James wrote:
Jaye wrote:
Lovie wrote:
so James, Jaye and or Wren, I read that Lee was a guard of BY, was that his body guard, or does it have hidden meaning? I know in Salt Lake BY had other guard around him to. Who and what were they. Why I ask, one of my ancester is a Gaurd of JS and then to BY. After reading the past few days, A light went on and I'm thinking maybe Danites??? Please correct me if I'M wring.

DUBBS please don't answer this, you have know idea!

(From PBS)

John Doyle Lee
(1812-1877)

A man whose life was stained by tragedy, John D. Lee is perhaps the most controversial figure in Mormon history.

Born in 1812 in Kaskaskia, Illinois Territory, Lee had a tumultuous childhood. At age three, his mother died after years of lingering illnesses, leaving Lee to his alcoholic father. From age seven to sixteen Lee was raised in an uncle's family. He worked for a time as a mail carrier before assuming managerial responsibility for his uncle's farm, then worked several years as a store clerk in Galena, Illinois. Finally, Lee moved to Vandalia, Illinois, where he met and married Agatha Ann Woolsey in 1833.

It was in Vandalia that Lee and his wife encountered Mormonism. In 1837 a Mormon missionary converted the couple to the young religion, which had been formally organized only seven years before. Lee's religious passion quickly became the driving force in his life, prompting him to move in 1838 to a homestead near the Mormon town of Far West, Missouri.

The large influx of Mormons into Northwest Missouri caused enormous tensions with the non-Mormon ("gentile" population. Many of the gentiles were hostile on purely religious grounds, but they also resented the political and economic power which the cohesive Mormon community had acquired. Individual confrontations soon exploded into near warfare involving murder, destruction of property, and cycles of raids and counter-raids between the Mormons and gentiles. Lee played an active role in many of the military conflicts, and soon became a member of the Danite Band, the formally organized Mormon militia. Finally Missouri's governor ordered the Mormons expelled or exterminated, sending an army which surrounded their community and forced the Mormon leadership to surrender.

As the Mormons began preparing for their trek eastward to Nauvoo, Illinois, Lee's religious devotion continued to strengthen. In 1838 he was promoted within the priesthood and made a member of the First Quorum of the Seventy, the body which directed the church's extensive missionary activities. From 1839 to 1844 he spent much of his time winning converts in Illinois, Tennessee and Kentucky. His commitment impressed the church leadership, and in 1843 he was chosen to guard the home of the church's founder and prophet, Joseph Smith.

John Lee's religious fervor only grew in intensity as the young religion entered its darkest hour. In June 1844 a mob dragged Joseph Smith and his brother from their jail cell in Carthage, Illinois, and murdered them, causing a crisis of leadership within the church. In addition, there was internal dissension over the doctrine of plural marriage, which had been formally announced within the church in 1843. Lee accepted the new doctrine, soon taking five more wives, and he remained devotedly loyal to the church leadership, especially the new leader, Brigham Young, whom Lee assisted during the Mormon flight to the "Winter Quarters" near the confluence of the Platte and Missouri rivers.

Having been persecuted from their religion's birthplace in New York to Missouri and Illinois, the Mormons had by 1846 decided to seek their own Zion in the American West. This journey, the first leg of which was the removal from Nauvoo to Winter Quarters, was to take the Mormons to Utah. By 1847 the first wagons began arriving in Utah's Salt Lake valley. After serving briefly in the Mexican-American War as a member of Brigham Young's "Mormon Battalion," Lee joined the gathering masses of Zion in Utah.

For the next decade, Lee played an important role in expanding the Mormon refuge in the West. He became a prosperous farmer and businessman in Southwestern Utah, helping to establish communal mining, milling and manufacturing complexes. He became the local bishop and the Indian agent to the nearby Paiute Indians. And he continued to be a frequent visitor and trusted confidant of the church leadership in Salt Lake City.

