumult that at the end

he would say despairingly to his

friends, "You don't know me.

No man knows my history.

I cannot tell it.

If I had not experienced what I

had, I would not have
believed it myself. "

He was born on December 23,

1805, in Sharon, Vermont, the

third son of a family
of nine children.

Both of his parents descended

from proud religious
non- conformity.

They were downwardly mobile

gentry who, through hard luck

and bad judgment, always
seemed to live on the edge.

The family moved on to Palmyra,

New York, where they bought
a small farm on rocky land.

It was a place and a time where

seers and prophets roamed the

countryside, each claiming
to possess God's truth.

>> If you want to think about

the fertility of religion in the

early 19th century, think of

mushroom soil... the richest

stuff you can imagine that will

grow almost anything... and there

you have what it was like to be

a believer in the
early 19th century.

Things were sprouting up all

around you, and you could stick

your own shovel in and
it might grow roots.

It was incredible, the
outpouring of religious

expression in a new environment

of religious freedom, really...

"lack of control" is
probably a better word.

No one had ever seen a
government that didn't put its

stamp on religion before.

>> It's important to remember in

the 1820s and 1830s, upstate New

York is in fact the
American frontier.

It is on the edge
of civilization.

It's marching forward in
farmland and development of the

Erie Canal, but still it's
the American frontier.

And this particular area becomes

known as the burned-over

district because it's fired with

evangelical fervor almost
on an annual basis.

>> There was such
religious fever.

But it brought around divisions

in American society, and those

divisions were reflected
in the Smith household.

The father was a Universalist,

the mother was more into
Presbyterian, and the kids

didn't quite know which way they

ought to be going and they
were struggling themselves.

>> NARRATOR: It was in this time

of confusion that young Joseph,

then just 14, had the first of

his visions that would become

the rock on which his
church was founded.

This is the story Smith told and

what devout Mormons
believed happened.

>> He is existentially gripped

by the question of
which church is right.

And so, with the insecurity that

that created in him, and the

uncertainty, he decides he needs

to find out for himself.

And he goes into this grove
of trees and he gets this

thundering, spectacular
theophany.

He describes how intense the

light was and how afraid he was,

that when it touched the trees

they would burst into flames.

He was actually scared.

And in that pillar of light

appear two persons, the
Father and the Son.

>> When Joseph Smith saw them,
he saw embodied beings.

He saw men the way you and I
would see men, with all the

biblical features the way Moses

said he saw them, with eyes and

ears and hands and faces.

>> He was blessed, I think, to

be visited by God the Father and

by his son Jesus Christ.

And in that moment he still hadi

the presence of mind to ask and

to fulfill the purpose for which

he came, which, interestingly,

wasn't to ask, "Is
there a true church?"

I've always been struck,
honestly, with the question he

posed: "Which of the
churches is true?"

And the answer was that none of

them were, and that was
an earth-shaking answer.

I'm sure it came as a
very big surprise to him.

>> He came from a tradition of

visionaries.

His father had dreams, his

grandfather had dreams, and so

it was nothing new for him as

well to feel that he had had

some kind of heavenly
communication.

And I think that is part of what

prepared him, but also prepared

his family to accept him as a

prophet, because before he could

test the waters of public

opinion, he had to pass
muster with his own family.

And it isn't every child that

would come before his parents

and say, "God and Christ just

visited me in a grove of trees"

and be believed. é!

>> NARRATOR: In the beginning,

Joseph would tell only his

family about what
happened in the grove.

Over the years, he would record

several versions of what he saw.

>> The first version of the

vision was written in Joseph
Smith's own hand in 1832.

It was personal; it merely dealt

with his sinfulness and his

going to the grove to ask God

for forgiveness, end of story.

Subsequently, over the next 12

years, there were other versions

that emerged from Joseph Smith
where the story got more

detailed, more colorful, and one

of the later versions became
the official version.

>> Finally, in 1838, we have God

the Father and the Son visiting

him, telling him to join
none of the other churches.

And it begs the question, was

Joseph building a
story as he went?

Because the story certainly

evolved and the story certainly

took on more miraculous, more

remarkable characteristics.

And he certainly became a
greater character with greater

status in God's eyes in each of

these stories, with a greater

work to do in each
of these stories.

>> My instinct is to attribute a

sincerity to Joseph Smith.

And yet, at the same time, as an

Evangelical Christian, I do not

believe that the members of the

Godhead really appeared to him

and told him that he should
start on a mission of, among

other things, denouncing the

kind of things that I
believe as a Presbyterian.

I can't believe that.

And yet, at the same time, I

don't... I really don't believe

that he was simply making up a

story that he knew to be false

in order to manipulate people
and to gain power over a

religious movement.

And so I live with the mystery.

>> NARRATOR: Joseph was born

into a world where Christianity

blended seamlessly with magic.

Like other farmers in Palmyra,

Joseph and his father dug their

rocky soil in hopes
of finding golnKKvL%7

Joseph looked into magic stones

and had visions of barrels of

buried treasure and was hired to

lead others in search of gold.

>> Joseph's preferred method of

finding buried treasure was to

place a peep stone in a hat,

draw the hat over his face to

exclude the light, and then look

into the stone and the location

of the treasure would
be identified.

>> It has to be said that Joseph

Smith wasn't the only person who

was wandering around with a seer

stone looking for gold, but he

was particularly good at it, and

well known to be
particularly good at it.

And it was technically illegal,

and he was taken before
the court for this.

>> He was arrested and tried for

his activities and, ironically,

those in court who believed in

him, under oath, on the stand,

swore that he had this ability

to see treasure slipping away

under the earth or to see
where they were buried.

>> NARRATOR: When Joseph was 17,

he would later say he worried
that he had not lived

purposefully and had lost
his divine connection.

Three years had passed
since his last vision.

But one night, all of that would

change and the story he told

would become another anchor for

the Mormon faith.

>> He was in an upper bedroom in

his small house one night.

He says the following thing
happened: a column of light

appeared in his room... literally

a column of light... and then a

person came down,
very glowing person.

The person was dressed
in white, a white robe.

>> He say's he's the angel

He's hovering over the ground.

He's got no shoes, he's

barefooted and he says he
knew that he had no clothes

underneath his robe.

And you could see his chest.

And so he begins to tell him...

the Angel Moroni... to tell

Joseph about the Book of Mormon,

where it is, what it is and what

his involvement in it would be.

But he doesn't just tell him, he

shows him, to the point where

Joseph sees the locality and the

very, very location
of the golden plates.

>> Joseph then goes to the spot

on the hill... it's not far from

where the Smith family farm was-

- and he locates the
plates there on the hill.

And the plates are under a rock,

which he had seen very
clearly in the vision.

He doesn't get to take the

plates then; he has to come back

every year for several years

until he gets the plates
late in the 1820s.

>> When he went to receive
them, he was married.

His wife and he
went to the hill.

He carried them down off the

He and his wife put them in the

buck board and took them home.

>> NARRATOR: According to
Joseph, the golden plates were

etched in ancient hieroglyphics,

and he was instructed
to translate them.

>> And we know that Joseph

didn't translate in the way that

a scholar would translate.

He didn't know Egyptian.

There were a couple of means

that were prepared for this.

One was, he used an instrument

that he found with the plates

that was called the
Urim and Thummim.

This is a kind of divinatory

device that goes back
into Old Testament times.

Actually, most of the
translation was done using

something called a seer stone.

He would put the stone in the

bottom of a hat... presumably to

exclude surrounding light... and

then he would put his
face into the hat.

It's kind of a strange
image for us.

>> NARRATOR: Working with his

wife and a small cadre of
friends, Joseph said he

translated the golden plates in

a creative burst over a period
of months, and then, as

instructed, returned the
plates to the angel Moroni.

The final translation was over

600 pages and would become the

Book of Mormon, one of the core

documents of a new faith.

>> I hear Joseph Smith's
voice every time I read it.

He was a farmer, he was
young, he was unlettered.

And he put this all together and

so you have this rough hewn kind

of text that is so beautiful in

all its imperfections because it

houses and it embodies the voice

of a real human being who had

encountered the miraculous.

>> I really think that Joseph

Smith, like shamans everywhere,

started out faking it... I have

to believe this, that he didn't

believe this at all, that he was

out to impress... but he got

caught up in the mythology
that he created.

This is what happens to shamans.

They begin to believe that they

can do these things, and then it

becomes a revelation;
they're speaking to God.

Joseph Smith had a sense of

destiny, and most
fakers don't have this.

