The North, the South and the Mormons

"I'm not sure that makes sense. The Confederacy was not the unknown, the US they had issues with included the South that would become the Confederacy."


Not sure what "south" you are referring too......If going by confederacy, NY, Ohio, Missouri and Illinois were all union states, if going by Geographic's, Ohio Missouri and Illinois all are on the same geographic line, If I drive straight east of where I live I will pretty much go through Springfield Illinois, Indianapolis Indiana and just a few miles south of Columbus Ohio in Ohio.....not exactly a southern line

If going by slave state.....NY was still a slave state when Mormonism was founded in 1820's there , however seldom hear of NY referred to as "southern".

To try to imply Mormons had major issues with any of the states that went on to become the confederacy before the civil war seems a stretch , as all their major settlements, and the problems of having been driven from them were in what in civil war terms would be considered "Northern" states
 
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Quoted from CHURCH HISTORY IN THE FULNESS OF TIMES STUDENT MANUAL, CHAPTER THIRTY; THE CIVIL WAR

Complete article/manual found here: https://www.lds.org/manual/church-h...-times-student-manual/chapter-thirty?lang=eng

The Civil War Period

“Chapter Thirty: The Civil War Period,” Church History in the Fulness of Times Student Manual (2003), 381–91

“The United States had experienced a decade of intense sectional division between the North and the South. In 1861 after Abraham Lincoln was elected president of the United States, several southern states seceded from the Union. On 12 April 1861 the first shots of the Civil War were fired on Fort Sumter, South Carolina. This fratricidal conflict lasted four years, destroying the Old South and costing 602,000 lives. In Utah during this period the Latter-day Saints enjoyed relative peace and progress.

The Saints and the Civil War

When the Civil War broke out,1 many Saints remembered the “revelation and prophecy on war” received by the Prophet Joseph Smith 25 December 1832:

“Verily, thus saith the Lord concerning the wars that will shortly come to pass, beginning at the rebellion of South Carolina, which will eventually terminate in the death and misery of many souls. …

“For behold, the Southern States shall be divided against the Northern States” (D&C 87:1, 3). In 1843 the Prophet had declared that the bloodshed that would begin in South Carolina “may probably arise through the slave question” (D&C 130:13). Many missionaries had often referred to this prophecy and felt some satisfaction in seeing the word of the Lord so literally fulfilled.
As the conflict deepened, the Saints viewed the Civil War with mixed emotions. They considered the bloodshed and devastation in the “states” a judgment upon the nation for the murders of Joseph and Hyrum Smith, for not keeping the commandments of God, and for the injustices inflicted upon the Saints in Missouri and Illinois. Members of the Church followed Joseph Smith’s lead in firmly supporting the American Constitution. John Taylor expressed the feelings of many Latter-day Saints when he addressed them:

“We have been driven from city to city, from state to state for no just cause of complaint. We have been banished from the pale of what is termed civilization, and forced to make a home in the desert wastes. …

“Shall we join the North to fight against the South? No! … Why? They have both, as before shown, brought it upon themselves, and we have had no hand in the matter. … We know no North, no South, no East, no West; we abide strictly and positively by the Constitution.”2

After war had raged for nearly a year, President Young acknowledged that the Saints were much better off in the West: “Had we not been persecuted, we would now be in the midst of the wars and bloodshed that are desolating the nation, instead of where we are, comfortable located in our peaceful dwellings in these silent, far off mountains and valleys. Instead of seeing my brethren comfortably seated around me to-day, many of them would be found in the front ranks on the battle field. I realize the blessings of God in our present safety. We are greatly blessed, greatly favored and greatly exalted, while our enemies, who sought to destroy us, are being humbled.”3

Church leaders never seriously considered supporting the Confederacy, and when President Abraham Lincoln asked them for soldiers to guard the transcontinental telegraph lines and transportation routes, the Church responded enthusiastically. The Saints also willingly paid an annual war tax of $26,982 imposed on the Utah Territory by the United States Congress. The Brethren repeatedly reaffirmed their loyalty to the Union. Indeed, just as some states were trying to get out of the Union, Utah was trying to get in.

