Sherlock Holmes was created in 1887 by Arthur Conan Doyle, whose creation would eclipse his creator in world renown. Known for his fastidiousness, scientific methods and use of sharp deductive logic, Holmes, and his long-suffering assistant, Dr. John H. Watson, are among the most beloved characters in the English canon. Doyle’s creation spawned the entire mystery (or crime, as it’s known across the pond) genre. But did you know that his first novel, A Study in Scarlet, features a murder mystery that includes a villainous depiction of early LDS leader Brigham Young and a gang of his enforcers, known as the Danites?
A Study in Scarlet, originally published in 1887 introduced Sherlock Holmes to the world. Photo courtesy of the Library of Congress
A Study in Scarlet was originally published in 1887 without fanfare in Beeton’s Christmas Annual. Doyle’s detective, however, lived on in future stories published in The Strand, a penny magazine that dealt in salacious and gossipy tales. In the first story, Holmes and Watson solve a mystery that has its improbable roots in Salt Lake City after two murders are committed by a London cabbie. The cabbie turns out to be the betrothed of a woman who was forcibly married off to a Mormon man on the order of Brigham Young back in Utah and has died of a broken heart. The erstwhile groom has tracked this Mormon man and his partner in crime to London and kills them in revenge, writing the German word for revenge, “RACHE,” in scarlet blood at one of the crime scenes (which gives the novel its colorful name). Holmes and Watson solve the crime, naturally, but the book paints the early Mormon faith in a rapacious and derogatory light. This perspective was common in entertainment and fiction of the period, which often treated the allure of the far-off frontier with a combination of fear and romanticism.
Meanwhile, in actual Utah, the Danites were a real deal. They were members of a fraternal order of Mormon men who played a part as vigilantes in the 1838 Mormon War in Missouri, before the faith’s Exodus-like emigration to Utah. Here in the West in 1857, the territorial militia, The Nauvoo Legion, (with the aid of mercenary Southern Paiutes), perpetrated the Mountain Meadows Massacre—the mass murder of at least 120 members of the Baker-Fancher wagon train traveling the Old Spanish Trail bound for California. (The event figures prominently in the Netflix series American Primeval.)
Photo thought to be Bill Hickman, who was also known as a “Danite chief.” The photo has sometimes been incorrectly identified as Porter Rockwell. Photo courtesy of Marriot Digital Library
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle created Sherlock Holmes, who was made famous in the novel A Study in Scarlet, which features a plot that originated in frontier Utah. Photo courtesy of the Library of Congress
Old Port
While it is folklore that the Danites were a precursor to the Nauvoo Legion, it is not known if the group formally existed in the Utah Territory. However, one of the Danites’ most well-known members, Porter Rockwell, was a notorious and feared Luca Brasi to Brigham’s Michael Corleone. Rockwell, known as “The Destroying Angel of Mormondom,” was indicted but never formally charged with the attempted assassination of the Governor of Missouri. He was also Brigham Young’s bodyguard out west. Meanwhile, the Danites and “Old Port” remain an important part of early Mormon folklore and legend.
Discover more Utah Lore, and find all our Community coverage. And while you’re here, why not subscribe and get six annual issues of Salt Lake magazine’s curated guide to the best of life in Utah?
