The Church recently carried an article on its Newsroom about a new history of the "mountain meadows massacre", arguably the worst event in Mormon history. The Church gave the three LDS authors unprecedented access to Church archives--archives that other scholars believed would implicate Brigham Young. In the end they found no evidence to support the prophet's involvment. The research for this book is impressive. It took them about 7 years to complete it. Just to give you an idea, the reasearch and writing process for my dissertation will take about 3-4 years. But I'm only one person, this project involved three experienced historians. In a video interview the three authors spoke about why they decided to write the book. Richard E. Turley, Jr (the Assistant Church Historian) said that the driving purspose for writing the book had to do with healing: "Only by facing this head-on, directly, could we finally expect to get to a point where real healing could take place." This is important. Since the Massacre, many Mormons have tried to forget about it, push it aside and try not to confront it. Yet it has always been the proverbial elephant in the room (among other elephants). As an historian, I think there is a great lesson in Bro. Turley's comments. It is just as dammaging to cover up our past as a people as it is to cover up our individual pasts from the Lord. Individually, we must all confront the scars of our past lest they continue to haunt us in the present.
Here's a link if you want more info.: http://newsroom.lds.org/ldsnewsroom/eng/news-releases-stories/book-provides-an-unflinching-look-at-mountain-meadows-massacre