Utah and the Church immediately felt the effects of the Southern States seceding. Governor Alfred Cumming, whose native state was Georgia, felt it his duty to resign from his federally appointed position. He quietly left Utah for his home. General Albert Sidney Johnston, from Virginia, resigned his post and joined the Confederate army. After a few months the army of Utah was withdrawn altogether. In March 1861 the Union, now minus several southern states, created the Territory of Nevada out of the western portion of Utah, and in 1862 and 1866 more territory was added to Nevada, which became a state in 1864.

With the federal troops gone from Utah, the overland mail and telegraph needed protection from Indians who were reportedly becoming more hostile and had destroyed several mail stations between Fort Bridger and Fort Laramie in Wyoming. In the spring of 1862 war officials contacted Brigham Young (though he was no longer governor) with a request that he organize a cavalry to give ninety days’ service on the trail until other U.S. troops could arrive. Soon a company of 120 men was raised and ready to travel. Ironically their commander was Captain Lot Smith of the Utah Militia, who had been instrumental just four years earlier in delaying federal troops. He was charged by Brigham Young to prevent the use of profanity and disorderly conduct among the men and to cultivate friendly and peaceful relations with the Indians. The men performed their work admirably, encountered no real fighting, pursued only a few Indians, and received compliments from the United States government for their service.4This service was the only direct military participation by an organized unit of the Latter-day Saints in the Civil War.

Also in 1862 the citizens of Utah made their third attempt to gain statehood. The Saints drafted a constitution for the proposed State of Deseret and elected a full slate of officers, with Brigham Young as governor. But their petition was denied, mostly because of polygamy, which the ruling Republican Party was determined to oppose.

Republican President Abraham Lincoln, although he signed the Morrill Anti-Bigamy Act of 1862, which was directed against the Latter-day Saints, did not press for its enforcement. He was fair-minded regarding the Mormon question and was more concerned about dealing with the southern rebellion. When Brigham Young sent Deseret News assistant editor T.B.H. Stenhouse to Washington, D.C., to ascertain Lincoln’s plans for the Mormons, the president told him, “Stenhouse, when I was a boy on the farm in Illinois there was a great deal of timber on the farms which we had to clear away. Occasionally we would come to a log which had fallen down. It was too hard to split, too wet to burn and too heavy to move, so we plowed around it. That’s what I intend to do with the Mormons. You go back and tell Brigham Young that if he will let me alone, I will let him alone.”5 Throughout the remainder of the war, President Lincoln’s tolerant attitude won him the respect of the Saints.”

End quote

….

Apparently, the North was tolerant according to the Mormon.
 
***Posted as Moderator***
The topic is the relationship of LDS members and the opposing sides in the American Civil War.
Please refrain from discussing dogma and current practices of LDS or any other religion.
 
There is already a thread on the subject here.

As far as factual evidence goes, it is not clear. In 1862 Capt. Lot Smith (the same one who was guarding the mountains of SLC against the US Army in 1857 during the Utah Expedition) raised 100 volunteer Cavalry to guard telegraph and mail lines in UT and WY from Native attacks. This happened in request by Lincoln to Young. When that situation was settled, Lincoln asked Young for Smith's regiment's involvement outside the Utah Territory, and Young refused. This was the only potential involvement of the Utah Territory in the ACW. My take would be that they were protecting their own interests and not that of the Union in their involvement.

Young himself made several speeches on the war, taking both sides on occasion. Overall he saw the War in some sort of an apocalyptic religious light that meant the beginning of a new era. There are some interesting material in the newspaper archive in the LoC, on the subject, if one wants to search the Utah papers of the era.

Mormons outside the Utah territory served on both sides, but that was a personal and not a religion-driven choice.
 
"I'm not sure that makes sense. The Confederacy was not the unknown, the US they had issues with included the South that would become the Confederacy."


Not sure what "south" you are referring too......If going by confederacy, NY, Ohio, Missouri and Illinois were all union states, if going by Geographic's, Ohio Missouri and Illinois all are on the same geographic line, If I drive straight east of where I live I will pretty much go through Springfield Illinois, Indianapolis Indiana and just a few miles south of Columbus Ohio in Ohio.....not exactly a southern line

If going by slave state.....NY was still a slave state when Mormonism was founded in 1820's there , however seldom hear of NY referred to as "southern".

