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Summarized by Kent Larsen
LDS Church Struggles with Who to Please over Mountain Meadows Buttons
BERRYVILLE, ARKANSAS -- Since you can't please everyone all the time,
you're often left trying to figure out who to please. When
contractors building a new monument at the site of the Mountain
Meadows Massacre near Cedar City, Utah uncovered the remains of
several victims and buttons and other property that belonged to the
victims, the Church quickly re-buried the remains. But recently the
status of the buttons and the other property has become uncertain.
The Church planned to donate the buttons, shards of pottery and wagon
wheel nut to the Carroll County Historical Society, in Arkansas, for
display in their library. The donation was scheduled for this
Saturday, and the society had purchased a new display case to hold
the material.
But a few weeks ago, members of the Mountain Meadows Monument
Foundation objected to the plan, asking that the state of Utah rule
on the ownership of the artifacts. "What we have to ask ourselves is,
is this finder keepers? If so, other graves will be disturbed as
well," said Scott Fancher of the Foundation, which wanted the
artifacts buried along with the remains.
Utah State Archaeologist Kevin Jones agreed. In an August 29th letter
to BYU, Jones recommended that the artifacts be buried along with the
victim's remains. The LDS Church seemed then to change its plans and
Glen Leonard, director of the LDS Church Museum of Art and History
told Fancher in a letter that if some family members would be
offended if the artifacts were displayed, "we would defer to those
feelings." The Church then took possession of the artifacts pending a
decision.
But now Ron Loving, president of the Mountain Meadows Association is
objecting. He says, "The preponderance of the relatives want the
buttons returned to Arkansas."
What?
Perhaps the most confusing part of this dispute is that there are two
associations that claim to represent the descendants of the
massacre's victims. The Arkansas-based Mountain Meadows Monument
Foundation is represented by Fancher, and the Utah-based Mountain
Meadows Association is headed by Ron Loving. The two organizations
disagree about what should happen with the buttons, leaving the LDS
Church unable to satisfy them both.
The Utah group says it wants the LDS Church to go ahead and donate
the buttons to the museum. Loving says that the state of Utah's
ruling on the matter is simply wrong. Claiming that the law the state
archaeologist relied on was meant for Native American remains, Loving
said that instead the state should treat the site as a crime site.
"As a crime site, the objects can legally be claimed by direct
descendants or the rightful next-of-kin," Loving's group says in a
statement on their website.
All this leaves the LDS Church without a clear course of action. One
of the two groups will be disappointed regardless of what it decides.
In the past, the Church relied on Loving's Utah-based Mountain
Meadows Association, but that group's advice didn't help them last
year when the remains were first uncovered. At that time the Church
contacted Loving, who advised the Church to keep the accidentally
uncovered remains secret. But when the discovery became public, that
advice backfired, and lead Burr Fancher, a member of the
Arkansas-based Mountain Meadows Monument Foundation, to call Loving a
"lackey in the employ of the Mormon Church and caters to Hinckley's
every whim."
Meanwhile, the Carroll County Historical Society in Arkansas is
holding a tour of the Arkansas sites dealing with the wagon train on
Saturday from 9 am to 4 pm hosted by Judge Roger V. Logan, a local
historian and Mountain Meadows' authority.
Sources:
Berryville: Mormons take possession of 1857 massacre artifacts
Little Rock AR Democrat-Gazette 8Sep00 N1
By John Magsam: Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Push to Rebury Artifacts From Massacre Criticized
Salt Lake Tribune 8Sep00 N1
By Christopher Smith: Salt Lake Tribune
Church Taking Custody of Massacre Artifacts
Salt Lake Tribune 7Sep00 N1
By Christopher Smith: Salt Lake Tribune
See also:
Backhoe Accident Ruined LDS Church's Attempt To Bury Mountain Meadows
Mountain Meadows Relics Raise New Controversy
Mormon News' Coverage of the Mountain Meadows Massacre Site
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