History of Utah, 1540-1886 - Brigham Young University

570 THE MOUNTAIN MEADOWS MASSACRE.
served but to make its desolation still more desolate.
Around the cairn that marks their grave still flit, as
some have related, the phantoms of the murdered
emigrants, and nightly reenact in ghastly pantomime
the scene of this hideous tragedy.
About ten o'clock on the morning of the 23d a
party of armed men alighting from their wagons
approached the site of the massacre. Among them
were the United States marshal, William Nelson, the
district attorney, a military guard, and a score of
private citizens. In their midst was John Do}de Lee.
Over the wheels of one of the wagons blankets were
placed to serve as a screen for the firing party.
Some rough pine boards were then nailed together in
the shape of a coffin, which was placed near the edge
of the cairn, and upon it Lee took his seat until the
preparations were completed. The marshal now read
the order of the court, and, turning to the prisoner,
said: "Mr Lee, if you have anything to say before
the order of the court is carried into effect, you can
do so now." Rising from the coffin, 53 he looked calmly
around for a moment, and then with unfaltering voice
repeated in substance the statements already quoted
from his confession. "I have but little to say this
morning," he added. "It seems I have to be made a
victim; a victim must be had, and I am the victim.
I studied to make Brigham Young's will my pleasure
for thirty years. See now what I have come to this
day ! I have been sacrificed in a cowardly, dastardly
manner. I cannot help it; it is my last word; it is
so. I do not fear death; I shall never go to a worse
place than I am now in. I ask the Lord my God, if
my labors are done, to receive my spirit." A Methodist
clergyman, 59 who acted as his spiritual adviser,
then knelt by his side and offered a brief prayer, to
which he listened attentively. After shaking hands
68 He first requested one James Fennemore, who was taking photographs
of the group in which Lee formed the central figure, to send a copy to each
of his three wives, Rachel, Sarah, and Emma. Fennemore promised to do so.
58 The Rev. George Stokes.