To try to imply Mormons had major issues with any of the states that went on to become the confederacy before the civil war seems a stretch , as all their major settlements, and the problems of having been driven from them were in what in civil war terms would be considered "Northern" states

My point was that the "South" was part of the "US" before the Confederacy. The Federal government had been influenced and included Southerners at various times. There issues with the "Federal government" and "US" included the South when it was part of the US. Not specific issues with specific Southern states (well other than massacring a bunch of people from Arkansas, that should be considered).

Everything the "US" did before the Confederacy included the South as part of that US. As the article i referenced pointed out, including quotes from Brigham Young, did not always single out the South separate than that US they had conflict over. They found it ironic the US they were conflicting with was fighting with each other (again they often saw it as the US as a whole as that article referenced). On top of that many like Brigham Young from the North where Mormonism was founded were fairly anti-slavery (again as the quotes from Brigham Young reflect).

Yes slavery was still legal in New York in some sense in 1820, but there were 10,000 slaves out of about 1.3 million people, or roughly 0.7%. So yeah by then a large portion of Northerners had already been very anti-slavery including many of the cultures Mormon founders came from, again as reflected by Brigham Young's own words.
 
My point was that the "South" was part of the "US" before the Confederacy. The Federal government had been influenced and included Southerners at various times. There issues with the "Federal government" and "US" included the South when it was part of the US. Not specific issues with specific Southern states (well other than massacring a bunch of people from Arkansas, that should be considered).

Everything the "US" did before the Confederacy included the South as part of that US. As the article i referenced pointed out, including quotes from Brigham Young, did not always single out the South separate than that US they had conflict over. They found it ironic the US they were conflicting with was fighting with each other (again they often saw it as the US as a whole as that article referenced). On top of that many like Brigham Young from the North where Mormonism was founded were fairly anti-slavery (again as the quotes from Brigham Young reflect).

Yes slavery was still legal in New York in some sense in 1820, but there were 10,000 slaves out of about 1.3 million people, or roughly 0.7%. So yeah by then a large portion of Northerners had already been very anti-slavery including many of the cultures Mormon founders came from, again as reflected by Brigham Young's own words.
No dispute the "south" was part of the US before the CW, however the fact remains most of the Mormon settlements and disputes weren't in the "southern part" of the US.. And it would seem slavery apparently wasn't so distasteful to preclude from moving to and settling in slave states, because they in fact did chose to. They chose to believe a slave state was the "garden of Eden" literally..... Edited.
Interestingly enough while here, abolitionism wasn't a major charge against them, their liberation of cattle and horses from non Mormon neighbors was, and the formation of Danites.
 
No dispute the "south" was part of the US before the CW, however the fact remains most of the Mormon settlements and disputes weren't in the "southern part" of the US.. And it would seem slavery apparently wasn't so distasteful to preclude from moving to and settling in slave states, because they in fact did chose to. They chose to believe a slave state was the "garden of Eden" literally..... Edited.

Interestingly enough while here, abolitionism wasn't a major charge against them, their liberation of cattle and horses from non Mormon neighbors was, and the formation of Danites.

Well to be fair the Mormons didn't have much options, they had to move further and further out of their home in the North for all those reasons you mentioned. Completely tangential, my wife's ancestor was a danite Cornelius Lott, he was one of the three "generals" of the danites.

Certainly the Mormons didn't fall into one specific bin (reflected in their lack of really supporting either side with anything more than lip server for the most part) and as they went further out of the North they obviously expanded in population beyond just Northerners (though again DNA tests show a genetic affinity between modern Mormons in Utah to the Northeast as shown in my wife's DNA test and her mothers, it's actually a linked cluster in AncestryDNA they found).

Though in the end Brigham Young became the leader, President, and prophet of the Mormons during that time and his views were not only clear but official doctrine.

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Slavery is the ruin of the South observed the President. The South has a beautiful climate and rich soil, but slavery ruins any soil.
----

I refer back to that article which sites quite a bit I already posted excerpts from.

