Isaac Chauncey Haight

Isaac C. Haight's personal journal can be found in a number of special collection libraries but is not readily available to the general public. I have taken the time to transcribe his journal so that more people can read his account of his life. The journal I used as my source was a microfilmed copy of a typescript of the original journal. Historical notes and pictures have been added throughout the book. This was done to create a small view into the world which surrounded Isaac Haight.

On September 11, 1857, a group of Mormons aided by Paiute Indians brutally murdered some 120 men, women, and children traveling through a remote region of southwestern Utah. Within weeks, news of the atrocity spread across the United States. But it took until 1874—seventeen years later—before a grand jury finally issued indictments against nine of the perpetrators. Mountain Meadows Massacre chronicles the prolonged legal battle to gain justice for the victims. The editors of this two-volume collection of documents have combed public and private manuscript collections from across the United States to reconstruct the complex legal proceedings that occurred in the massacre’s aftermath. This exhaustively researched compilation covers a nearly forty-year history of investigation and prosecution—from the first reports of the massacre to the dismissal of the last indictment in 1896. Of special importance in Volume 2 are the transcripts of legal proceedings against John D. Lee—many of which the editors have transcribed anew from the shorthand. The two trials against Lee led to his confession, conviction, and ultimately his execution on the massacre site in 1877, all documented in this volume. Historians have long debated the circumstances surrounding the Mountain Meadows Massacre, one of the most disturbing and controversial events in American history, and painful questions linger to this day. This invaluable, exhaustively researched collection allows readers the opportunity to form their own conclusions about the forces behind this dark moment in western U.S. history.

"Published by Oxford University Press in 2008, Massacre at Mountain Meadows relied on new and exhaustive research to tell the story of one of the grimmest episodes in Latter-day Saint history. On September 11, 1857, southern Utah settlers slaughtered more than 100 emigrants of a California-bound wagon train. In this much-anticipated sequel, Richard E. Turley Jr. and Barbara Jones Brown follow up that volume with an examination of the aftermath of the atrocity. In greater detail than ever before, Vengeance Is Mine documents southern Utah leaders' attempts to cover up their crime by silencing witnesses and spreading lies about the victims and perpetrators of the crime. Investigations by both governmental and church bodies were stymied by stonewalling and political wrangling. While nine men were eventually indicted, five were captured and only one, John D. Lee, was executed. The book examines the maneuvering of the defense and prosecution in Lee's two trials, the second ending in Lee's conviction. The book examines the fraught relationship between Lee and church president Brigham Young, including what Young knew of the crime and when he knew it. The book also tells the story of the seventeen young children who survived the massacre and their later return to Arkansas, from where the ill-fated wagon train originated. The book traces the fate of the perpetrators to the end of their lives, including the harrowing demise of Nephi Johnson, who screamed, "Blood! Blood! Blood!" in the delirium of his death bed more than sixty years after the massacre"--

"Dear Brother," Jane Manning James wrote to Joseph F. Smith in 1903, "I take this opportunity of writing to ask you if I can get my endowments and also finish the work I have begun for my dead.... Your sister in the Gospel, Jane E. James." A faithful Latter-day Saint since her conversion sixty years earlier, James had made this request several times before, to no avail, and this time she would be just as unsuccessful, even though most Latter-day Saints were allowed to participate in the endowment ritual in the temple as a matter of course. James, unlike most Mormons, was black. For that reason, she was barred from performing the temple rituals that Latter-day Saints believe are necessary to reach the highest degrees of glory after death. A free black woman from Connecticut, James positioned herself at the center of LDS history with uncanny precision. After her conversion, she traveled with her family and other converts from the region to Nauvoo, Illinois, where the LDS church was then based. There, she took a job as a servant in the home of Joseph Smith, the founder and first prophet of the LDS church. When Smith was killed in 1844, Jane found employment as a servant in Brigham Young's home. These positions placed Jane in proximity to Mormonism's most powerful figures, but did not protect her from the church's racially discriminatory policies. Nevertheless, she remained a faithful member until her death in 1908. Your Sister in the Gospel is the first scholarly biography of Jane Manning James or, for that matter, any black Mormon. Quincy D. Newell chronicles the life of this remarkable yet largely unknown figure and reveals why James's story changes our understanding of American history.

Includes biographical information on 4,500 individuals associated with the frontier