And this is how he transformed

something that I think was

clearly made up into something

that was absolutely convincing.

>> NARRATOR: Every July in
Palmyra, New York, Mormons

celebrate their origins in an

extravagant pageant
on the Hill Cumorah.

An enormous cast reenacts

Joseph's discovery of the plates

that contained scriptures
of an ancient history.

Under a 40-foot golden statue of

the angel Moroni, the pageant

tells how the ancient prophet

Mormon gave the plates to his

son Moroni and how he buried

them in 400 A.D. on the very

site where the pageant
itself is unfolding.

The tablets recall the story of

Israelites who sailed from
Jerusalem about 600 B.C. and

were guided to a country that

would be one day be
known as America.

Here, these ancient Israelites

split into two races, the
Nephites and the Lamanites.

For hundreds of years, they
engaged in brutal warfare.

( explosion )

Here in America, during the

three days after his crucifixion

in Jerusalem, Christ came in his

resurrected being to preach

peace and righteousness
to these warring people.

Here, in 1827, the young Joseph

Smith would say he dug up the

tablets recording this entire

history that would become the

Book of Mormon.

>> The kind of revelation that

Joseph describes is the scandal

of Mormonism in the same way

that the resurrection of Christ

is the scandal of Christianity.

And what I mean by that is that

on the face of it that's an

affront to sophisticated notions

of how the universe works.

God doesn't deliver gold
plates to farm boys.

It's a cause of embarrassment to

many intellectuals in the church

to continue to insist that

Joseph had literal gold plates

given to him by a real angel.

But I also mean that it's a

scandal in the sense that it is

inseparable from the heart and

soul of Mormonism, that one
could no sooner divorce the

historical claims of the Book of

Mormon from the church then one

could divorce the story of
Christ's resurrection from

Christianity and survive
with the religion intact.

>> NARRATOR: For nearly two

centuries, Mormons have rooted

their faith in the truth of the

golden plates and of Joseph

Smith's original
vision in the grove.

They are the foundation of this

church, and for its leaders
there is no middle ground.

Their prophet is righteous and
he saw and talked to God.

>> We declare without
equivocation that God the Father

and his Son the Lord Jesus

Christ appeared in person
to the boy Joseph Smith.

When I was interviewed by Mike

Wallace on the 60 Minute

program, he asked me if I

actually believed that.

I replied, "Yes, sir, that's the

miracle of it. "

This is the way I feel about it.

Our whole strength rests on the

validity of that vision.

It either occurred or it did not

occur.

If it did not, then this work is

a fraud; if it did, then this is

the most important and wonderful

work under the heavens.

>> Well, I think there's no

question that the church rises

or falls on the veracity of

Joseph Smith's story.

History as theology is perilous;

if it turns out that the whole

story of Christ's resurrection

was a fabrication, then

Christianity collapses.

That's the price we pay for

believing in a God who

intervenes in human history, who

has real interactions with real

human beings in real
space and time.

That makes it historical, and

that's a reality that we just

can't flee away from.

>> All religion, western and

eastern, is founded
upon miracle.

It makes little sense to present

arguments against Joseph Smith

and early Mormonism that would

extend equally well to what we

are told about the origins of

what will eventually be Judaism,

the origins of Christianity, the

origins of Islam.

All religion depends
upon revelation.

All revelation is supernatural.

If you wish to be a hard rock

empiricist, then you should not

entertain any religious doctrine

whatsoever.

>> NARRATOR: In the early 1830s,

the burned-over district in

upstate New York was a strange

and fervent place.

Prophets roamed the countryside

in bearskins.

Annie Lee and the Shakers danced

ecstatically and
renounced all sex.

Millennial visionaries saw the

end of the world in
every fiery sunset.

>> The question is, how did

Mormonism distinguish itself in

such a crowded field?

There were many people who

claimed revelation from heavens,

who claimed to be prophets, who

claimed to speak with the same

kind of oracular voice.

I think the main difference in

the case of Joseph Smith was

that he had something concrete

to show for it.

It was the Book of Mormon.

It always came back to
the Book of Mormon.

>> NARRATOR: Its publication in

1830 was unprecedented.

At a time when most religious

manuscripts were two-page

pamphlets selling for a few

cents, Smith's book was leather-

bound and costly.

Initially, the Book of Mormon

didn't sell well, but gradually,

book by book, it was passed from

his family and his
friends to strangers.

>> Strange as the Book of Mormon

might appear to us, it didn't

particularly appear strange to

its converts in
the 19th century.

It's curiously American in its

own right. vN[Y%I©núÑyXO@ñ?÷"Oeç

It's frontier literature, it's

expansive, it deals with the

roiling of peoples across great

plains and the rise and fall ofÑ

civilizations.

>> It was religion
made in the U.S.A.

For the first time, you had a

homegrown religion, a
homegrown prophet.

It was the religion of the poor

people, and Joseph Smith came to

them and said, "You are at the

center of the drama. "

If you like, he situated the

United States within
the biblical story.

>> The most important function

that the Book of Mormon served

in the early church was not that

it introduced new teachings, not

that there was any particular

message or content which

revolutionized the world; it was

the mere presence of the book of

Mormon itself as an object that

was a visible, palpable object

that served to... as concrete

evidence that God had opened the

heavens again.

>> NARRATOR: From the first hour

of its founding in April 1830 at

a farmhouse in New York, Joseph

Smith's church was
controversial.

He proclaimed his was the one

true church since the death of

Christ's apostles.

He had 40 converts by the end of

May and just as many enemies.

Neighboring newspapers denounced

the Book of Mormon as a fraud,

as blasphemous or just too

bizarre to believe.

>> What outraged the traditional

Christians of the day was that

this guy comes along, Joseph

Smith, and he says, "Push the

delete button on all of the

stuff you are arguing about

because we have to go back to

the very beginning and restore a

true, original, primitive

Christianity that has been

corrupted for 1,800 years, and

you're a part of the corruption.

You are the corrupters of it in

this present day.

And that God has given me a... a

Newer Testament, but not only a

newer written record of what God

wants for human beings, but that

God has restored the office of

prophet, and I am the prophet

for this new age.

And I'm a prophet who is

receiving new teachings from

God. "

>> I think one of the hallmarks

of Joseph Smith's thought was

the collapse of the
sacred distance.

That generally is held to be an

absolutely essential ingredient

in our experience of the divine,

that sense of worshipful

distance that should obtain

between man and God.

He did this by arguing that when

revelations came to him, they

came through vehicles as

palpable and earthly as seer

stones, or Urim and Thummim, or

gold plates; that God himself

was once as we are,
that he is embodied.

That level of detail and

specificity isn't suppose to

obtain when we're talking about

things that are supposed to be

ineffable.

It was an affront to traditional

religious faith in ways that

were troubling and threatening.

>> NARRATOR: As much as he

aroused fury, Smith
also aroused ardor.

After he was chased out of town

in 1831, 75 people followed him

to Kirtland, Ohio.

Here he joined the preacher

Sidney Rigdon, who brought a

hundred members of his own

congregation into
Smith's church.

And later, there was another

convert, Brigham Young.

>> This 30-year-old carpenter,

his wife is ill, near
death and will die.

He is penniless, he is looking

for direction.

He's joined one church and left

it, joined another
church and left it.

And suddenly, when he meets

Joseph Smith, he says,
"I will follow you.

You have the answers I've been

looking for. "

So Brigham Young becomes in

microcosm what a number of

people experienced when they

listen to and talk
to Joseph Smith.

Extremely charismatic, extremely

confident, a man of the people.

He didn't talk down to people;

he spoke to them about issues

that touched their very lives.

>> What Joseph Smith offered

everyone who followed him...

every follower, he said, had the

ability to speak
directly to God.

"God will speak to you.

He will give you inspiration.

You can have a personal

relationship with God. "

>> NARRATOR: Others continued to

join in great numbers.

From 1831, Smith was sending out

missionaries across America.

By 1837, the small town of

Kirtland had swollen to 3,000,

the majority of them Mormon.

In Kirtland, Joseph Smith began

calling all his followers

Latter-day Saints because he

believed they were living in the

end times with the sacred purity

of Christ's first disciples.

It was here that his theology

evolved beyond
conventional Christianity.

Smith received revelations that

reestablished the roles of the

original 12 apostles, and he

created the priesthood for all

deserving male members.

He astonished everyone by

building not a Christian church

but a temple inspired by the Old

Testament.

It would be the place for new

secret rituals of anointing and

blessing meant to connect the

Saints to God.