He was no abolitionist and proclaimed a such, but his opinion on slavery was clear and as that article pointed out at one point even said

----
Brigham believed that the war might have been shortened if the government had “cast out the Seceders” when the secession crisis had begun.[52] Although many Mormons sympathized with the South, Brigham was emphatic that “South Carolina [had] committed treason” when it seceded, and he regretted that Buchanan had not “hung up the first man who rebelled” in the state.[53] When some suggested that peaceful secession was an option, Brigham scoffed at the idea and argued that eventually “the fierce spirit urging to civil war” would overwhelm the nation, resulting in “rapine, flame, and bloodshed.”[54]
----

It's clear there were many Southern sympathizers in the Mormon community, none of that mattered. The President and Prophet of the Mormons clearly had strong views on the subject. I see no love for the North or the South.

My point with the South being part of the US before the CSA is that the Mormons issues were in locality but also in issues with the Federal government (over their methods and especially polygamy). The South showed no particular love for the Mormons and had no different stance on the issues the government had with them. I see nothing to suggest when the Mormons rallied against the US they were singling out the North and ignoring the South. They especially disliked Buchanan who was a Democrat and we should not ignore the fact they were anti-slavery in a territory which is an important context with the decades of disputes over territories and slavery, including Dred Scott and of course Lincoln's election on getting rid of slavery in the territories.

Again they don't fit nicely into any typical Civil War bin but considering Brigham Young's positions and their extra cultural and political friction with aspects of the South I don't see how they would fall on that side.
 
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I grew up in Utah, as a descendant of LDS pioneers on my mother's side and Illinois Yankees on my father's side. I've been reading this thread today with great interest, due to my heritage and the faith that I continue to practice as a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. I'd like to add a couple of points:
  • Quite a few "Mormons" built homes and communities in Missouri (1830s), prior to being driven out by mob actions and then settling in Illinois. When they were subsequently also driven from Illinois (the exodus from Illinois began in 1846), they first crossed the Mississippi River into Iowa territory, not then a state. In essence, they had been driven by their enemies out of the very country whose Constitution they continued to defend. When the Saints embarked for what later became Utah, it was part of Mexico. As I understand it, Brigham Young had determined that if the United States of America wouldn't protect Saints' rights, they would leave the country altogether. And yet, among the earliest actions that the Saints took in Utah was to petition the United Sates to become admitted as a state, and Brigham Young was a firm defender of the Constitution, as noted by others.
  • The Mountain Meadows Massacre is the worst blight on the history of Utah. But, please don't simply blame all Saints who were living in Utah. No, "they" (i.e. all Mormons, or the main body of the members, or even the leadership of the Church) did not perpetrate the massacre, but a small minority in southern Utah. Some of these men were particularly incensed by the Missourians in the Arkansas company who purportedly boasted of depredations against Mormons years before and who then bragged that they would do the same to the Mormons in Utah. Please, PLEASE don't think that I or anyone of my faith today would excuse the massacre by saying they deserved it because of this. That's not my intention of sharing this info - it's simply the history as I understand it. BTW, I can think of very few acts perpetrated by "Christians" that could be more egregious than the Mountain Meadows Massacre or similar events. (I'm also thinking of the Crusades, pogroms, the massacres of native Americans, the Yugoslav/Balkans Wars...)
  • I have a sense that most Saints, even early arrivals, would have identified with the North more than the South. When I first became sentient in the 60s and 70s, I would say that there might even have been some antipathy for the South among 19th-century. Latter-Day Saints. I believe that this was due to, (1) Saints who associated Missouri and Missouri's treatment of the Saints who settled there in the 1830s with the South; (2) missionaries were often ill-treated in the South and the Church was not well-received in the South in the 19th century; (3) Church members were generally opposed to slavery; and, (4) members were told then, as now, to uphold the Constitution.
  • By the time that the Saints began moving to Utah, many church members, such as many of my own ancestors, had emigrated from Great Britain, Scandinavia, or other parts of Europe where slavery had already been abolished. There were possibly as many leaders of the church who were immigrants, themselves, as there were leaders who were from the North. I don't think that any of these immigrant leaders would have supported slavery, either.
 
Well to be fair the Mormons didn't have much options, they had to move further and further out of their home in the North for all those reasons you mentioned. Completely tangential, my wife's ancestor was a danite Cornelius Lott, he was one of the three "generals" of the danites.

Certainly the Mormons didn't fall into one specific bin (reflected in their lack of really supporting either side with anything more than lip server for the most part) and as they went further out of the North they obviously expanded in population beyond just Northerners (though again DNA tests show a genetic affinity between modern Mormons in Utah to the Northeast as shown in my wife's DNA test and her mothers, it's actually a linked cluster in AncestryDNA they found).

