Extermination Order (Mormonism) - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Missouri Executive Order 44, also known as the "Mormon Extermination Order" (alt. exterminating order) in Latter Day Saint history

History of the Latter Day Saint movement

The Latter Day Saint movement is a religious movement within Christianity that arose during the Second Great Awakening in the early 19th century and that led to the set of doctrines, practices, and cultures called Mormonism and to the existence of numerous Latter Day Saint churches...

, was an executive order issued on October 27, 1838 by the governor of Missouri, Lilburn Boggs

Lilburn Boggs

Lilburn Williams Boggs was the sixth Governor of Missouri from 1836 to 1840. He is now most widely remembered for his interactions with Joseph Smith and Porter Rockwell, and Missouri Executive Order 44, known by Mormons as the "Extermination Order", issued in response to the ongoing conflict...

. The directive was issued in the aftermath of the Battle of Crooked River

Battle of Crooked River

The Battle of Crooked River was a skirmish between Latter Day Saint forces and Missouri state militia unit from southeast of Elmira, Missouri in Ray County under the command of Samuel Bogart...

, a clash between Mormons and a unit of the Missouri State Guard

Missouri State Guard

The Missouri State Guard was a state militia organized in the state of Missouri during the early days of the American Civil War. While not initially a formal part of the Confederate States Army, the State Guard fought alongside Confederate troops and, at times, under regular Confederate...

in northern Ray County, Missouri, during the so-called "Mormon War" of 1838. Insisting that the Mormons had committed "open and avowed defiance of the laws", and had "made war upon the people of this State," Boggs precipitously directed that "the Mormons must be treated as enemies, and must be exterminated or driven from the State if necessary for the public peace—their outrages are beyond all description."

While the order is often referred to as the "Mormon Extermination Order" due to the phrasing used by Boggs, relatively few people were killed as a direct result of its issuance. However, the state militia and other authorities used Boggs' missive as a pretext to expel the Mormons from their lands in the state, and force them to migrate to Illinois

Illinois

Illinois is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal,...

. Mormons did not begin to return to Missouri until 25 years later, when they found a more welcoming environment and were able to establish homes there once more. In 1976, citing the unconstitutional nature of Boggs' directive, Missouri Governor Kit Bond

Kit Bond

Christopher Samuel "Kit" Bond is a former United States Senator from Missouri and a member of the Republican Party. First elected to the U.S. Senate in 1986, he defeated Democrat Harriett Woods by a margin of 53%-47%. He was re-elected in 1992, 1998, and 2004...

formally rescinded it.

Background

Executive Order 44 was issued by Governor Lilburn Boggs

Lilburn Boggs

of Missouri

Missouri

Missouri is a US state located in the Midwestern United States, bordered by Iowa, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Kansas and Nebraska. With a 2010 population of 5,988,927, Missouri is the 18th most populous state in the nation and the fifth most populous in the Midwest. It...

during the 1838 Mormon War, which had been caused by friction between the Mormons and their neighbors, largely due to tensions resulting from the growing economic and electoral power of the Mormon community. The war ended with the expulsion of almost all Mormons from the state of Missouri. The Mormons had been given a county

Caldwell County, Missouri

Caldwell County is a county located in the U.S. state of Missouri. , the population was 8,969. Its county seat is Kingston. The county was organized in 1836 as a haven for the Mormons, who had been previously driven from Jackson County, Missouri in November of 1833 and had been refugees in...

of their own to settle in after their expulsion from Jackson County

Jackson County, Missouri

Jackson County is a county located in the U.S. state of Missouri. With a population of 674,158 in the 2010 census, Jackson County is the second most populous of Missouri's counties, after St. Louis County. Kansas City, the state's most populous city and focus city of the Kansas City Metropolitan...

in 1833, but the increasing influx of new Mormon converts moving to northwestern Missouri led them to begin settling in adjacent counties. This provoked the wrath of other settlers, who had operated under the assumption that the Mormons would remain confined to Caldwell County

Caldwell County, Missouri

.

Missouri was governed during this time by Boggs, who was notorious for his own personal disdain for the Mormon religion. As the conflict between Mormons and their neighbors escalated during the fall of 1838, Boggs refused to forcibly intervene to prevent depredations against the Mormons, which in turn often led to retaliation by the latter against their perceived enemies. Ultimately tensions escalated into open conflict, culminating in the looting and burning of several Mormon farms and homes, the sacking and burning of Gallatin

Gallatin, Missouri

Gallatin is a city in Daviess County, Missouri, United States. The population was 1,789 at the 2000 census. It is the county seat of Daviess County.-History:...

by Mormon "Danite

Danite

The Danites were a fraternal organization founded by Latter Day Saint members in June 1838, in the town of Far West in Caldwell County, Missouri. During their period of organization in Missouri, the Danites operated as a vigilante group and took a central role in the events of the 1838 Mormon War...

" elements, and the taking of Mormon hostages by a militia unit commanded by Cpt. Samuel Bogart

Samuel Bogart

Samuel Bogart was an itinerant Methodist minister and militia captain from Ray County, Missouri who played a prominent role in the 1838 Missouri Mormon War before later moving to Collin County, Texas, where he became a Texas Ranger and a member of the Texas State Legislature...