Even in the far West, however, neither Lee nor his co-religionists were beyond the reach of the country whose persecution they had fled. In 1857, prompted by complaints about church power in the territory and a public outcry against polygamy, the United States sent an army to Utah, raising Mormon fears that the final annihilation was at hand. This invasion was the backdrop for the still-controversial Mountain Meadows Massacre, in which a wagon train of about 120 gentile immigrants, suspected of hostility toward the church, was destroyed by Mormon and Paiute forces in southwestern Utah.

Lee's involvement in the massacre -- the extent of which is still vigorously disputed and will probably never be known -- was to haunt him for the next two decades, and would ultimately lead to his execution. He had written a letter to Brigham Young shortly after the massacre which laid the blame squarely on the Paiute Indians, but even among his own neighbors rumors of Lee's guilt abounded. In 1858 a federal judge came to southwestern Utah to investigate the massacre and Lee's part in it, but Lee went into hiding and local Mormons refused to cooperate with the investigation. Folk songs dating back to this year blamed Lee for the massacre. A warrant for his arrest remained outstanding.

Although the church sought to lower Lee's profile, by removing him as a probate judge, the Mormon leadership continued to return his immense loyalty. In 1860, Brigham Young visited one of Lee's mansions and publicly praised his personal industriousness and communal economic contributions. In 1861 the residents of Harmony, Utah, elected him as their presiding elder.

But Lee could not escape the legacy of Mountain Meadows. By the late 1860s, his diary, and letters from several of his wives, speak of persistent harassment by his Mormon neighbors for his connection with the massacre, including threatening letters and the ostracization of his children. In 1870 a Utah paper openly condemned Brigham Young for covering up the massacre. That same year Young exiled Lee to a remote part of northern Arizona and excommunicated him from the church, instructing his former confidant to "make yourself scarce and keep out of the way."

The next several years brought a continued decline in Lee's fortunes. He had several episodes of severe illness; drought followed by torrential rains destroyed many of his buildings and crops; former neighbors preyed upon his livestock and otherwise took advantage of his absence; several of his wives deserted him. Nevertheless, he was managing to eke out a living in a homesteader's cabin near the Colorado River in Northern Arizona (at one point hosting John Wesley Powell's 1869 expedition before their trip through the Grand Canyon) when a sheriff captured him in November 1874.

Lee's first trial ended inconclusively with a hung jury, probably because of the prosecution's misguided attempt to portray Brigham Young as the true mastermind of the massacre. A second trial, in which the prosecution placed the blame squarely on Lee's shoulders, ended with his conviction. The trials were the subject of enormous public attention and gave rise to many accounts of the massacre and of Lee's life. These accounts, naturally, vary widely in their factual accuracy, but many contain the classic elements of anti-Mormon paranoia: fear of Mormon political and economic power and horror at the sexual depravity assumed to be implicit in plural marriage. Most play up the fact that Lee had numerous wives and emphasize the plight of the women and children killed and captured at Mountain Meadows. Lee himself continued to profess his innocence.

Nearly twenty years after the massacre, Lee was executed at Mountain Meadows. Although angry at Brigham Young's treatment of him, Lee's final words maintained the deep religious faith that had marked his entire adult life:

"I have but little to say this morning. Of course I feel that I am at the brink of eternity, and the solemnities of eternity should rest upon my mind at the present... I am ready to die. I trust in God. I have no fear. Death has no terror."

So...in recap...In 1838 John D.Lee was promoted within the priesthood and made a member of the First Quorum of the Seventy, the body which directed the church's extensive missionary activities.

In 1843 John D.Lee was chosen to guard the home of Joseph Smith. After the martyrdom of Joseph and Hyrum, Lee assisted Brigham Young with the immigration west.

He served in the Mormon Battalion, and was an influential member of the faith for a decade.

He was also a bishop, an indian agent, a frequent visitor to Salt Lake City, and a trusted confident to the LDS hierarchy of leadership.

Even after the massacre, Brigham Young praised Lee for his industry and efficiency and Lee was elected as Presiding Elder...but eventually his Mormon peers began to persecute him, his wives and his children.