Mormons today still talk about

the miraculous three months when

the temple was consecrated.

>> We have literally hundreds of

accounts of eyewitnesses who

heard rushing of wind and heard

angelic choirs.

It was a day very much like the

Pentecost of the new testament.

>> People talked of seeing

angels fly in through
the windows.

They talked of seeing God stand

next to Joseph Smith.

They had what appears to be, at

times, mass hallucinations or

mass visions.

But whatever happened was

absolutely remarkable.

>> Joseph Smith was the Henry

Ford of revelation.

He wanted every home to have

one, and the revelation he had

in mind was the revelation he

thought he'd had,
which was seeing God.

And so, for Joseph Smith, seeing

God was what it was
to be religious.

And so, he sets about

duplicating that original

experience for everybody else.

Revelation is everything to this

It is revelation or nothing for

these people.

>> Kirtland is both the best of

times and the worst of times.

In 1836, there's a huge national

speculative bubble; everybody

and his brother is investing in

real estate, and it
captures Kirtland.

And in the frenzy of speculation

that develops, Joseph Smith

founds a bank, enters into all

these business enterprises, and

then the bubble bursts.

The bank collapses,
people lose money.

It's faith-shattering
in Mormon context.

People are challenging his role

as prophet, questioning

prophecies that
aren't happening.

There are stories about... of

sexual improprieties, and these

will continue to grow.

And even Brigham Young says, "At

one point in Kirtland, there

were ten people who believed in

the prophet. "

>> And by December of 1837, some

of his closest followers wants

to take over the Kirtland

temple, pose guns and knives to

drive the other Mormons out.

I think he is also worried about

lawsuits against him.

All these debts that he's

incurred would... could have

hauled him into court and kept

him there for years.

So he has to, in a
way, sneak away.

So, I think he left sort of in

despair and regret that all had

gone so wrong.

You would think he would have

become discouraged, would have

reconsidered his plans, but when

he goes to Missouri, he has not

compromised in the slightest his

desire to do the same thing all

over again... to build another

city, to build another temple

and to continue
gathering the Saints.

>> NARRATOR: A powerful sense of

persecution has shaped
Mormon history.

Most Americans don't even know

about the dark days that haunt

Mormons still today.

>> Our people knew hate.

Our people knew what it was like

to be hated.

They knew what it was like to

have their children killed.

have their prophet
murdered in cold blood.

Their blood had been spread

across six states.

We are a church that has had an

extermination order
issued against us.

That is unprecedented in the

history of this
God-fearing nation.

>> House burning, rapings,

abuse, taking over
land and possessions.

All that was part of it, but it

was also denunciation from every

other level, from state
houses to pulpits.

"These people are not
what they should be.

They're invaders.

Get rid of them,
get rid of them. "

>> The hatred of Mormonism is

mysterious, it's fascinating,

it's perplexing.

Mormons were plain old white,

largely English-descended

American farmers who were God

fearing, who lived in

agricultural settlements and

wanted the best for their

children, for their wives, for

their families.

Why would they be so hated?

It has to do with the fear of

the unknown, fear of
power and hierarchy.

Did the Mormons really think for

themselves, or did Joseph Smith

think for them?

The fear of unknown personal

practices, polygamy, the fear of

unknown beliefs... all of these

things made the Mormons feared.

It made Americans
worry about them.

And yet underneath there is

still something else that's hard

to get at.

There's still something else

about Mormons that seems so odd,

so peculiar, and yet it's

difficult to put a historian's

finger on what that is.

>> NARRATOR: From the first day,

there had been opposition
to this church.

In Missouri, it
would turn bloody.

Joseph Smith had sent

missionaries to
Independence in 1831.

Within five years, there were

5,000 Mormons in Missouri.

They had come here in the wake

of another of Smith's
early revelations.

>> The reason the Mormons were

in Missouri is because Joseph

Smith revealed that Missouri was

designated as the location of

Zion, this future city of God.

This is where we believe human

existence began.

More specifically, we believe

that Jackson County was the

place where Adam and Eve lived

in the Garden of Eden.

Probably more significant,

though, we believe that there

will be a place... a community

established, a city... that will

be here to meet the Savior.

The Savior will come here.

So I think it's in every single

Mormon's... back of their mind,

Missouri is important.

>> When Smith announced that

Independence was the site of the

Garden of Eden and that this

would be the site of the new

Zion and that God would give

this chosen land to his new

followers, it didn't sit well

with the old settlers in Jackson

County, and many of them were

very explicit about it.

They said, "We got along fine

with the Mormons.

We had no problem with them

until Joseph Smith came along

with these revelations and told

us they were going to take all

of our land. "

>> NARRATOR: Tensions grew.

There were skirmishes between

the native Missourians
and the Mormons.

By the time Joseph Smith arrived

from Kirtland in 1838, the

Missourians had driven the

Mormons in forced migration from

one county to another.

They lost homes and land, many

had been tarred and feathered,

but they had also formed their

own militia.

>> And Joseph Smith was adamant

that the Latter-day Saints were

not Quakers who would turn the

other cheek and avoid violence.

They would pick up arms, they

would defend themselves.

>> NARRATOR: The
Mormons retaliated.

They drove Missourians off their

land and burned their homes.

It had become a war.

The stage was set for an even

greater violence in a Mormon

village called Haun's Mill.

>> October 30, 1838, dawned as a

beautiful day.

It was clear, the wind was calm

and Indian summer temperatures.

My third grade grandfather,

Austin Hammer, and a great

uncle, Jon Yorke, were there on

guard duty to defend the mill.

>> A group of up to 200 or 300

horsemen rode into the village

of Haun's Mill.

The women grabbed the children

and ran for the woods.

The men made for the
blacksmith shop.

That's where the
arms were stored.

The mob quickly surrounded the

blacksmith shop, and because the

logs hadn't been chinked, they

were able to stick their muskets

through the gaps in the logs.

>> Mobbers are poking their guns

through the opening between logs

and just shooting
anything that moves.

It's like shooting
fish in a barrel.

>> NARRATOR: As the raiding

party rode off, they left 17

Mormons dead, 13 wounded.

One old man had been hacked to

death by a corn cutter and a boy

of ten had been shot
at point blank range.

None of the killers
was ever arrested.

>> It wasn't until I was a

senior in college that I

realized that I had ancestors

who were actually
there at Haun's Mill.

And I went to the church

historical department and I did

some digging around and actually

found an account written by a

great, great, great aunt of mine

who was a young girl at the

And she had described both the

event and its aftermath in vivid

detail many years
after the fact.

When word came that the massacre

had been accomplished and the

mobbers had left, they came back

into the village.

And here it was many, many, many

years later.

She's remembering that day, as a

young girl of nine, being taken

by her mother into this center

of the village and seeing this

scene of just carnage
and devastation.

But the one image that seemed to

stand out in her mind decades

and decades later was the sound

of the bodies as they placed

them on a door and
slid them into a well.

I've often wondered of the... of

the horror that that sound must

have held for that young girl,

who apparently remembered it for

the rest of her life.

>> NARRATOR: Governor Lilburn

Boggs of Missouri took a

dramatic stand to
end the violence.

For the first and only time in

American history, a state

government issued an
extermination order.

"The Mormons must be treated

like enemies," it read, "and

must be exterminated or driven

from the state for
the public peace. "

The Mormons were forced to

surrender their land and

possessions and to be out of

Missouri by Spring.

>> Mormons have a very complex

relationship with their own

sense of persecution.

It is unfair to say that they

courted persecution.

On the other hand, it is fair to

say that it brought them

exhilaration and conviction that

what they were doing was the

right thing because God's

prophets have never been welcome

in their own lands.

Persecution both identified them

as special and seared into them

the pain of what being a

peculiar people means.

>> The journey from Missouri to

Illinois for another new

beginning is one of the darkest

days of Joseph
Smith's existence.

And at that time, he turns to

Brigham Young, calls him to

organize the people and make an

orderly exodus.

And this is a recurring theme

for the Latter-day Saint people:

persecution, exodus.

And they believe they've reached

the promise land when they

arrive at the banks of the

Mississippi river in
Nauvoo, Illinois.

>> NARRATOR: When the Mormons

arrived in Illinois in 1839,

they had become a
national story.

People in Illinois were shocked

by press accounts of the Haun's

Mill atrocity and
welcomed the refugees.

Joseph Smith bought 18,000 acres

that became the Saints' new

gathering place, Nauvoo... their

own city where they could create

a perfect society in preparation

for Christ's return.