, operating in northern Ray County (to the south of Caldwell). When Mormon militia from the town of Far West

Far West, Missouri

Far West, Missouri, was a Latter Day Saint settlement in Caldwell County, Missouri.-Foundation and early history:The town was founded by Missouri Mormon leaders, W. W. Phelps and John Whitmer in August 1836 shortly before the county's creation. The town was platted originally as a square area,...

moved south to the militia camp on the Crooked River

Crooked River (Missouri)

The Crooked River is a tributary of the Missouri River in west-central Missouri in the United States. The river was the site of the Battle of Crooked River during the Mormon War of 1838...

to rescue their co-religionists, the resulting battle aroused considerable terror throughout the western part of the state. Lurid rumors of a planned full-scale Mormon invasion of Missouri had run rampant throughout the summer, and these only increased as reports of this "Battle of Crooked River" reached the capital at Jefferson City

Jefferson City, Missouri

Jefferson City is the capital of the U.S. state of Missouri and the county seat of Cole County. Located in Callaway and Cole counties, it is the principal city of the Jefferson City metropolitan area, which encompasses the entirety of both counties. As of the 2010 census, the population was 43,079...

, with spurious accounts of Mormons allegedly slaughtering Bogart's militia company, including those who had surrendered. Further dispatches spoke of an impending Mormon attack on Richmond

Richmond, Missouri

Richmond is a city in Ray County, Missouri, United States. The population was 5,797 at the 2010 census. It is the county seat of Ray County.-Geography:Richmond is located at...

, county seat of Ray County, though in fact no such attack was ever contemplated. It was in this environment of fear and misinformation that Boggs chose to act.

Boggs issued Executive Order #44 to General John Clark

John Bullock Clark

John Bullock Clark, Sr. was a member of both the United States Congress and the Confederate Congress.-Biography:...

, whom he had appointed to head up the state militia forces being assembled to reinstate citizens of Daviess County (north of Caldwell) who had been allegedly driven from their homes by renegade Mormons. Having heard lurid reports of alleged Mormon depradations on the Crooked River, Boggs directed Clark to change his mission from restoring the Daviess countians to their homes, to one of direct military operations against the Mormons themselves.

Text of the Order

Boggs' Missouri Executive Order Number 44, read as follows:

Aftermath and rescinding

Although the Extermination Order technically became inoperative with an end to the state of war and the surrender of Mormon leaders at Far West

Far West, Missouri

on November 1, it continued to dignify the forced removal of the Mormons by unauthorized citizens and renegade militia units. The Mormons in Caldwell County had been forced, as part of their surrender agreement, to sign over all of their property to pay the expenses of the campaign against them; although this act was later held unlawful, the Mormons were still forcibly ejected from their homes—often at gunpoint—and forced to leave Missouri with only what they could carry. Although Boggs belatedly ordered a militia unit under Colonel Sterling Price

Sterling Price

Sterling Price was a lawyer, planter, and politician from the U.S. state of Missouri, who served as the 11th Governor of the state from 1853 to 1857. He also served as a United States Army brigadier general during the Mexican-American War, and a Confederate Army major general in the American Civil...

(later to achieve fame as a Confederate

Confederate States of America

The Confederate States of America was a government set up from 1861 to 1865 by 11 Southern slave states of the United States of America that had declared their secession from the U.S...

Civil War

American Civil War

The American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...

general) to northern Missouri to stop ongoing depredations against the Mormons, he refused to repeal Order #44. The Missouri legislature deferred discussion of an appeal by Mormon leaders to rescind the decree, and nearly all Latter Day Saints—more than 10,000 altogether—had been driven from the state by the spring of 1839.

Boggs himself was excoriated in certain portions of the Missouri press, as well as those of neighboring states, for his action in issuing this order. General David Atchison, a prominent non-Mormon legislator and militia general from western Missouri who had refused to take part in operations against the Mormons, demanded that the Legislature formally state its opinion of Boggs' order, for "he would not live in any state, where such authority was given". Although his proposal and similar ones by others went down to defeat, Boggs himself saw his once-promising political career destroyed as a result of the Mormon War (and especially due to his "extermination order"), to the point that by the time the next election came around, even his own party (the Democratic Party

Democratic Party (United States)

The Democratic Party is one of two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Republican Party. The party's socially liberal and progressive platform is largely considered center-left in the U.S. political spectrum. The party has the lengthiest record of continuous...

) was reluctant to be associated with him. After surviving an assassination attempt in 1842, Boggs ultimately emigrated to California, where he died in relative obscurity in the Napa Valley in 1860.

Boggs' extermination order, long unenforced and forgotten by nearly everyone outside the Latter Day Saint community, was formally rescinded by Governor Christopher S. Bond

Kit Bond

on June 25, 1976, 137 years after being signed. In late 1975, President Lyman F. Edwards of the Far West

Far West, Missouri

stake of the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, now known as the Community of Christ

Community of Christ

The Community of Christ, known from 1872 to 2001 as the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints , is an American-based international Christian church established in April 1830 that claims as its mission "to proclaim Jesus Christ and promote communities of joy, hope, love, and peace"...

, invited Bond to participate in the stake's annual conference as a good-will gesture for the United States Bicentennial

United States Bicentennial

The United States Bicentennial was a series of celebrations and observances during the mid-1970s that paid tribute to the historical events leading up to the creation of the United States as an independent republic...

. As part of his address at that conference, Bond presented the following Executive Order:

External links

Mormon War Letters, the battle correspondence leading up to, and including, the Extermination Order - presented by LDS historian Mel Tungate.

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