In 1870, a Utah paper openly criticized Brigham Young for covering up MMM, and that same year, Brigham Young exiled Lee to Arizona, excommunicated him, and instructed his former friend and confident to "make yourself scarce and keep out of the way."

No wonder Brother Lee felt so deeply betrayed. Jaye, you have blown my mind with this wee bit of information.

Lovie, I have nothing to add, other than I am blown away by Jaye.

Yes, he sure can copy and paste can't he?

Dubbs wrote:
Jaye wrote:
Lovie wrote:
so James, Jaye and or Wren, I read that Lee was a guard of BY, was that his body guard, or does it have hidden meaning? I know in Salt Lake BY had other guard around him to. Who and what were they. Why I ask, one of my ancester is a Gaurd of JS and then to BY. After reading the past few days, A light went on and I'm thinking maybe Danites??? Please correct me if I'M wring.

DUBBS please don't answer this, you have know idea!

(From PBS)

John Doyle Lee
(1812-1877)

A man whose life was stained by tragedy, John D. Lee is perhaps the most controversial figure in Mormon history.

Born in 1812 in Kaskaskia, Illinois Territory, Lee had a tumultuous childhood. At age three, his mother died after years of lingering illnesses, leaving Lee to his alcoholic father. From age seven to sixteen Lee was raised in an uncle's family. He worked for a time as a mail carrier before assuming managerial responsibility for his uncle's farm, then worked several years as a store clerk in Galena, Illinois. Finally, Lee moved to Vandalia, Illinois, where he met and married Agatha Ann Woolsey in 1833.

It was in Vandalia that Lee and his wife encountered Mormonism. In 1837 a Mormon missionary converted the couple to the young religion, which had been formally organized only seven years before. Lee's religious passion quickly became the driving force in his life, prompting him to move in 1838 to a homestead near the Mormon town of Far West, Missouri.

The large influx of Mormons into Northwest Missouri caused enormous tensions with the non-Mormon ("gentile" population. Many of the gentiles were hostile on purely religious grounds, but they also resented the political and economic power which the cohesive Mormon community had acquired. Individual confrontations soon exploded into near warfare involving murder, destruction of property, and cycles of raids and counter-raids between the Mormons and gentiles. Lee played an active role in many of the military conflicts, and soon became a member of the Danite Band, the formally organized Mormon militia. Finally Missouri's governor ordered the Mormons expelled or exterminated, sending an army which surrounded their community and forced the Mormon leadership to surrender.

As the Mormons began preparing for their trek eastward to Nauvoo, Illinois, Lee's religious devotion continued to strengthen. In 1838 he was promoted within the priesthood and made a member of the First Quorum of the Seventy, the body which directed the church's extensive missionary activities. From 1839 to 1844 he spent much of his time winning converts in Illinois, Tennessee and Kentucky. His commitment impressed the church leadership, and in 1843 he was chosen to guard the home of the church's founder and prophet, Joseph Smith.

John Lee's religious fervor only grew in intensity as the young religion entered its darkest hour. In June 1844 a mob dragged Joseph Smith and his brother from their jail cell in Carthage, Illinois, and murdered them, causing a crisis of leadership within the church. In addition, there was internal dissension over the doctrine of plural marriage, which had been formally announced within the church in 1843. Lee accepted the new doctrine, soon taking five more wives, and he remained devotedly loyal to the church leadership, especially the new leader, Brigham Young, whom Lee assisted during the Mormon flight to the "Winter Quarters" near the confluence of the Platte and Missouri rivers.

Having been persecuted from their religion's birthplace in New York to Missouri and Illinois, the Mormons had by 1846 decided to seek their own Zion in the American West. This journey, the first leg of which was the removal from Nauvoo to Winter Quarters, was to take the Mormons to Utah. By 1847 the first wagons began arriving in Utah's Salt Lake valley. After serving briefly in the Mexican-American War as a member of Brigham Young's "Mormon Battalion," Lee joined the gathering masses of Zion in Utah.