Missouri survivors, alongside

new European converts, worked in

a communal economy to build

homes and factories.

By 1844, Nauvoo's population had

swollen to 12,000, rivaling the

size of Chicago.

>> Nauvoo becomes the apex, the

peak of Joseph Smith's career.

He's eminently successful.

He's achieved everything that he

set out to do.

He's created a dynamic,
beautiful city.

And to many, this is the

happiest days of the early

church, and he's engaged in the

most remarkable and innovative

stages of his prophetic career.

>> In Nauvoo, suddenly there's a

rush of new revelations, two of

the key ones.

Baptism for the dead... Joseph

Smith reveals that it's been

presented to him that Latter-day

Saints can baptize dead members

to bring them into their family

to ensure life everlasting

together in the great beyond,

beyond the veil.

The second principle revealed

celestial marriage.

That... consistent with

teachings in the Old Testament,

that certain special individuals

are called to practice plural

marriage, what we call polygamy

sometimes... much to his wife,

Emma Smith's, great
disappointment.

>> NARRATOR: And the

disappointment and anger of many

of his followers when they

discover that Smith and other

leaders had been secretly

engaging in plural marriage.

Joseph Smith had launched

himself on a path of self

destruction, obsessed with

building his military
and political power.

He had the Nauvoo city charter

written so that he could assume

even greater authority.

He was elected mayor, he had

himself appointed chief justice

of the city court and lieutenant

general of the Nauvoo Legion.

Nauvoo had become a perfect

theocracy, and their neighbors

increasingly saw the Mormon's

dominance as a threat.

>> There are these fabulous

pictures of Smith holding his

sword out, and that's a very

martial picture.

So that you combine religion,

military force, political power,

and you've got something that

looks like a country, a whole

new identity within the United

States' borders.

>> In the early 1840s, he

decides, "I will run for

president of the United States. "

This is appalling to many

people, that here is a person

coming from this unique,

theological, unusual

anthropomorphically other group,

and he's going to run for

president of the United States?

Add onto that the political

dominance of Mormons in that

area, the economic dominance of

the Mormons in that area, the

control of commerce of the

Mormons in that area, and the

violence starts to
flare on the fringes.

And Joseph Smith knows that it's

coming to an absolute showdown.

One more spark is all it will

take to bring all the forces on

earth against him.

He knows this.

The spark is found in the Nauvoo

Expositor.

>> NARRATOR: The Nauvoo

Expositor was a newspaper

published by William Law, once a

close associate of Joseph Smith

who had broken with the
prophet over plural marriage.

The Expositor, in its first and

only issue, exposed Smith's
secret practice of polygamy,

charging him with coercing young

women and assuming
dictatorial political power.

>> He would call some of them

lies, but other of them were

truths that he did not want to

be trafficked in
the public press.

He reacts in a rage.

He orders its destruction.

The destruction of an American

printing press in the eyes of

the public at that time
is a horrific act.

It's antithetical to the
American experience.

>> NARRATOR: The people in the

surrounding counties who had

welcomed the Mormons now
wanted to get rid of them.

Prominent citizens called for

Smith's death and would later

become part of the
mob that killed him.

>> He stands alone.

He stands charged.

He has an opportunity to flee,

and it's one of the most
interesting moments in the

history of the
Latter-day Saints.

He has the moment to flee.

He starts to, and, by various

interpretations, for one reason

or another, he turns the horse

and comes back to face arrest,

which means being imprisoned in

the Carthage Jail, which means

death at the hands of
a mob within days.

>> NARRATOR: Smith was
imprisoned on charges of

treason.

Although the Governor of
Illinois had promised his

protection, just two days later,

a mob of 200 non-Mormon men,

their faces painted
black, rushed the jail.

>> They storm up the stairs.

Smith and his brother and

friends put up a stout defense.

>> Joseph is hit
repeatedly at the window.

He fell through the window,
calling to God, and was dead

within moments of striking the

ground.

>> NARRATOR: There were those

who hoped that Joseph's death

would be the end of Mormonism,

but he was, in his own words, a

rough stone rolling, and in

death, as in life, he would
shatter expectations.

The flawed Joseph, the man,
left enduring controversies.

He seemed to thrive in
opposition, leaving the Mormons

in conflict with their neighbors

and in exile from the rest of

But the prophet Joseph had given

his people a new set of
doctrines and rituals that

became a powerful faith that at

its heart claimed that all

righteous men could become gods.

For his followers, Mormonism was

the American dream writ large.

But he had set them on a path

that would prove to be both
exhilarating and dangerous.

>> Imagine if you are walking

the streets of Nauvoo in the

days after the murder
of Joseph Smith.

You have pure chaos... promises

of different leadership, others

starting to lay claim to the

mantle of authority to lead
this religious following.

The mobs that are anti-Mormon

are gathering on the
outskirts of the city.

>> NARRATOR: The Church was

hanging by a thread; its members

were splitting up into
contentious groups.

Some dissenters wanted to return

to a Mormonism without polygamy

and the temple rites and
threatened to break away.

>> Brigham Young arrives and in

very short order commands the

attention of the Mormons and

also earns their confidence.

Brigham Young brings order and a

sense of purpose to
the chaos of Nauvoo.

>> NARRATOR: But the pressure on

the Mormons was building.

The Illinois legislature had

revoked the Nauvoo city charter

and a governor's commission
told the Mormons to leave.

>> Brigham's sense is Illinois

has abandoned us, the United

States of America has abandoned

us; we will leave
the United States.

He knows they're going westward;

there is no other option.

They dare not turn back to the

east; there's no
deliverance there.

>> NARRATOR: Young thought he

had found the Mormons a new home

outside of America in maps of

the valley of the Great Salt

Lake, which was then
part of Mexico.

But many refused to go,

including Joseph
Smith's widow, Emma.

Her followers, led by her son,

would ultimately become the
Reorganized Church of Jesus

Christ of Latter-day Saints.

But the remaining Saints, the

majority of them,
left with Young.

>> They set out in the middle of

winter, and very shortly after

they began the evacuation
the river freezes.

They spend three months

struggling through the mud
and the sleet and the snow.

They lose a lot of people.

It's a time of
immense suffering.

>> NARRATOR: In 1846, Brigham

Young led the first group of

what would become over 3,000

Mormons westward
out of Illinois.

It was one of the largest mass

migrations in the history of

When they got to Nebraska, he

organized Winter Quarters, a

temporary way station where each

successive wave of immigrants

would plant crops, rest and

replenish themselves for
the arduous journey ahead.

>> For all of Brigham Young's

great organizational skills, he

appears to be tormented
at times by self-doubt.

"How can I assume the
mantle of Joseph?

How can I become a prophet like

Joseph Smith, because unlike

Joseph, God doesn't speak to me. "

In February of 1847, in the

midst of very, very tough times

at Winter Quarters,
he falls ill.

And in the midst of this
sickness, he has a dream.

He finds himself in a room with

Joseph Smith, an the light is

streaming in through an open

window and Smith has his
feet up on the table.

And Brigham Young says to him,
"How can I be a prophet?"

And Joseph Smith says to him,

"Listen to the still, small

voice.

If you listen for God's

inspiration, He will
always direct you. "

And when Brigham Young wakes
up, he is transformed.

After that, this second guessing

and this hesitation is gone.

From that moment in February

1847 at Winter Quarters, Brigham

Young assumes the
mantle of Joseph.

>> With every myth, there
is a central truth.

And the great myth of the Mormon

exodus to the west is how
heroic the effort was.

They could not turn back.

They could only go forward, and

all they had was this sense of

faith that somehow they would be

delivered at the other end.

They didn't have enough wagons,

they didn't have enough horses,

so at various times they
would use pull carts.

This is 1,000 miles of pulling a

cart along a very rough, rutted

trail, all on a sense of faith.

Fathers dropping dead, leaving

their wives and young children

to be scooped up by the
succeeding wave of Mormons

heading to the west.

They start too late
on certain journeys.

They're trapped by Wyoming

blizzards as they move
across the plains.

Death by the dozens is typical.

Death in the hundreds on

occasion, all on this purpose
of going to a deliverance.

>> It was a pilgrimage of the

most foundational and
fundamental kind that forged a

people.

And today, people within the

faith reenact the trek and
connect with this sacred

history.

They envision themselves as

Saints walking to Zion, walking
to their own salvation.

It's an incredibly
powerful story.

>> When I realized that seven of

my eight great, great
grandmothers walked all or part

of that trail, I knew that

that's where my journey
had to start, too.

