OCR Text |
Show I must also attest to the fact that while large appropriations have been made for the Indian services in California large numbers, amounting to thousands of the Indians in that state and migrating to this Territory, which will doubtless increase the expenses of the Service in Utah Territory to double what it had been heretofore. It may not be amiss to allude briefly to the unfortunate massacre which occurred at Elk-Mountain on the 22nd day of September last, in which three young men lost their lives, and a fourth one was severely wounded by the Indians. Many circumstances have been alledged as the cause of this massacre, but the following is the most plausible. A party of the men at the Fort fitted out an expedition to the Navajo Country to trade while at the same time the Utahs were induced to go and a smiliar expedition list had nothing suitable for their expedition and consequently had poor success in trading. But the Mormons boys sold everything they had at their own prices. This was well calculated to excite a prejudice in the minds' of their red friends who supposed they were men making bad medicine for them. I think this the cause of their unparalleled perfidy. I am not prepared to cast any blame upon the men at the Fort, they had used every possible exertion, not only to establish peaceful situations with them but to Christianize them. For if I am correctly informed, the most, if not all of these who are charged with the Massacre had been baptized into the church, and had received the |