For the next decade, Lee played an important role in expanding the Mormon refuge in the West. He became a prosperous farmer and businessman in Southwestern Utah, helping to establish communal mining, milling and manufacturing complexes. He became the local bishop and the Indian agent to the nearby Paiute Indians. And he continued to be a frequent visitor and trusted confidant of the church leadership in Salt Lake City.

Even in the far West, however, neither Lee nor his co-religionists were beyond the reach of the country whose persecution they had fled. In 1857, prompted by complaints about church power in the territory and a public outcry against polygamy, the United States sent an army to Utah, raising Mormon fears that the final annihilation was at hand. This invasion was the backdrop for the still-controversial Mountain Meadows Massacre, in which a wagon train of about 120 gentile immigrants, suspected of hostility toward the church, was destroyed by Mormon and Paiute forces in southwestern Utah.

Lee's involvement in the massacre -- the extent of which is still vigorously disputed and will probably never be known -- was to haunt him for the next two decades, and would ultimately lead to his execution. He had written a letter to Brigham Young shortly after the massacre which laid the blame squarely on the Paiute Indians, but even among his own neighbors rumors of Lee's guilt abounded. In 1858 a federal judge came to southwestern Utah to investigate the massacre and Lee's part in it, but Lee went into hiding and local Mormons refused to cooperate with the investigation. Folk songs dating back to this year blamed Lee for the massacre. A warrant for his arrest remained outstanding.

Although the church sought to lower Lee's profile, by removing him as a probate judge, the Mormon leadership continued to return his immense loyalty. In 1860, Brigham Young visited one of Lee's mansions and publicly praised his personal industriousness and communal economic contributions. In 1861 the residents of Harmony, Utah, elected him as their presiding elder.

But Lee could not escape the legacy of Mountain Meadows. By the late 1860s, his diary, and letters from several of his wives, speak of persistent harassment by his Mormon neighbors for his connection with the massacre, including threatening letters and the ostracization of his children. In 1870 a Utah paper openly condemned Brigham Young for covering up the massacre. That same year Young exiled Lee to a remote part of northern Arizona and excommunicated him from the church, instructing his former confidant to "make yourself scarce and keep out of the way."

The next several years brought a continued decline in Lee's fortunes. He had several episodes of severe illness; drought followed by torrential rains destroyed many of his buildings and crops; former neighbors preyed upon his livestock and otherwise took advantage of his absence; several of his wives deserted him. Nevertheless, he was managing to eke out a living in a homesteader's cabin near the Colorado River in Northern Arizona (at one point hosting John Wesley Powell's 1869 expedition before their trip through the Grand Canyon) when a sheriff captured him in November 1874.

Lee's first trial ended inconclusively with a hung jury, probably because of the prosecution's misguided attempt to portray Brigham Young as the true mastermind of the massacre. A second trial, in which the prosecution placed the blame squarely on Lee's shoulders, ended with his conviction. The trials were the subject of enormous public attention and gave rise to many accounts of the massacre and of Lee's life. These accounts, naturally, vary widely in their factual accuracy, but many contain the classic elements of anti-Mormon paranoia: fear of Mormon political and economic power and horror at the sexual depravity assumed to be implicit in plural marriage. Most play up the fact that Lee had numerous wives and emphasize the plight of the women and children killed and captured at Mountain Meadows. Lee himself continued to profess his innocence.

Nearly twenty years after the massacre, Lee was executed at Mountain Meadows. Although angry at Brigham Young's treatment of him, Lee's final words maintained the deep religious faith that had marked his entire adult life:

"I have but little to say this morning. Of course I feel that I am at the brink of eternity, and the solemnities of eternity should rest upon my mind at the present... I am ready to die. I trust in God. I have no fear. Death has no terror."

So...in recap...In 1838 John D.Lee was promoted within the priesthood and made a member of the First Quorum of the Seventy, the body which directed the church's extensive missionary activities.