Though in the end Brigham Young became the leader, President, and prophet of the Mormons during that time and his views were not only clear but official doctrine.

----
Slavery is the ruin of the South observed the President. The South has a beautiful climate and rich soil, but slavery ruins any soil.
----

I refer back to that article which sites quite a bit I already posted excerpts from.

He was no abolitionist and proclaimed a such, but his opinion on slavery was clear and as that article pointed out at one point even said

----
Brigham believed that the war might have been shortened if the government had “cast out the Seceders” when the secession crisis had begun.[52] Although many Mormons sympathized with the South, Brigham was emphatic that “South Carolina [had] committed treason” when it seceded, and he regretted that Buchanan had not “hung up the first man who rebelled” in the state.[53] When some suggested that peaceful secession was an option, Brigham scoffed at the idea and argued that eventually “the fierce spirit urging to civil war” would overwhelm the nation, resulting in “rapine, flame, and bloodshed.”[54]
----

It's clear there were many Southern sympathizers in the Mormon community, none of that mattered. The President and Prophet of the Mormons clearly had strong views on the subject. I see no love for the North or the South.

My point with the South being part of the US before the CSA is that the Mormons issues were in locality but also in issues with the Federal government (over their methods and especially polygamy). The South showed no particular love for the Mormons and had no different stance on the issues the government had with them. I see nothing to suggest when the Mormons rallied against the US they were singling out the North and ignoring the South. They especially disliked Buchanan who was a Democrat and we should not ignore the fact they were anti-slavery in a territory which is an important context with the decades of disputes over territories and slavery, including Dred Scott and of course Lincoln's election on getting rid of slavery in the territories.

Again they don't fit nicely into any typical Civil War bin but considering Brigham Young's positions and their extra cultural and political friction with aspects of the South I don't see how they would fall on that side.

It probally should be noted the Mormons actually practiced slavery especially with Indian slaves, such as the Timpanogo and legalized it with the Act in relation to service and the act for the relief of Indian slaves and prisoners both passed in 1852 during Brigham Young, and unofficially by acts such as taking children from slain victims such as at Mountain Meadows, then parceling them out to raised by Mormon families.
 
Yes. Remember also that any Mormon expression of anti-slavery views did not mean that LDS believed in equality for black men. Edited.

The Act in relation to service which not only legalized slavery in Utah made it also clear they weren't equals with a stiff anti-miscegenation clause

Young actually defends slavery as the curse of Cain....yet like many things they believe its ok for them......its just other peoples slavery that is bad:bounce:


https://www.blackpast.org/african-a...frican-american-history/utah-slave-code-1852/
 
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It probally should be noted the Mormons actually practiced slavery especially with Indian slaves, such as the Timpanogo and legalized it with the Act in relation to service and the act for the relief of Indian slaves and prisoners both passed in 1852 during Brigham Young

Please include the reference. Also keeping in mind this was 9 years before the Civil War.

and unofficially by acts such as taking children from slain victims such as at Mountain Meadows, then parceling them out to raised by Mormon families.

That was not slavery. That was a horrible massacre that was covered up and hidden away and they took the left over children and adopted them out to families.

It's dangerous to just throw the word "slavery" around. The US official racial system of slavery is a specific version of it and there were indeed other systems of slavery. They weren't all the same and though the Meadows Massacre was horrible them adopting the children out certainly wasn't slavery, more like child theft.
 
I did both are a matter of record

Act_in_Relation_to_Service made African American slavery legal in Utah

act for the relief of Indian slaves and prisoners made indian slavery legal for a period of 20 years after capture, which increased it from 10 which it was under the old Mexican law.

Both can be found online and at wiki, I provided the actual act for relation to service in other post

As to not taking captive children as somehow not being slavery...….would think thats rather subjective as the children didn't have a choice of where to go or remain with their parents...….who had done nothing to deserve death. Little different then attacking Indian villages to make slaves of the women and children

this has Indian one text https://collections.lib.utah.edu/details?id=716787

They had their own territory to do what they wanted to do...…..and what they did was include slavery both for Africans and Indians.
 
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