What I was searching for out on

the trail was the kind of faith

that sent my great, great
grandmother Hannah Middleton

Hawkey from England, over the

ocean, then by train to the edge

of what was then the edge of the

United States, to the middle of

the country, where she was
dumped, expected to build her

own handcart and then pull her

belongings and walk with that

handcart and her three children

across the United States
to the Salt Lake Valley.

When she was asked in later

years, was she sorry for that?

She had lost her son.

She buried him along the way.

Was she sorry she
made that decision?

Was there ever doubt?

She said no, there was never

doubt anywhere along the way.

She felt relieved
when her son died.

He died of starvation,
exhaustion and cold.

She was relieved when he died.

She came through with her two

young daughters.

She didn't walk
again for a year.

I could never arrive at that

certainty, and that's the reason

I choose not to practiceÑ&7wKoI

But I still practice faith, but

it's a different kind of faith.

I think it's based
in uncertainty.

>> One observer visited the

Saints on the prairie.

He said it was one of those

haunting, haunting experiences,

to see the vast stretches of

isolation and loneliness, and

then you'd hear the soft strains

of classical music coming over

the hills, and there would be

the Saints gathered around,
playing music and dancing.

The philosopher Nietzsche once

wrote, "I should never believe

in a God who would not know how

to dance. "

And I feel the same way.

There is, in the Mormon faith, a

kind of celebration of the
physical, which I think is a

little bit outside the
Christian mainstream.

When the Saints moved west to

Utah, one observer in the 1850s

noted that they had schools in

most every block, but that every

night, the schools were
converted into dancing schools.

And he observed with some

displeasure that Mormons taught

their children that they should

go to school, but they
must go to dancing school.

And I think that there's a

connection between the place of

dancing in Mormon history and

the concept of an embodied God.

Because we believe that God the

Father, as well as Jesus Christ,

are physical, embodied beings,

that elevates the body
to a heavenly status.

And I think there's a kind of

exuberance and celebration that

is in many ways a result of that

same collapse of sacred distance

that was so central to
Joseph Smith's thinking.

Instead of denigrating the

things of the body in order to

elevate the things of the
spirit, Joseph always argued

that it was the successful
incorporation of both that

culminated in a fullness of joy.

And so dancing, I think, is in

many ways just an emblem or a

symbol of a kind of righteous
reveling in the physical

tabernacle that we believe is a

stage on our way to
godliness itself.

>> NARRATOR: On July 24, 1847,

more than a year after they left

Nauvoo, and after years of

persecution and forced
migrations when thousands had

lost their lives and property,

Brigham Young and the first

contingent of Mormons finally

reached the valley of
the Great Salt Lake.

>> When the Latter-day Saints

arrive in 1847, this is still

technically Mexican territory.

No one in their right mind would

choose to settle in the Great

Basin.

In Brigham's eyes, he
looked and he saw a desert.

This is the right place.

Drive on.

It is one of those very rare

moments where people literally

are gathered around Brigham and

saying, "Are you serious?

I have been in that wagon for 60

days.

I'd gladly do another 60 just to

get to a better place than this.

This can't be the place. "

Why here?

Because it was the land
no one else wanted.

Brigham knew what he wanted.

He wanted the turf for an

isolated people to build up the

Kingdom of God on Earth,
and do it on their terms.

The fact that it was off
the beaten path, fine.

The fact that it was going to be

tough and rugged and hard
to make a go, even better.

It will bring us
closer together.

We'll be more dependent
upon each other.

>> There's a good reason why
historians refer to this as

exodus... much like Moses leading

the Jews out of Egypt... because

this was, in its own way, a
miraculous trip in which the

Mormon faithful walked away from

the rest of the country and in

many senses walked out of

secular time and
into sacred time.

With each step they walked
further and further away from

the rest of the world and deeper

and deeper into their faith,

gathering in Zion, building up

the kingdom of God and creating

something that the rest of
the world had never seen.

>> I will never forget spending

a night in the Mountain Meadows.

To be there, and for me, to walk

what was a killing field, the

last day on earth of men, women,

and children... I was a young
father at the time and I

realized that children that were

the age of my own children
died in that location.

And nighttime is the cruelest
time in Mountain Meadows.

The wind blows across
me, and it chills me.

It touches you in a
unique and profound way.

>> There's nothing else in

Mormon history like the
Mountain Meadows Massacre.

It presents a huge challenge, an

enormous difficulty, to
believing Latter-day Saints.

And for any historian, it's a
horrific, troubling event.

And for me, the key question is,

how did these decent, religious

men who had sacrificed so much

for what they believed in, how

did they become mass murderers?

>> By any standards, what
they did was horrific.

It's white people killing white

people's babies and white people

killing unarmed white women.

And then you have a religious
people who are doing this.

You expect religious people to

act differently than
you do soldiers.

All of that goes into making

Mountain Meadows the horror
that it was and is to us.

>> To understand what set
the stage for this almost

incomprehensible act of
violence, you have to take

yourself to a different world,
to a different time and

different place: Utah Territory,

the mid 1850s.

>> NARRATOR: For the Mormons,

the first years in
Utah were difficult.

A terrible drought
hit the entire West.

People were pushed to the
verge of starvation.

But slowly the
situation improved.

>> Brigham's idea to colonize,

to send people out and establish

supporting communities,
starts to come to life.

Immigrants are arriving,
repopulating the Salt Lake

Valley and then being dispatched

with great order and sense of

purpose to far flung areas to

begin new agricultural projects.

And rather than view it as the

good times, Brigham
is deeply troubled.

The ardor of the
faith starts to ebb.

The sense of commitment, in the

eyes of Brigham Young, begins to

disappoint and in 1853 Brigham

says, "That is enough. "

It's ultimately known
as the Reformation.

>> People were called to reform

and repent and to step up to the

mark and practice the old
time religion of Mormonism.

The religious leaders were

engaged in an orgy of fanatical

rhetoric and warning people of

the price they would pay, up to

the point of their very lives,

should they did not
live righteously.

>> The Mormons in the 19th

century really believed
that the end was nigh.

And you could believe that this

was really a land that was ripe

for that transformation, that

you were already half
there, to the resurrection.

It was as though the earth
was already on fire.

You were living in fire... red,

orange, yellow, fiery
land and rocks.

Red, it's like blood red.

And when the wind blows, it

creates a kind of... an excess,

a zealotry.

I think the very land itself
infused people with a sense

almost of doom that
the end was nigh.

>> NARRATOR: The Mormons had

come west to escape America, but

within a year of arriving, they

found themselves suddenly part

of the United States again.

The settlement of the Mexican

War had given the United States

government sovereignty over

Utah.

Although Brigham Young was
appointed governor of the new

territory, he was forced to

accept outside federal officials

in his administration, and he

bristled at their challenge to

his absolute rule
over the Mormons.

>> They send a petition signed

by thousands of people from Utah

saying that they will no longer

obey any laws of Congress
that they don't like.

They run out virtually every

non-Mormon federal official in

the territory and it appears
that Brigham Young is

deliberately trying to provoke a

reaction from the
national government.

>> This plays out against the

backdrop of the American Union

itself tearing apart.

The South is making continual

sounds towards secession, the

issue of slavery and states'

rights, and the person that's

dealing with it is a president

by the name of James Buchanan.

Buchanan declares the Utah

Territory in rebellion, and he

marches 20% of the entire United

States Army to the West
to subdue the rebellion.

>> They really believed, the

Mormons, that their
lives were in peril.

This is a culture that had
experienced persecution in

Missouri, in Illinois.

Their prophet had been murdered.

They understood what it was
to literally be at war.

They believed they
could be exterminated.

Under such conditions, it
doesn't excuse what happened,

but it helps us understand the

extremely heated,
supercharged atmosphere.

>> NARRATOR: As the United

States Army moved towards Utah

in the summer of 1857, the
Mormons learned that a wagon

train from Arkansas was heading

west on a trail through the

southern part of the territory.

>> They are led by a man
by the name of Fancher.

At the same time as they are

loading their wagons to head

out, one of the most beloved

members of the L.D.S. Church is

murdered in Arkansas
while on a mission.

This is an extraordinary
confluence of events...

reformation, a beloved figure

murdered in Arkansas, the Army

is marching, and here comes a

wagon party from Arkansas on the

trail.

The Mormons are aware that
the Army is marching.

Brigham declares martial
law, trade with no one.

And then word spreads that

they're from Arkansas, even
some with Missouri roots.

