Hypothetical: Texas vs. Utah

[Ironhold]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mormon_Mill,_Burnet_County,_Texas

I've been thinking about this over the last few days.

Not many people know about this, but before his death Joseph Smith was eying Texas as a possible place to set up more colonies for the church. A few members were sent out, but Joseph's death pretty well ended this.

However, Lyman Wright did indeed lead his offshoot group to Texas, where they set up two settlements. One, Mormon Mill, is still standing and is an officially designated historical site. The other, though, is underneath a man-made lake. 

What might have happened had an actual colony of members, under orders of Joseph Smith, set up shop somewhere in Texas? 

[Just_A_Guy]

3 hours ago, Ironhold said:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mormon_Mill,_Burnet_County,_Texas

I've been thinking about this over the last few days.

Not many people know about this, but before his death Joseph Smith was eying Texas as a possible place to set up more colonies for the church. A few members were sent out, but Joseph's death pretty well ended this.

However, Lyman Wright did indeed lead his offshoot group to Texas, where they set up two settlements. One, Mormon Mill, is still standing and is an officially designated historical site. The other, though, is underneath a man-made lake. 

What might have happened had an actual colony of members, under orders of Joseph Smith, set up shop somewhere in Texas? 

As it was, Texas had over 600,000 people in 1860.  The LDS Church had 1/10 that number of members worldwide.

Most likely a Mormon settlement in Texas would have been mobbed again by the secessionists for having real or suspected abolitionist/pro-Union sympathies; and if Mormons were even still in Texas by the end of the Civil War, then they’d have had to deal with an always-hostile reconstructionist federal government.

As unpleasant as those years were for us—we really dodged an extraordinary number of bullets during that period.

Edited September 11, 2022 by Just_A_Guy

[Vort]

4 hours ago, Just_A_Guy said:

As it was, Texas had over 600,000 people in 1860.

600,000 people?! That's nearly SIX TIMES as many people as attend any given Penn State football game! Amazing!

[Ironhold]

https://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/entries/mormons

Almost forgot about the entry in the Handbook of Texas, a resource maintained by the Texas State Historical Association.

[pam]

Instead of funeral potatoes at funerals they'd be serving brisket and corn in a cup.