With those of the Carson Valley, the California brethren mainly returned
to Utah, late in 1857, or early in 1858, at the time of the Johnston
invasion. Mr. Hakes gave additional details. On September 11, 1857,
occurred the Mountain Meadows massacre in the southwest corner of Utah.
This outrage, by a band of outlaws, emphatically discountenanced by the
Church authorities and repugnant to Church doctrines, which denounce
useless shedding of blood, was promptly charged, on the Pacific and,
indeed, all over the Union, as something for which the Mormon
organization itself was responsible. So it happened that, in December,
1857, J. Riley Morse, of the colony, rode southward post haste from
Sacramento with the news that 200 mountain vigilantes were on their way
to run the Mormons out of California. Not wishing to fight and not
wishing to subject their families to abuse, about 400 of the San
Bernardino settlers, within a few weeks, started for southern Utah,
leaving only about twenty families. The news of this departure went to
the Californians and they returned to their homes without completing
their projected purpose. Many Church and coast references tell of the
"recall" of the San Bernardino settlers, but Hakes' story appears ample
in furnishing a reason for the departure. Many of these San Bernardino
pioneers later came into Arizona. Those who remained prospered, and many
of the families still are represented by descendants now in the
Californian city. The settlement is believed to have been the first
agricultural colony founded by persons of Anglo-Saxon descent in Southern
California.