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Show The Coming of the Mormons 67 Most Indians were servants or farmhands for the whites. They were often treated and passed around like property. George A. Smith wrote on one occasion that "Brother Barnard presented me with a child, a Pihede girl about four years old. He purchased it off Walker for an ox." 48 Even Jacob Hamblin, who was probably the best white friend the Nuwuvi had in those years, was involved in the slave trade. In July of 1854 he wrote in his diary: "I bought an Indian boy about six years old. I gave for him a gun, a blanket, and some ammunition. Brother A. P. Hardy took him to Parowan and let Brother Judd have him. Brother Hardy was offered a horse for him by a gentile [a non-Mormon | .... I bought him that I might let a good man have him that would make him useful." 49 In later years Hamblin purchased two girls in order to provide each of his wives with a personal maid.50 Many of the children, despite being adopted, died at an early age. Thomas D. Brown told how he purchased five children, only two of whom lived until the end of the year.51 Zadok K. Judd purchased at least three children, one of whom survived until maturity. Most of the deaths seem to be attributable to measles and other white diseases to which the Indians had little resistance. Those who survived usually found themselves torn between two cultures. They were unable to accept or adapt to the strangeness of the whites who, in most cases, avoided dealing with them on an equal basis. On the other hand, white-raised Nuwuvi after a few years of education found it equally difficult to reject the material things the white society offered them. It was difficult to return to live with their people who were slowly becoming more and more impoverished. Nevertheless, many of the white-held Nuwuvi eventually ran away to return to Indian life.52 The Mormon willingness to accept this kind of slave trade seems based on two things. First, was an ethnocentric attitude which made them unwilling to accept the worth of the careful balance the Nuwuvi had worked out with nature, an attitude that existed everywhere on the frontier. Americans everywhere misunderstood Indian culture, failing to recognize the value of living closer to the environment. This attitude led the Mormons to a belief that anything which removed the Nuwuvi from their traditional lifestyle was a benevolent |