[Wilford Woodruff]
29th We have another Express in this morning saying that the Armey are rapidly marching towards us. Will soon be at Bridger & they wish men immediately sent out.
Elder John D. Lee also arived from Harmony with an express and an awful tale of Blood. A Company of Calafornia Emigrants of about 150 men women & Children many of them belonged to the mob in Missouri & Illinois they had many Cattle & Horses with them. As they travelled along south they went damning Brigham Young Heber C. Kimball & the Heads of the Church saying that Joseph Smith ought to have been shot a long time before he was. They wanted to do all the evil they Could so they poisoned Beef & gave it to the Indians & several of them died. They poisioned the springs of water. Several of the saints died. The Indians became inraged at their Conduct & they surrounded them on a prairie & the Emigrants formed a Bulwark of ther waggons & dug an Entrenchment up to the Hubs of there waggons but the Indians fought them 5 days untill they killed all their men about 60 in Number. They then rushed into their Carrall & Cut the throats of their women & Children except some 8 or 10 Children which they brought & sold to the whites. They striped the men & women Naked & left them stinking in the boiling sun.
When Brother Lee found it out he took some men & went & buried their bodies. It was a horrid awful Job. The whole air was filled with an awful stench. Many of the men & women was ro[otten?] with the pox Note before they were hurt by the Indians. The Indians obtained all ther Cattle Horses & property guns &c.
Their was another large Company of Emigrants who had 1,000 head of Cattle who was also damning both Indians & Mormons. They were afraid of shareing the same fate. Brother Lee had to send interpeters with them to the Indians to try to save their lives while at the same time they are trying to kill us.
We spent most of the day in trying to get the Brethren ready to go to the mountains.
Brother Brigham when speaking of the cutting of the throats of women & children as the Indians done South Said that it was heart rending that Emigration must stop as he had before said. Brother Lee said that He did not think their was a drop of innocent Blood in their Camp for he had too of their Children in his house & he Could not get but one to kneel down in prayer time & the other would laugh at her for doing it & they would sware like pirats. The scene of Blood has Commenced & Joseph said we should see so much of it that it would make our hearts sick.
[Note: Here, Lee spins a tale to cover up Mormon involvement in the Mountain Meadows Massacre, placing the blame on the Indians and the Immigrants themselves.]
[Wilford Woodruff's Journal: 1833-1898 Typescript, Volumes 1-9, Edited by Scott G. Kenney, Signature Books 1993, http://amzn.to/newmormonstudies]
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