Pleasant Grove, originally named Battle Creek, is a city in Utah County, Utah, United States, known as "Utah's City of Trees". It is part of the Provo–Orem Metropolitan Statistical Area. The population was 37,726 at the 2020 Census.
The Mountain Meadows Massacre was a series of attacks during the Utah War that resulted in the mass murder of at least 120 members of the Baker–Fancher emigrant wagon train. The massacre occurred in the southern Utah Territory at Mountain Meadows, and was perpetrated by settlers from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints involved with the Utah Territorial Militia who recruited and were aided by some Southern Paiute Native Americans. The wagon train, made up mostly of families from Arkansas, was bound for California, traveling on the Old Spanish Trail that passed through the Territory.
Antonga, or Black Hawk, was a nineteenth-century war chief of the Timpanogos Tribe in what is the present-day state of Utah. He led the Timpanogos against Mormon settlers and gained alliances with Paiute and Navajo bands in the territory against them during what became known as the Black Hawk War in Utah (1865–1872). Although Black Hawk made peace in 1867, other bands continued raiding until the US intervened with about 200 troops in 1872. Black Hawk died in 1870 from a gunshot wound he received while trying to rescue a fallen warrior, White Horse, at Gravely Ford Richfield, Utah, June 10, 1866. The wound never healed and complications set in.
Chief Walkara was a Shoshone leader of the Utah Indians known as the Timpanogo and Sanpete Band. It is not completely clear what cultural group the Utah or Timpanogo Indians belonged to, but they are listed as Shoshone. He had a reputation as a diplomat, horseman and warrior, and a military leader of raiding parties, and in the Wakara War.
William Adams "Wild Bill" Hickman was an American frontiersman. He also served as a representative to the Utah Territorial Legislature.
The History of Utah is an examination of the human history and social activity within the state of Utah located in the western United States.
The Baker–Fancher party was a group of American western emigrants from Marion, Crawford, Carroll, and Johnson counties in Arkansas, who departed Carroll County in April 1857 and "were attacked by the Mormons near the rim of the Great Basin, and about fifty miles from Cedar City, in Utah Territory, and that all of the emigrants, with the exception of 17 children, were then and there massacred and murdered" in the Mountain Meadows massacre. Sources estimate that between 120 and 140 men, women and children were killed on September 11, 1857, at Mountain Meadows, a rest stop on the Old Spanish Trail, in the Utah Territory. Some children of up to six years old were taken in by the Mormon families in Southern Utah, presumably because they had been judged to be too young to tell others about the massacre.
The Black Hawk War, or Black Hawk's War, is the name of the estimated 150 battles, skirmishes, raids, and military engagements taking place from 1865 to 1872, primarily between Mormon settlers in Sanpete County, Sevier County and other parts of central and southern Utah, and members of 16 Ute, Southern Paiute, Apache and Navajo tribes, led by a local Ute war chief, Antonga Black Hawk. The conflict resulted in the abandonment of some settlements and hindered Mormon expansion in the region.
Fort Utah was the original white settlement at Provo, Utah, United States, and was established March 12, 1849. The original settlers were President John S. Higbee and about 30 families or 150 persons that were sent from Salt Lake City to Provo by President Brigham Young. Several log houses were erected, surrounded by a 14-foot (4.3 m) palisade 20 by 40 rods in size, with gates in the east and west ends, and a middle deck, for a cannon. The fort was first located west of town, but was moved to Sowiette Park in April 1850.
Kanosh was a nineteenth-century leader of the Pahvant band of the Ute Indians of what is now central Utah having succeeded the more belligerent Chuick as principal chief. His band had "a major camp at Corn Creek." He is remembered for having been "friendly toward early Mormon Pioneer settlers."
