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The Utah War
( Excerpts from the full account )
It was a good war. "Killed, none; wounded, none; fooled, everybody," reported a correspondent of the New York Herald. The incident of 1857-58 known as the Utah Expedition, the Utah War or Buchanan's Blunder was a collision of territorial self-determination against a federal government already faced with insubordination in Kansas and its Southern states. When President James Buchanan decided to flex federal muscle against Utah Territory and "the Mormon problem," he ignited a full rebellion that, before it was all over, embarrassed the military arm of the young republic and confounded the president.
Typifying Mormon reaction, Sanford Porter Sr. wrote, "[We are] weak in number, and weak in means, but with too much American blood in our veins to put ourselves up as a target for an army to shoot at without making any effort to protect ourselves." Popular Utah rhetoric cast the Mormons in the role of "Uncle Sam's nephews," walking in his footsteps against tyranny.
During the months of October and November, between 1,200 and 2,000 militiamen were stationed in the narrow, high-walled Echo Canyon and the equally defensible East Canyon, on the main road into the Salt Lake Valley. Living on little more than baked flour and water and dealing with the numerous feet of snow that kept falling on the Wasatch Range, the Utah men built breastworks, dug rifle pits and dammed the streams and rivers in preparation for battle. Those who venture off today's interstate highway can still see the remnants of their efforts.
Militiamen sought what food, clothing, arms and ammunition they could carry, separated out the two wagons, and burned the rest. Lyman W. Porter felt it a shame to destroy so much property, as did others who rode with Smith. These were men who had experienced much deprivation on the Utah frontier. Neither was it in their nature to be thieves and vandals. The 24-year-old Porter became fascinated by a resin soap that melted and ran in a big yellow stream from the burning wagons and then cooled on the snow below. He used his knife to cut out a chunk, which he carried home. After the conflict was over, he returned a pistol he had taken in a raid to its rightful owner.
Read the full story at... http://www.thehistorynet.com/we/blutahwar2/
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