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As a duty to myself, my family, and mankind at large, I propose to
give a full and true statement of all that I know and all that I did in that
unfortunate affair, which has cursed my existence, and made me a wanderer
from place to place for the last nineteen years, and which is known to the
world as the Mountain Meadows Massacre. I have no vindictive feeling against
any one; no enemies to punish by this statement; and no friends to shield by
keeping back, or longer keeping secret, any of the facts connected with the
Massacre.
I believe that I must tell all that I do know, and tell everything just as
the same transpired. I shall tell the truth and permit the public to judge
who is most to blame for the crime that I am accused of committing. I did
not act alone; I had many to assist me at the Mountain Meadows. I believe
that most of those who were connected with the Massacre, and took part in
the lamentable transaction that has blackened the character of all who were
aiders or abettors in the same, were acting under the impression that they
were performing a religious duty. I know all were acting under the orders
and by the command of their Church leaders; and I firmly believe that the
most of those who took part in the proceedings, considered it a religious
duty to unquestioningly obey the orders which they had received. That they
acted from a sense of duty to the Mormon Church, never doubted. Believing
that those with me acted from a sense of religious duty on that occasion, I
have faithfully kept the secret of their guilt, and remained silent and true
to the oath of secrecy which we took on the bloody field, for many long and
bitter years. I have never betrayed those who acted with me and participated
in the crime for which I am convicted, and for which I am to suffer death.
My attorneys, especially Wells Spicer and Wm. W. Bishop, have long tried,
but tried in vain, to induce me to tell all I knew of the massacre and the
causes which led to it. I have heretofore refused to tell the tale. Until
the last few days I had intended to die, if die I must, without giving one
word to the public concerning those who joined willingly, or unwillingly, in
the work of destruction at Mountain Meadows.
To hesitate longer, or to die in silence, would be unjust and cowardly. I
will not keep the secret any longer as my own, but will tell all I know. At
the earnest request of a few remaining friends, and by the advice of Mr.
Bishop, my counsel, who has defended me thus far with all his ability,
notwithstanding my want of money with which to pay even his expenses while
attending to my case, I have concluded to write facts as I know them to
exist. I cannot go before the Judge of the quick and the dead with out first
revealing all that I know, as to what was done, who ordered me to do what I
did do, and the motives that led to the commission of that unnatural and
bloody deed.
