THE SAINTS MUST GO. 133
most of the remainder being set free a week later on giving bail. Lucas ^'^ then retires with his troops, leaving the country to be ravaged by armed squads that burn houses, insult women, and drive off stock ad libitum^^ The faint pretext of justice on the part of the state, attending forced sales and forced settle- ments, might as well have been dispensed with, as it was but a cloak to cover official iniquity.*'^
bers who had desolated our society, nor would he receive testimony except against us. . .The judge in open court, while addressing a witness, proclaimed that if the members of the church remained on their lauds to put in another crop thoy should be destroyed indiscriminately, and their bones be left to bleach on the plains without a burial... Mr Doniphan, attorney for the defence, and since famed as a general in the Mexican war, finally advised the prisoners to offer no defence; "for," said he, "though a legion of angels from the opening heavens should declare your innocence, the court and populace have decreed your destruction.". . .Joseph and Hyrum Smith, Sidney Rig- don, Lyman Wight, Caleb Baldwin, and Alexander McRay were committed to the jail of Clay co. on charge of treason; and Morris Phelps, Lyman Gibbs, Darwin Chase, Norman Shearer, and myself were committed to the jail of Richmond, Ray co. , for the alleged crime of murder, said to be committed in the act of dispersing the bandit Bogart and his gang. ' Id. , 230-3.
^ Ingloriously conspicuous iu the Missouri persecutions were generals Clark, Wilson, and Lucas, Colonel Price, Captain Bogart, and Cornelius Gil- liam, 'whose zeal in the cause of oppression and injustice, ' says Smith, 'was unequalled, and whose delight has been to rob, murder, and spread devasta- tion among the saints, . .All the threats, murders, and robberies which these officers have been guilty of are entirely ignored by the executive of the state, who to hide his own iniquity must of course shield and protect those whom he employed to carry into effect his murderous purposes.' Times and Sea- sons, i. 7.
- ' Pages of evidence, both Mormon and anti-Mormon, might be given, and
can indeed at any time be produced, to prove the commission of innumerable wrongs and revolting atrocities on the part of the people of Missouri, while abetted therein by state forces, commanded by state officers, and all under guidance of the state governor.
- '^ There is abundance of testimony from disinterested sources, even from
the opposers of Mormonism themselves, to prove the persecution on the part of the people of Missouri unjust and outrageous. I will quote only three from many similar comments that have been made on this subject, and all, be it re- membered, emanating from the open and avowed enemies of this religion.
Says Prof. Turner of Illinois college: 'Who began the quarrel? Was it the Mormons? Is it not notorious, on the contrary, that they were hunted like wild beasts, from county to county, before they made any desperate re- sistance? Did they ever, as a body, refuse obedience to the laws, when called upon to do so, until driven to desperation by repeated threats and assaults from the mob? Did the state ever make one decent effort to defend them as fellow-citizens in their rights, or to redress their wrongs? Let the conduct of its governors, attorneys, and the fate of their final petitions an- swer. Have any who plundered and openly massacred the Mormons ever been brouglit to the punishment due to their crimes? Let the boasting mur- derers of begging and helpless infancy answer. Has the state ever remuner- ated even those known to be innocent, for the loss of either their property or their arms? Did either the pulpit or the press through the state raise a note of remonstrance or alarm? Let the clergymen who abetted and the editors