In 1843 John D.Lee was chosen to guard the home of Joseph Smith. After the martyrdom of Joseph and Hyrum, Lee assisted Brigham Young with the immigration west.

He served in the Mormon Battalion, and was an influential member of the faith for a decade.

He was also a bishop, an indian agent, a frequent visitor to Salt Lake City, and a trusted confident to the LDS hierarchy of leadership.

Even after the massacre, Brigham Young praised Lee for his industry and efficiency and Lee was elected as Presiding Elder...but eventually his Mormon peers began to persecute him, his wives and his children.

In 1870, a Utah paper openly criticized Brigham Young for covering up MMM, and that same year, Brigham Young exiled Lee to Arizona, excommunicated him, and instructed his former friend and confident to "make yourself scarce and keep out of the way."

No wonder Brother Lee felt so deeply betrayed.

And how did that long winded copy and paste job answer Dovies question clifford frickin clavin? holy crap, you have such a need to have people thing you are of intelligence you post long winded diatribes that don't even answer questions, why do you do that? Ego? Very odd.

1. I have repeatedly reminded you that since the day I posted the talk by the late President Hinckley in his fireside address to young marrieds regarding emotionally abusive behavior...I have not referred to you as either Kent, or Percy, nor have I called you names, or belittled your opinions...yet you continually refer to me as Clifford Clavin, and continue to use emotionally abusive words and tactics toward me, and others on this forum.

Why do you do that? Odd.

You have falsely claimed that you follow the words and teachings of Jesus Christ, His apostles, His prophets, and the general authorities of the LDS faith...but you have consistently done exactly the opposite of what they have taught.

Why do you do that? Odd.

2. It took very little time to access the information for Lovie, and to post it, and to recap what it said.

3. The article I posted did answer Lovie's question...and quite a number of questions which have been posed in the past. If someone asks a question...I am not above checking out the available resources and offering suggestions and assistance.

Dubbs wrote:
As I said, there is a difference when God tells you to do something, and you doing it on your own.

The Lafferty brothers obviously didn't get that memo, 'cause I'm pretty sure they still believe that God told them to kill their sister-in-law & neice. Would you mind explaining it to them? I'm sure that if you sit down and discuss it, they'll come to an understanding.

Apparently Dubbs has very conveniently forgotten all the many times he has copied and pasted very long articles as it suited him to do.

Dubbs wrote:
James wrote:
Just Reading wrote:
James wrote:
myomyomy wrote:
Kit Kat I agree with what you say to a certain extent. Let me ask you a question. If you were to spread false information about another person, and you later find out to not be totally correct, do you have a responsibility to say you are sorry and try to correct misstatements? Now if an organization realizes it has not correctly taught or portrayed an event in its past history that caused hurt to others, even though they did not participate but rather turned a blind eye, do you think this organization would have a moral responsibility to account for false information previously taught?

By the way, both "wren" and "just reading" seem to be well read on MM subject.

"By the way, both "wren" and "just reading" seem to be well read on MM subject" TRUE STORY, from my experience anything they write about they most generally know what they are talking about.

Thank You James Just Reading, You are welcome.

According to 'all' the Paiute, Shoshone, Goshute, Ute, Sioux and Seminole Elders that I have sat with the fire, consider the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints the most lost of Christian Churches. Many of these elders were baptized into the LDS faith, primarily because of Mormon Church leader's words. According to these Elders "we soon learned that their (Mormons) words were empty, their words were an attempt to satisfy their ravishing dog appetite, claiming they were the friends of our people, we soon understood, all they wanted was sole possession of Mother Earths lands and water. Just look around you James and you will see what we speak is true."

The inner mountain west American Native people 'must' forgive the atrocities and cultural genocide that have been perpetrated upon them by the Mormons for a true transforming cultural event. It seems the L.D.S. faith leaders are so intoxicated by their good works and their elaborate campaign to cover-up and denying any wrong doing condemns them to repeat these atrocities.