The Mountain Meadows Massacre was caused in part by events relating to the Utah War, an armed confrontation in Utah Territory between the United States Army and Mormon Settlers. In the summer of 1857, however, Mormons experienced a wave of war hysteria, expecting an all-out invasion of apocalyptic significance. From July to September 1857, Mormon leaders prepared Mormons for a seven-year siege predicted by Brigham Young. Mormons were to stockpile grain, and were prevented from selling grain to emigrants for use as cattle feed. As far-off Mormon colonies retreated, Parowan and Cedar City became isolated and vulnerable outposts. Brigham Young sought to enlist the help of Indian tribes in fighting the "Americans", encouraging them to steal cattle from emigrant trains, and to join Mormons in fighting the approaching army.
The conspiracy and siege of the Mountain Meadows Massacre was initially planned by its Mormon perpetrators to be a short "Indian" attack, against the Baker–Fancher party. But the planned attack was repulsed and soon turned into a siege, which later culminated in the massacre of the remaining emigrants, on September 11, 1857.
The Timpanogos are a tribe of Native Americans who inhabited a large part of central Utah, in particular, the area from Utah Lake east to the Uinta Mountains and south into present-day Sanpete County.
Sanpitch was a leader of the Sanpits tribe of Native Americans who lived in what is now the Sanpete Valley, before and during settlement by Mormon immigrants. The Sanpits are generally considered to be part of the Timpanogos or Utah Indians
The Battle at Fort Utah was a violent attack in 1850 in which 90 Mormon militiamen surrounded an encampment of Timpanogos families on the Provo River one winter morning, and laid siege for two days, eventually shooting between 40 and 100 Native American men and one woman with guns and a cannon during the attack as well as during the pursuit and capture of the two groups that fled the last night. One militiaman died from return fire during the siege. Of the Timpanogos people who fled in the night, one group escaped southward, and the other ran east to Rock Canyon. Both groups were captured, however, and the men were executed. Over 40 Timpanogos children, women, and a few men were taken as prisoners to nearby Fort Utah. They were later taken northward to the Salt Lake Valley and sold as slaves to church members there. The bodies of up to 50 Timpanogos men were beheaded by some of the settlers and their heads put on display at the fort as a warning to the mostly women and children prisoners inside.
Chief Tabby-To-Kwanah was the leader of Timpanogos when they were displaced to the Uintah and Ouray Indian Reservation. He rose to power as a young man and was sub-chief under his cousin Chief Walkara when the Mormon pioneers first arrived in Timpanogos territory. He was one of the principal clan leaders over a band in southern Utah Valley, along with Chief Peteetneet and Grospene. He was a grandson of Turunianchi, who was the leader when the Timpanogos first contacted the Europeans during the Dominguez–Escalante Expedition. Turunianchi's grandsons made up the royal line of "brothers" referred to by Brigham Young. Tabby-To-Kwanah means "Child of the Sun." Tabiona, Utah is named after him.
Wakara's War was a dispute between the Paiute Indians and the Mormon settlers in the Utah Valley. This war is characterized as a string of disputes and skirmishes over property and the land from July 1853 to May 1854. This war was influenced by factors such as religious differences, the slave trade, and the division of the Salt Lake Valley.
Battle Creek Falls is a waterfall on the west skirt of Mount Timpanogos east of Pleasant Grove, Utah. Access to Battle Creek Falls is from the Battle Creek Trailhead off the Kiwanis Park picnic area. The waterfall plunges into the rock at the base of the cliff without creating a pothole. The base of the waterfall has access directly from the trail. Bridal Veil Falls is on the same mountain side, approximately 10 miles south for Battle Creek Falls.
Over the past two centuries, the relationship between Native American people and Mormonism has included friendly ties, displacement, battles, slavery, education placement programs, and official and unofficial discrimination. Native American people were historically considered a special group by adherents of the Latter Day Saint movement (Mormons) since they were believed to be the descendants of the Lamanite people described in The Book of Mormon. There is no support from genetic studies and archaeology for the historicity of the Book of Mormon or Middle Eastern origins for any Native American peoples. Today there are many Native American members of Mormon denominations as well as many people who are critical of Mormonism and its teachings and actions around Native American people.
The Circleville Massacre was an 1866 lynching of 27 Southern Paiute Native American men, women, and children by members of Mormonism's largest denomination the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Circleville, Utah.
