Nov 17, 2016 - Sale 2432

Sale 2432 - Lot 232

Price Realized: $ 3,000
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 700 - $ 1,000
(MORMONS.) Roberts, Daniel. Letter describing Brigham Young's public denunciation of two federal officials. Autograph Letter Signed to Major Holding [Jacob Holman], U.S. Indian Agent at Salt Lake City. 2 pages, 12 x 7 1/2 inches, plus integral address leaf with no postal markings, on one folding sheet; moderate wear at folds, seal tears to address leaf. (MRS) Provo, UT, 18 January 1852

Additional Details

Roberts had been asked to share "the language of Gov. Brigham Young that he used in the Territorial Legislature recently in my hearing." He asked that his testimony be kept confidential "while I remain in the valey among the people called Mormons." Roberts stated that Brigham Young had insulted two federal officials, Broughton Harris and Perry Brocchus, who "came here the representatives of a poor, damned, contemptable, rotten government and they poor dmd drunken cusses thought to lead the government of Utah, as they would lead a whore by the tail . . . I let them know that I led the whore by the nose while they were grappling after her arse (suiting his gestures to his words)." Both Harris and Brocchus had fled the territory in September 1851 as the two of the famed Runaway Officials. Provenance: Mrs. F.H. Sweet; Parke Bernet sale, 24 September 1963, lot 255, to the consignor.