SOURCE: “Polygamous yet Monogamous: Cultural Conflict in the Writings of Mormon Polygamous Wives,” in Old West—New West: Centennial Essays, edited by Barbara Howard Meldrum, University of Idaho Press, 1993, pp. 115-32.

In the following essay, Harline uses private writings included in the diaries and autobiographies of Mormon women to show how these polygamous wives were torn between their faith in the mandates of God and their emotional struggles with the realities of day-to-day life.

In response to the federal government's efforts to abolish polygamy in 1870, five thousand Mormon women held a “mass indignation meeting” in the Salt Lake Tabernacle, where they heard their female leader proclaim: “Were we the stupid, degraded, heartbroken beings that we have been represented to be, silence might better become us.” High-profile polygamous wives were adamant about their right to live their religion as they pleased, and bristled at accusations that they might be...