Uinta Springs Camp monument of the Daughters of the Utah Pioneers

The Fountain Green massacre is one of the most-frequently cited examples of violence between Utes and Mormon colonists surrounding the so-called Walker War. A Daughters of the Utah Pioneers monument (no. 172), located in City Park in Fountain Green, Utah, memorializes the Fountain Green Massacre.

Event

In the early morning hours of October 1, 1853, Utes of Sanpitch attacked and killed four men—William Reed, James Nelson, William Luke, and Thomas Clark—who were encamped at Uinta Springs, near the head of Salt Creek Canyon. The men were driving two ox-drawn wagons filled with wheat to Salt Lake City, as the advance party of a larger group headed by a local Manti, Utah, Mormon leader, Isaac Morley. William Luke, an immigrant from Manchester, England, was anxious to go see his three sons, who had recently arrived from England, and may have encouraged the group to hasten its journey. The four men camped at Uinta Springs against Morley's instructions, which had been for the group to make camp on the San Pitch River and await the arrival of the main group.

When Morley's group arrived at the camp, they found William Reed stripped, scalped, and disemboweled a short distance from the wagons. Luke and Nelson's throats were cut; they were also disemboweled. The Morley party emptied the wagons of their grain and then loaded three of the bodies for transport to Nephi, Utah (Clark's body later being found by a relative) and as the party readied to move on, numerous Utes appeared on the hillside. Oral tradition holds that Morley, angry over disobedience to his orders, denied the dead men burial in the town cemetery. Their gravesites are unknown, despite efforts to locate the remains of the four men.[1]

Revenge massacre

The next day, a group of eight Goshute Native Americans uninvolved with the attack at Fountain Green and seeking peace with the Mormon settlers at the fort in Nephi, Utah were invited into the fort then murdered and buried in a mass grave.[2][3]: 145 [4] In 2006 the remains of the victims were discovered in Nephi.[2][5][6]

Subsequent violence

A little less than five years later, four Danish immigrants—Jens Jorgensen, his wife Hedevig Jorgensen[7] Jens Terklesen, and Christian I. Kjerulf—were slain by natives in Salt Creek Canyon, while they were en route to settle with other Scandinavian immigrants in the Sanpete Valley. This tragedy, known as the Salt Creek Canyon Massacre, was marked by the brutality with which Jorgensen's wife and unborn child were butchered with a tomahawk.

See also

References

  1. ↑ Trauntvein, Myrna. "Digging for Relatives (Ancestors dig for skeletal remains near Nephi City Cemetery)". The Times-News. Nephi, UT.
  2. 1 2 Rood, Ronald J. (2017). "The Archaeology of a Mass Grave from Nephi, Utah and One Event of the Walker War, Utah Territory. Excavations at 42JB1470, Nephi, Utah". In Kiarszys, Grzegorz; Zalewska, Anna Izabella (eds.). Materiality of Troubled Pasts: Archaeologies of Conflicts and Wars. Szczecin, Poland: University of Szczecin. ISBN 978-83-943365-3-0 – via ResearchGate.
  3. ↑ Wimmer, Ryan (December 13, 2010). The Walker War Reconsidered (Master of History thesis). Brigham Young University.
  4. ↑ Carter, D. Robert (February 18, 2006). "Frontier violence traumatized both colonists and Indians". Daily Herald. Retrieved May 2, 2023.
  5. ↑ Trauntvein, Myrna (June 27, 2007). "Native American remains reveal evidence of being executed". The Times-News. Nephi, Utah. Retrieved August 17, 2016.
  6. ↑ Trauntvein, Myrna (August 9, 2006). "Skeletal remains found at construction site in Nephi". The Times-News. Nephi, Utah. Retrieved August 17, 2016.
  7. ↑ Sorensen, Rodney. "Killed by the Indians". Sorensen Family History. Retrieved August 17, 2013.

Sources

  • Bigler, David L. (1998). Forgotten Kingdom: The Mormon Theocracy in the American West, 1847-1896. Arthur H. Clark Company. ISBN 978-0-87062-282-3.
  • Gottfredson, Peter (1919). History of Indian Depredations in Utah. Skelton Publishing Company. OCLC 2326617.
  • Michno, Gregory & Susan (2008). Forgotten Fights: Little Known Raids and Skirmishes on the Frontier, 1823 to 1890. Mountain Press Publishing Company. ISBN 978-0-87842-549-5.
  • Whitney, Orson F. (1892). History of Utah. George Q. Cannon & Sons. OCLC 504189185.

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