And the Mormons say, "Missouri...

the massacre at Haun's Mill. "

>> NARRATOR: As the Arkansas

wagon train approached the town

of Cedar City in southern Utah,

local Mormon militia leaders,

including Major John D.
Lee, were on high alert.

In Salt Lake City, Governor

Brigham Young had promised the

federal government he would

protect immigrants
passing through Utah.

But he had also told local
Native American leaders that

they now had his permission to

steal cattle from
these wagon trains.

>> It was a new policy.

"We'll allow the Indians to take

the cattle, which will teach the

government a lesson that we
can't control the Indians. "

And so the Cedar City leaders

decided to take some cattle,

using the Indians, and, "by the

way, if some of those bad guys

are killed, we won't be sorry. "

>> The Fancher party arrived at

Cedar City, according to the

Mormon journals, on the
fourth of September.

All our best evidence is that

they make it to Mountain Meadows

by Sunday evening, September 6.

And they pull in to this
beautiful alpine valley, and

felt that they were safe.

On Monday morning, September 7,

the wagon train is
just starting to stir.

>> They started getting coffee

and getting breakfast, and

people starting to get around.

Then all of a sudden, in the

distance, you hear crack, or

boom.

And it began.

They're trying to circle those

wagons, and eventually
get dug in.

>> At first, they think
it's by Indians.

And then there's some doubts.

>> But it appears that Mormon

militiamen launched the attack

with the support
of some Paiutes.

And it seems like they use the

Paiutes as shock troops.

It then settled
down into a siege.

Lee had to send to the
settlements to get more and more

men out and the Arkansans
are fighting back hard.

>> But the turning point was,

for John D. Lee, "They saw me

there, they knew I was there,

they knew Mormons were involved

and we can't let them
tell that story. "

>> We know that there was a

council meeting in Cedar City at

which the military commanders

decided that every adult who

could testify or bear
witness would have to die.

>> After a couple of days, a
white flag appears on the

horizon, and a man walks
out, and he's white.

And he says, "I'm from one of

the local communities, and we've

talked with the Native
American tribes.

If you put down your weapons,

leave your goods behind, we've

negotiated that you can leave

this field and your safe
passage is guaranteed. "

The wounded are
put into a wagon.

The youngest children
are put into a wagon.

Then the older children walk.

The women walk.

The men walk.

They get about a quarter mile

outside of the encirclement.

Someone believes
they see a signal.

>> Each Mormon walking along

with our men, wheeled around

suddenly and shot the man next

to him, killing most
of them n the spot.

I was one of those children.

At the time of the massacre, I

wasn't quite three years old,

but even when you're that

young, you don't forget the

horror of having your father

gasp for breath and go limp,

when you have your arms around

his neck, screaming with terror.

You don't forget the screaming

of other children, and the

agonized shrieks of women beig

hacked to death.

And you wouldn't forget it,

either, if you saw your own

mother topple over in the wagn

beside you, with a big red

splotch getting bigger and

bigger on the front
of her calico dress.

Sarah Baker Mitchell.

>> The wounded have been shot in

the wagons as well.

The women, the children.

The youngest children disappear

and are secreted off and are

taken in by Mormon households in

the nearby communities.

The bodies are left in place.

>> NARRATOR: When the massacre

was over, at least 120 men,

women and children
were murdered.

The Mormons had spared 17

children because they believed

the souls of those under the age

of eight were not fully formed

and still innocent.

>> John D. Lee would write years

later that from the day the

Fancher party was slaughtered on

the field, there was a vow of

silence, and that the person who

broke that vow would pay for it

with their lives.

>> The problem with trying to

tell the story of Mountain

Meadows... the sources
are all fouled up.

You have either got to rely on

the testimony of the murderers

or of the surviving children.

And so what we know about the

actual massacre is... could be

challenged on almost any point.

But what we do know is the

cover-up, and the cover-up can

be very clearly documented and

it is not ambiguous.

It is absolutely clear that this

event was purposely distorted

and misrepresented and hidden.

>> NARRATOR: Denials from the

church began immediately.

They sent letters to Mormon

authorities outside Utah saying

the Paiute Indians had done it

and passed reports to Washington

repeating this falsehood.

The church's claims were

countered with days.

In 1858, a report on the front

page of the New York Times

identified John D. Lee as the

instigator of the massacre.

>> My great great grandfather

was John D. Lee, who was the

only one brought to trial and

convicted for this, in which

there was complicity of at

least... at least five other

leaders, I think, as you read

the history, that should have

been in that trial.

Brigham Young, who was his

adopted father, did not support

him in the trial.

He did not come in and say,

"Let's find these other guys.

It isn't only John D.
Lee's fault here. "

>> Ultimately, he's executed,

ironically, in the
Mountain Meadows.

Lee goes to his death

protesting, not necessarily his

innocence, but "not the role

that I am being set up for. "

>> The people who participated

in the massacre that day, the 75

or 100 men who were involved...

I think I became more

sympathetic to their plight

because of this idea, this

Mormon principle, of
perfect obedience.

These men were ordered to appear

at Mountain Meadows.

So, in a way, they were victims

of their own devotion and

And if you can get people to

believe that they are doing

God's will, you can get them to

do anything.

>> NARRATOR: One of the most

elusive and enduring questions

is who gave the order?

Was it local militia leaders?

Or had it come from the highest

authority, from Brigham Young?

>> After having studied this for

a decade and having looked at it

in great detail, I'm convinced

that this was done explicitly at

Brigham Young's orders.

Nothing happened in Utah

Territory that Brigham Young

didn't know about.

It was a... an act of vengeance.

It was a political act to

demonstrate that the Mormons

controlled the overland road,

and it was ordered
from the very top.

>> As I explored the sources, I

felt relieved at what I'd found.

I felt comforted that Brigham

Young did what he thought was

best in his Utah war policy.

But his own personality and his

own flamboyant rhetoric caused

him to go beyond where he should

have gone.

His mistake was to stir up some

emotions which got
out of control.

But he didn't order it then, and

he didn't condone it.

>> Shortly before the events

took place on September 11,

1857, the day of the massacre,

Brigham Young called a number of

Indian tribal leaders
to Salt Lake City.

And in that meeting, Dimick

Huntington was there actually

taking notes, and in his diary

we have an account of Brigham

Young actually instructing the

tribal leaders, telling them

that they essentially may have

all of the wagon trains on a

certain route.

The Mormons were
preparing for war.

In a way, it was Brigham Young

saying, "Go ahead
and have at it. "

We have very little evidence of

any involvement of Brigham Young

in the Mountain Meadows

Massacre, but we do have this

one indication in my great great

grandfather's diary saying that,

at least, Brigham Young set the

stage for certain
events to take place.

>> Over 150 years later people

still argue over the ghosts of

Mountain Meadows.

Who pulled the trigger?

Who gave the order?

Will it ever be resolved?

>> I have no doubt, on the basis

of what I have studied and

learned, that Mormons...

including local leaders of our

church... were prime movers in

that terrible episode and

participated in the killing.

And what a terrible thing to

contemplate, that the barbarity

of the frontier and the

conditions of the Utah war and

whatever provocations were

perceived to have been given,

would have led to such an

extreme episode, such an extreme

atrocity perpetrated by members

of my faith.

I pray that the Lord will

comfort those that are still

bereaved by it, and I pray that

He can find a way to forgive

those who took such a terrible

action against their
fellow beings.

>> Mountain Meadows may be that

moment when you can look and

say, "This is where Mormonism's

own checks and balances failed

them, and they lost control, and

they burned to the ground. "

This fire, this sense of being

God's anointed, of speaking in

the name of God, having a work

to do, being above the law,

Mountain Meadows may be the

symbol of that.

And until Mormonism itself comes

to terms with Mountain Meadows

and how that happened, it will

remain alive for them as well.

>> My grandfather lived plural

marriage, and he went to prison

in the 1880s, and served his

time there for living
plural marriage.

My mother had told me that

Grandpa was really a good man,

because of the things that they

had suffered and the persecution

they had to go through, all for

the religion.

>> "As I was going up the

stairs, I met a man
who wasn't there.

He wasn't there again today.

I wish, I wish, he
would go away. "

That symbolizes the church and

plural marriage.

People still rush to judgment,

believing that Utah is

synonymous with plural marriage,

and that somehow that connection

still extends to the

contemporary Church of Jesus

Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Every ten years, the United

States rediscovers the

polygamists, purporting to be

Mormon fundamentalists, still

believing in plural marriage.

And then it goes away.

