The Saints and Union: Utah Territory during the Civil War

by E.B. Long

Utah Territory During the Civil War. Long's portrayal of two volatile personalties-Mormon leader Brigham Young and U.S. military commander GeneralnPatrick Connor--depicts events which helped shape the "opening up of the West." 310 pp., cloth, dj..

Genres: Religion, History

292 pages, Hardcover

First published April 1, 1981

Reviews

[Taylor · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book tells the story of the Civil War as it played out within the Utah territory. The author makes little effort to contextualize those events through the backgrounds or lives of major actors. The author also wastes no space in the book explaining how the events in Utah affected the war more broadly (if at all). Instead, the book focuses extremely heavily on primary sources, quoting letters and newspaper articles at length on nearly every page. There is very little analysis of these sources, and the variety of sources appears relatively slim––the author relies particularly heavily on the two newspapers that were in print in Utah during most of the Civil War period.

If you want a book of block quotes describing the everyday happenings of the Utah Territory during the Civil War, this is for you. I found it difficult to get through this book, even though it comes in under 300 pages.

[Annaleah Faith Woodard · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is 70% quotes. This makes the narrative a little dry. The quotes are redundant at times. I read it because I was interested in reading about the church leadership at a time the government was not so friendly to the church. It accomplished this. What I walked away with is Brigham was very dedicated to the notion the Constitution was a correct outline of how our government should be organized, but how it was being practiced was far from following that outline. It is negative towards Brigham at times.