In my opinion, following the cultural "forgiving" process, the American Native people and their allies will blossom like a rose and become a beam empowering light that will influence the entire world to live more in harmony with one another. I wrote this story to give one way of resolving the seething hatred the American Native people of the inner mountain west have for the Mormons.

My Gift
In the summer of 1848, thirteen Mormon pioneers were in the middle of a twenty-six-day journey across a Utah desert when they were attacked by a band of thirty "enraged" Ute warriors. These particular settlers were substantially armed with rifles and with an abundance of ammunition. They immediately made a fortified circle with their carts and wagons chained together to defend themselves. Over the three-day attack, most of the migrating settlers were killed. By the early morning light of the fourth day, the Ute's for some unknown reason retreated and left their dead behind. Only three settlers, a woman and two men, survived. All of their horses were stolen or killed.

As the settlers sorted through the carnage, and with the thick smell of death, they found only a meager amount of provisions and water that could possibly sustain them for about eight or nine more days. Not knowing if any Ute warriors were nearby, the settlers had resigned themselves to joining their dead family members and friends, through exposure, starvation and / or the lack of water. Just then, a faint moan was heard several yards outside of their encampment, seemingly from a young child. The woman, against the warnings of the men, left the fortification and shortly returned, carrying a young Ute child, who was near death. The men wanted to kill the boy, but the woman would not allow it. Instead, she nursed the boy by sharing their scant water supply with him and dressed his wounds. Because of the woman's care, over the next few days, the boy's wounds began to heal, but he would, only occasionally, regain a sluggish unconsciousness and then fell back into a quasi-coma.

A day or so later, the Ute warriors returned, catching the Mormons by surprise. As the warriors prepared to kill the remaining settlers, the young boy's voice could be heard, saying in his language, "Father, they saved me from death and shared water with me." Startled and amazed at hearing his son's voice, the tallest of the warriors softened his heart and requested that the other warriors withdraw from the two men and woman. The pioneer's lives, for the moment, had been spared.

After thoroughly inspecting the child's condition, the father carefully picked his son up, while still holding his war club. Carefully cradling his child against his broad bare chest, the father, with a stoic look, in his tear filled eyes, walked to the side of his beautifully painted horse and carefully lifted his boy and gently placed him onto the bare back of this magnificent animal. With the horse's bridle in his right hand and his 'war' club in his left, he turned away. As the father and boy left the encampment, without a word or even a glance at the settlers, the warrior dropped his club. The other Ute's slowly, also in silence, turned away and left the pioneers.

After four freezing nights and five torrid days had passed, the settlers were in the hands of death. One of the men imagined an image of a person on horseback, with two other horses quietly gazing at him in a seemly ghost like manner. With a dazed and feeble cry "Oh, Lord," waking the other man and woman from their deathlike slumbers, as the rider hovered over them.

The pioneers were barely able to discern that the rider was a young Ute Warrior and not an illusion. The nearly naked Ute Brave dismounted his horse; he knelled next to the woman and with his moistened fingers, gently dampened the woman's lips, eyes and face. He then did the same with each of the men. Very softly, in broken English, he said, "These horses and food are gifts from my father and mother."

The settlers slowly began to garner some feelings of hope that they were not going to be killed or die in this arid desert. However, the woman and the men began to murmur that there were 'only three horses'. After a few moments of quietly listening to the pioneers' voice this fearful concern, the young Ute Warrior stood and with broken English responded, "Yes, there are only three horses. The horses are a 'gift' from my father while the food is a 'gift' from my mother's people."

He then respectfully said "the walk to my village is 'my gift' and turned and began his journey.

Little confused, how did the pioneers "find" a ute baby in the middle of the desert?

James? Anyone?

Jaye wrote:
Apparently Dubbs has very conveniently forgotten all the many times he has copied and pasted very long articles as it suited him to do.

Nah . . . he just wants an excuse to belittle you for providing reality-based facts. It's just what he does to make himself feel better about his lack of historical knowledge.