And then ten years later, it

comes back again, and so they

get featured on
national television.

Every time it comes out, the

Church of Jesus Christ of

Latter-day Saints flinches,

knowing that there's going to be

housewife in Illinois or a

banker in Atlanta or a clergyman

in upstate New York who's going

to look at that and say, "Aha,

polygamy, Mormons, Utah, I knew

>> I wish to state
categoricallk %ç4ing

thaVU81z. H(Z]yC1

whatever to do with those

practicing polygamy.

They are not members of this

Most of them have
never been members.

They're in violation
of the civil law.

They know they are in violation

of the law.

They are subject
to its penalties.

The Church, of course, has no

jurisdiction whatever
in this matter.

If any of our members are found

to be practicing plural
marriage, they are

excommunicated, the most serious

penalty the Church can impose.

>> There is a disconnect, and

it's a powerful disconnect.

The Church of Jesus Christ of

Latter-day Saints embraces the

totality of its history, because

it speaks to the roots of the

Mormon experience. á@qr[

That history is central to

telling that story.

But the bumps in the road,

particularly plural marriage,

are aspects of the story they

are not comfortable
dealing with.

They wish that man would go

>> NARRATOR: The origins of

polygamy are unclear.

What we do know is that in

Nauvoo in the summer of 1843, in

his office above the general

store, Joseph Smith dictated the

revelation authorizing polygamy.

In his revelation Smith claimed

that God had commanded his

people to live in plural

marriages, and by doing so they

would progress to the highest

level of heaven as gods.

>> Though the revelation on

polygamy was given during the

Nauvoo period in the 1840s, we

know that he was talking about

the practice of polygamy in

scriptural terms as early as

1831 and 1832.

He had an affair, or if you want

to call it, a marriage, during

the Kirtland period to a 19-

year-old girl who served as a

maid in the Smith home.

>> Joseph Smith begins seriously

to take plural wives,
in rapid order.

Maybe 30 wives in total, ten of

them married to other men.

There was pressure
put on these women.

They were told that this was the

Lord's will, and he was the

Lord's prophet, and that if they

were to please God,
they had to comply.

Joseph tended to couch it in

terms of the blessings that

would come not only to them but

to their whole family, that they

would all be blessed by being

sealed together in this

relationship with the prophet.

It led to all sorts
of problems for him.

It tried the souls of even the

faithful members, and, of

course, it led to great

alienation of his own wife Emma.

>> The question arises, did

Smith lie to his wife?

Probably so, but we don't have

enough of the dialog to know

exactly what went on between

Smith and his wife.

We do know that he had marriages

that she didn't know about, and

that they were with women who

lived under her roof, and they

were with her friends.

And that, of course, is a

nightmare for anyone.

>> In his own mind he believed

that Abraham and the other

prophets in the Old Testament

were directed by God to practice

polygamy, and so I think he used

that, and I think in his own

mind he became convinced that if

God had allowed them to do it,

God would permit
Joseph Smith to do it.

But for me, as I studied the

issue, I came to the conclusion

that his sexual desire drove the

practice and that he found a way

to sanctify it, to make it

respectable, and to couch it in

scriptural terms with

revelations of convenience.

>> When I started finding out

some of the things that Joseph:ó

Smith actually did and said, I

think he was struggling with

trying to bring together

spirituality and sexuality.

And quite frankly, Christianity

has been really bad at this, and

most major religions have been

really bad at spirituality and

sexuality.

You're supposed to be spiritual

on Sunday, sexual when you're in

bed with your partner... your

legal husband or wife, right, no

one else... and yet you're

supposed to deny your sexuality

in all of these other contexts.

Well, it doesn't make sense.

>> Do I think Smith's

revelations on polygamy can be

reduced to his sex drive?

No, I don't, anymore than I

think the Book of Mormon can be

reduced to treasure hunting.

It's too simplistic.

We all know this.

There are so many easier ways to

satisfy our sex drive than to

have many marriages,
at least at one time.

Now, maybe serially, but having

many marriages at one time seems

to me to be the least rational

way to satisfy one's sex drive.

>> Joseph Smith turns to Brigham

Young, and said, "Brigham, you

are being called to enter into

this practice. "

And Brigham's initial
reaction is, "No.

No, I cannot.

Ask me to do anything.

Ask me to sacrifice my
wealth, my fortune.

Ask me to be away
from my family.

But don't ask me to do this. "

Joseph Smith continually

reintroduces the subject month

after month after month, and

finally Brigham Young is

watching a funeral pass down the

main street of Nauvoo, and he

finally acknowledges, "I will

accept this principle, and it's

the first time in my life that I

desire the grave.

I wish I were dead rather than

have to do this. "

But Brigham Young, once

committed, all the way in.

And soon Brigham Young is noting

in his diary, in his journal,

"M.E.," married for eternity,

page after page after page.

>> NARRATOR: Young would

officially marry more than 50

Many of those were widows and

elderly women whom he cared for

economically.

And not all the women lived with

him as man and wife.

Those who did would bear him 57

children.

>> When the Mormons were driven

off of Nauvoo and started to

head to the west, they packed

polygamy in their wagons, and

they carried this principle into

the frontier of the
American West.

They felt if they were free of

the United States they could

practice this aspect of their

religion as revealed by Joseph

>> NARRATOR: Plural marriage

would never be widely practiced

by the rank and file of the

Overall, 20% to 30% of the

Saints were polygamists, most of

them from the leadership who

could afford it.

>> The perceived notion is that

polygamy was a wonderful thing,

that it was the divine

principle, and that the people

who could live it were living a

higher order.

The reality, I think, is that it

was so full of heartbreak, just

heart-wrenching moments and

events when a husband came home

and said to his wife, "Emma, the

Bishop has said that I have to

take another wife, and I have my

eye on Prudence.

She is 16 years old.

Prudence Karchner,
and you know her.

We've grown up with her in the

community, and the Bishop has

said that I'm to take
her for a wife. "

And this is exactly what

happened to my
great grandfather.

And I have his wife's diary.

She was devastated.

She was... she was... just

couldn't believe that... that

this man, with whom she had

several children and had a

wonderful life, that she was now

going to have to share him with

a 16-year-old girl.

She was 30.

That 16-year-old girl was my

great grandmother.

And it took a few days of going

out for walks at
night and talking.

And then everybody adjusted to

the idea, "Yes, we are going to

have another wife. "

And it isn't, "I'm going to have

another wife," but "We're going

to have another wife. "

They really did try and make it

work, because they... again, the

idea of perfect obedience.

You simply can't say,
"I won't do this. "

You can't say that and still be

a good Mormon.

>> NARRATOR: In 1852 the Mormons

ended the secrecy, publicly

announced they were practicing

plural marriage and began to

preach it from the pulpit.

In Victorian America, editorials

raged against imagined harems

and concubines in Utah.

Protestant ministers denounced

the practice and the outrage

spread through sensational
popular novels.

>> And the stories included

women beaten within an inch of

their lives, locked in cellars,

escaping across the desert.

It's the stuff of great drama.

>> Many of them depicted Mormons

as a kind of white slavers who

would raid caravans or wagon

trains in order to secure brides

for the harem of Brigham or

other high-profile
church leaders.

In Senate testimony in the 19th

century, it was alleged that

Mormons were actually offering

human sacrifice on the altars of

the Salt Lake Temple.

>> Many anti-polygamists thought

that Mormon polygamy was nothing

more than a fraud.

They thought these priests had

delegated themselves with sexual

opportunities that they denied

to the rest of the men in their

own society and that they had

denied women their own natural

inclination to monogamy.

The Mormon defenders of polygamy

met anti-polygamists on their

own turf and fought it out.

They said, "You bet marriage

makes a difference.

Take a look at your own

societies and the prostitutes

and the abandoned women that are

And look at our society, and see

every woman have the opportunity

to be married to a man who not

only will marry her but is an

upstanding member of the faith. "

>> NARRATOR: But the Mormons

would pay a high price

politically for their
embrace of polygamy.

For 47 years Utah was denied

admission as a state.

The United States government

insisted that the Mormon church

must completely renounce

>> Polygamy was always the

easiest whipping boy for federal

officials who really feared

something else.

And what they feared was

theocracy in Utah, the union of

church and state, where the

people of Utah territory would

adhere more closely to religious

leadership than elected

leadership.

The democratic process meant

nothing to them.

>> NARRATOR: Brigham Young

passionately defended plural

marriage until his
death in 1877.

