On September 11, 1857, Arkansas emigrants bound for California left their besieged camp in this valley after Mormon militiamen bearing a white flag falsely promised them protection. Following the militia leaders’ directions, the women, children, and wounded departed first, while the men and older boys left last, each escorted by a militiaman. As the men neared this spot, a signal was given, the militiamen beside them turned and fired on the unarmed emigrant men and older boys, and within minutes all were dead near the wagon road. Farther up the road, the women, children, and wounded who had gone ahead were also murdered. Only 17 children aged six and under survived. This ground has traditionally been associated with the burials of the men and boys killed nearby. On the day after the massacre, Mormon militia members hastily buried the victims in shallow graves near where they fell, but within days wolves and coyotes had pulled the bodies from the earth. Local ranchers, a federal Indian agent, and soldiers reburied many bones in 1858 and 1859. Small rock cairns once marked some burial sites, but the stones are now mostly scattered. For more than a century, this ground has remained untilled and protected from desecration by its owners out of respect for those who died in the massacre and are buried in the vicinity.