SOTW 3 Annotated for LDS Ch. 38 American Tragedies

The Trail of Tears

Fifteen hundred years before the events that we’ll read about today happened, Mormon wrote about his people saying they would “be scattered and driven about as chaff before the wind.” He further wrote “the seed of this people may more fully believe [the] gospel, which shall go forth unto them from the Gentiles. But behold, it shall come to pass that they shall be driven and scattered by the Gentiles; and after they have been driven and scattered by the Gentiles, behold, then will the Lord remember the covenant which he made unto Abraham and unto all the house of Israel (see Mormon 5:15-20).

Here is a story of one way this came to pass.


Nat Turner’s Revolt

The events that took place here coincided with the Saints moving to Jackson County, Missouri. Some of the hostilities that occurred were as a result of the local Missourians and the Saints, who were mostly Northerners, disagreeing about the slavery issue. With the great influx of the Saints, the Missourians felt that they would be outvoted in the slavery issue. With the Nat Turner’s revolt in recent memory, many felt that the Saints would incite the local slaves to rebellion as well. This fear only inflamed the bad feelings already existing between the two groups (for more information see Garr and Johnson, eds., Regional Studies in Latter-day Saint History: Missouri, p. 343) .