50,000 people came from across

the country to view his simple

coffin, wreathed in white wool

and to pay their respects to the

leader who they felt had saved

the church and made Joseph

Smith's vision a reality.

His successors continued the

struggle and the U.S. government

declared polygamy a felony and

began to imprison hundreds of

>> And when the Utah territorial

prison filled up, and the Idaho

territorial prison filled up,

and the Arizona territorial

prison filled up, they began

sending them east to Nebraska

and even to Detroit.

They were being convicted
by the hundreds.

And so men had to
often hide out.

>> When we focus only on the

suffering imposed on families

whose husbands went to jail,

we're not really taking a look

at the big picture to the extent

that there was a simple story of

innocent, separatist, utopian

existence stomped on without

provocation by the rest of the

country, then I think we have

missed the really interesting

part of 19th century Mormonism,

which is that they claimed a

separate political life and the

power to control those within

their borders, and the ability

to keep the rest of the world

out of that control.

>> Congress comes after the

Mormon people in the Utah

territory with every weapon at

their disposal.

In 1887, they pass the Edmonds-

Tucker Act.

No longer is it aimed at the

individual; now we will target

the Church itself.

We will seek to prohibit

immigration of people to the

United States who are Mormon.

We will disfranchise members of

the Mormon church.

They will not be allowed to sit

on juries, they will not have

the right to hold office, they

will not have the right to vote,

and we will seize the property

of the Mormon church.

>> NARRATOR: In 1890, under

enormous pressure, the new

leader, Prophet Wilford

Woodruff, issued a manifesto

that he would only years later

describe as a revelation.

In it he announced that from

this time forward the L.D.S.

church renounced polygamy.

>> But if you read that

statement, it is little more

than a piece of advice.

It is not a commandment.

There are... there is no "thus

sayeth the Lord"
in the document.

It is not described as a

And I think that Wilford

Woodruff and some of those

authorities working with him

simply looked upon the manifesto

as a device to somehow get the

government to back off, and they

hoped that the manifesto
would save them.

>> NARRATOR: The church's

official renunciation of

polygamy and other political

concessions finally led to

statehood for Utah in 1896.

But some Mormons continued to

practice plural marriage in

secret even when the Church

threatened them with
excommunication.

>> For Mormons to walk away from

polygamy was related very

directly to their understanding

of how one was saved.

Sometimes I think it's easy to

think of if you went to another

Christian and said, "The United

States is going to legislate

against baptism.

You can't baptize anymore. "

Well, what would they do?

They would dig a... they would

start doing it in
their swimming pools.

They'd dig a hole
in their basements.

They would still baptize.

So Mormons were still performing

these celestial marriages.

>> In my own view, the largest

consequence of it fed into the

development of fundamentalism,

which arose in the early 20th

century, where many who had been

engaged in these very practices

secretly, lying about them,

believed that the Church, now

having decided to go clean on it

and stop the practice, was yet

being dishonest, and felt that

they had as much license and

permission to continue to do so

themselves as church authorities

had done in the past.

>> As the 20th century

progresses the leadership of the

L.D.S. Church makes the decision

no longer to be passively

opposed to polygamy, they decide

to aggressively root out the

practitioners of polygamy

because they believe they're an

enduring stain on the reputation

of the Church.

And so the Church develops an

informant system.

They develop a close working

partnership with local law

enforcement to identify church

members, identify them for

prosecution to make a dramatic

show of the formal breaking of

the L.D.S. Church with any

vestige of polygamy.

>> NARRATOR: But all that would

backfire in 1953, when state

troopers, with church support,

raided the small polygamist

community of Short
Creek, Arizona.

>> It is a night of no moon, so

it's perfect darkness, and the

police roll into the
town of Short Creek.

And much to their

disappointment, they're greeted

by the men and women gathered in

the town square singing "God

Bless America. "

The police take the
men into custody.

They drive them away to Kingman,

Arizona, to face trial.

The women and the children are

also taken into state custody.

And what happens is these

evidentiary photos start getting

published in newspapers and

national magazines, and rather

than snowball towards

conviction, it produces this

great public sentiment, leave

these people alone.

>> My parents were both involved

in the Short Creek raid.

They were both small
children at the time.

My father was taken from his

parents and lived with an

adopted... he was adopted out to

a family and he lived with them

for a time, and here are

families and they're living

their life, and all of a sudden

they're just ripped apart.

If I had to go through that, I

don't know what I would do.

>> NARRATOR: Many of the

estimated 30,000 to 60,000

fundamentalist Mormons who still

practice polygamy today claim

that they are the real Mormons,

that they practice the principle

of plural marriage as revealed

to Joseph Smith and will not

obey the later renunciations by

the Church.

>> Joseph Smith told us that if

we wanted to become gods, we had

to do as God had done, and God

lived polygamy.

And in the Bible, Abraham lived

polygamy, and he said that if we

want those blessings and we want

to attain godhood, that we had

to do as they had done.

>> There is no such thing as a

Mormon fundamentalist.

It is a contradiction to use the

two words together.

More than a century ago, God

clearly revealed unto his

prophet Wilford Woodruff that

the practice of plural marriage

should be discontinued, which

means that it is now against the

law of God.

>> NARRATOR: Today the public

face of polygamy is often that

of its most extreme adherents

like Warren Jeffs, who was the

absolute ruler of an isolated

community of Mormon
fundamentalists.

>> Are you Warren Jeffs?

>> Yes.

>> NARRATOR: He recently pled

not guilty to charges that he

was an accomplice to rape for

arranging the marriage of a 14-

year-old girl to an older man.

>> The fundamentalist groups

that practice polygamy in the

contemporary setting have been

marginalized.

They've been isolated, where

they are turned so far inward

that can make them much more

likely to be subjected to the

strong personality and

determined beliefs of someone

such as Warren Jeffs.

>> NARRATOR: But most

fundamentalist Mormons live

quiet... even ordinary... lives,

some in their own small

communities, others in
the larger society.

They are wealthy and poor, urban

and rural.

While polygamy is still a crime,

few are prosecuted.

>> We have 15 people in our

family, three mothers and 11

Even as a little girl, I saw the

beauty in plural marriage and

always wanted to live it.

We believe in present-day

revelation, and the process by

which I got married, it was

through prayer and a
lot of inner work.

It's not through courtship.

It's more like an arranged

As far as my experiences of

being a first wife and having

other women come into my life

and my husband's life, it's...

you know, it's difficult.

Living the principle of plural

marriage, it is a refiner's

fire, because it gives you the

opportunity to see yourself in a

light or in a way that you would

not have the
opportunity otherwise.

You are put in circumstances to

show yourself and other people

and God what choice you are

going to make, whether or not

you are a loving, giving person

or if you are going
to be selfish.

It's pretty much a process of

development... oh, this is

awful.. that you get
in no other way.

People are innately jealous.

Just depends on what you're

jealous about.

So, you know, I'ive had to deal

with that, as far as, you know,

sharing my husband.

And really, it's learning the

context in which you can share

the most intimate part of your

life with these other women.

It's not necessarily
yours, it's ours.

>> The purpose of religion in my

life is... it's comprised of the

principles that transform my

character into the character

similar of God.

I mean, it's how I
can become like God.

The focus of plural marriage

becomes the family... raising

children who will want to become

like God and who will please

But we want society to respect

our desire to live beyond, to

live deeper, to live a life that

takes us further than
those around us.

>> When you see adults and

families of conscience, of free

will, enter into this union, it

puts you in pause for a second

and you recognize that you can't

broadly characterize polygamy as

black or white.

There is a huge swath of gray

over this issue as it's

practiced in the
western United States.

>> Mainstream orthodox Mormons

today, while officially they

deplore polygamy, nevertheless,

somewhere naggingly at the back

of their minds, is a great

ambivalence because this was a

revelation to Joseph Smith.

What are they going to say, God

didn't reveal it
to him, you know?

It was, to them, a very profound

moment in their history, and

very, very important, and these

people keep it alive.

>> NARRATOR: Like many of their

beliefs, polygamy had put the

Mormons in conflict with

themselves and with
their country.

It was a struggle that was in so

many ways emblematic
of their entire

journey.

>> In this microcosm of the

Latter-day Saints, which is only

at most 180 years old, you have

a definition of the American

experience itself, not just what

it means to be unique, but what

it means to deal
with the unique.

Not just to say, "I'm going to

hold fast to my principle. "

But what does it mean to back

off from your principle and seek

accommodation?

How do you go from being the

ultimate outcast to the

embodiment of the mainstream in

two generations?

It's a breathtaking
transformation

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