Mormonism and doctrine/Repudiated concepts/Blood atonement

Criticism

Critics claim that during the administration of Brigham Young apostates were secretly put to death. They claim this is in line with the teachings of LDS leaders at the time that apostasy was the unforgivable sin, and that the only thing an apostate could do to redeem himself was to give his own life, willingly or unwillingly.

Response

Despite a number of rhetorical statements by LDS leaders in the late 1850s, there is no evidence that anyone was "blood atoned" at the orders of Brigham Young or any other general authority. Contemporary claims for such actions uniformly come from anti-Mormon books and newspapers with lurid titles such as The Destroying Angels of Mormondom^[1] and Abominations of Mormonism Exposed.^[2]

The First Presidency issued an official declaration on the matter of killing apostates, as a form of blood atonement, in 1889. This declaration reads, in part:

Notwithstanding all the stories told about the killing of apostates, no case of this kind has ever occurred, and of course has never been established against the Church we represent. Hundreds of seceders from the Church have continuously resided and now live in this territory, many of whom have amassed considerable wealth, though bitterly opposed to the Mormon faith and people. Even those who made it their business to fabricate the vilest falsehoods, and to render them plausible by culling isolated passages from old sermons without the explanatory context, and have suffered no opportunity to escape them of vilifying and blackening the characters of the people, have remained among those whom they have thus persistently calumniated until the present day, without receiving the slightest personal injury.

We denounce as entirely untrue the allegation which has been made, that our Church favors or believes in the killing of persons who leave the Church or apostatize from its doctrines. We would view a punishment of this character for such an act with the utmost horror; it is abhorrent to us and is In direct opposition to the fundamental principles of our creed.^[3]

Specific claims

This section will respond to specific examples of people purportedly "blood atoned."

Thomas Coleman (or Colbourn)

Thomas Coleman (referred to as "Colbourn" in some sources) was a black Mormon slave employed by Brigham Young at the Salt Lake House hotel. In 1866, Coleman was apparently discovered talking discreetly with a woman he was believed to be courting, and the men who discovered them together killed him and mutilated his body. A label was placed on his body: "Notice to all niggers! Leave white women alone!!!"^[4] His death was purportedly covered up by an all-Mormon grand jury.

The difficulty here is that "blood atonement" was supposedly applied to endowed Mormons who apostatized. While Coleman may have been a Mormon, he definitely wasn't an endowed member, nor was he an apostate. Assuming the reported circumstances of his death are true, they are a tragic example of racism, one all too common in that time period.

Endnotes

1. [note] "Achilles" [pen name for Samuel D. Sirrine], The Destroying Angels of Mormondom; or a Sketch of the Life of Orrin Porter Rockwell, the Late Danite Chief, San Francisco, 1878.
2. [note] William Hall, Abominations of Mormonism Exposed; Containing Many Facts and Doctrines Concerning That Singular People, During Seven Year's Membership with Them; From 1840 to 1847, Cincinnati, 1852.
3. [note] Offical Declaration, 12 December 1889, signed by the First Presidency (Wilford Woodruff, George Q. Cannon, and Joseph F. Smith), the Quorum of the Twelve (Lorenzo Snow, Franklin D. Richards, Brigham Young Jr., Moses Thatcher, Francis M. Lyman, John Henry Smith, George Teasdale, Heber J. Grant, John W. Taylor, M.W. Merrill, A.H. Lund, and Abraham H. Cannon), and counselors (John W. Young and Daniel H. Wells).
4. [note] Union Vedette, 13 December 1866, page 3. A scan of the article is available here.

Further reading

FAIR web site

• FAIR Topical Guide: Blood atonement FAIR link
• Michael Parker, "Did Brigham Young Say that He Would Kill an Adulterous Wife with a Javelin?" FAIR link