Episode 113: Mormon Thieves

**Lindsay Hansen Park** (0:13)
It's 1849, and Brigham Young is cranky.
Let's be honest, he's straight up cranky all the time, but this particular time, he was big mad about the honorable, self-sacrificing men of the Mormon battalion. Here's the thing, I was gonna write this episode about something completely different, but then I was looking in Juanita Brooks' papers and found a folder of her notes on the Mormon battalion, and she chronicles a bunch of times that Brigham Young just shat all over his faithful soldiers. And so it got me curious, what was happening here? And why would Brigham Young turn on his own guys like this?

**Bryan Buchanan** (0:54)
You all remember the Mormon battalion, the 500 stout volunteers, stripling warriors, if you will, who sacrificed leaving their families on basically no pay to walk by foot to California to fight in Uncle Sam's pretend war so that other Mormons could illegally encroach on Indian lands protected by the Indian Intercourse Act of June of 1834

**Lindsay Hansen Park** (1:14)
Yeah, so sweet cinnamon bears. Let's see what their loyal prophet and leader allegedly said about them.
Brigham told John D. Lee that the battalion boys were made up of the lowest scrapings of hell. Very Brigham Young quotes there. And we're gonna talk about this later, the summer quarters, because John D. Lee is basically in charge there. So they have winter quarters, they have summer quarters. And you're gonna hear about that a little bit in the next quote.
So here's the quote from Juanita Brooks' notes. Quote, there has been no man in this church that has done as much for the soldier, wives and poor widows as Brother Lee has, but myself. And Juanita notes, Lee is quoting from Brigham Young talking about himself.
In fact, he has run and exposed himself enough to wear him out. Now to oppress and sacrifice him, it cannot be done. And those that use the influence against him will go down to hell. And I know that the lowest scrapings of hell were in the battalion. Notwithstanding, there were some good men among them. The soldiers' wives had lied and tattled about me and Brother Rockwood and said that we have cheated and wronged them out of their money and thereby poisoned and sour the feelings of their husbands. Blame it on the women, of course. They're the liars. John D. Lee being a cheat. What a terrible lie, slander.
Back to John D. Lee. In so much that they give way to the same spirit and commence finding fault with their brethren who have done all they could to sustain the soldiers' families while their husbands were gone. Great God, could women trammel me in this manner? No, all their counsel and wisdom, although there are many good women, don't weigh as much with me as they weight of a fly turd. Excuse me for my vulgarity. It is not common for me to use such a language, says Brigham Young.
I don't talk like this normally.

**Bryan Buchanan** (3:01)
No, definitely not common.

**Lindsay Hansen Park** (3:02)
Excuse me for my vulgarity. It's not common for me to use such language, but I know of no language to mean to suit the case before us. It is not a woman's place to counsel her husband, and the moment a man follows a woman, he is led astray and will go down to hell unless he retracts his steps.
Yeah, I mean, I feel like even though Brigham, you know, John D. Lee's writing this down and bragging about how beloved he is, which he always did, Brigham Young thinks I'm awesome. This sounds pretty accurate to Brigham Young's speech patterns, I'd say.

**Bryan Buchanan** (3:34)
He was terrified of women. They're always trying to trample him.

**Lindsay Hansen Park** (3:39)
Always trample the poor Brigham. He's really the victim of women.
He's the real victim here.

**Bryan Buchanan** (3:46)
But this isn't the first part of the story though, because we need to back up to 1846 The saints there are snuggled down in winter quarters and the detachments of the battalion are trying to return home.
Brigham Young has ordered John D. Lee to travel to Santa Fe from winter quarters to collect the payments that were due to the soldiers from the federal government. Because remember, the Mormons weren't just playing for Uncle Sam's team because the Star-Spangled Banner is on a loop in their hearts. John Doyle is supposed to go get that shiny government cash back to winter quarters. But interestingly, there's accusations that he pocketed or stole the money and was not honest in his accounting.

**Lindsay Hansen Park** (4:22)
What?

**Bryan Buchanan** (4:23)
No, I swear, we beat John D back.