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Originally posted by getreadyalready
So he wasn't a regular nor irregular Mason, basically, he wasn't a Mason at all!
“About 4 o’clock in the morning I entered the porch in the lower court where I met the porter who admitted me through the door which led to the foot, or nearly so, of a great flight of stairs which, by ascending, led me to the door of the outer court [of the attic story] which I found tiled within by an officer. I, having the proper implements of that degree, gained admittance through the outer and inner courts which opened and led to the sacred departments [i.e., the endowment rooms]…Having entered, I found myself alone with the Tiler that kept the inner courts [and I/we] set about and soon got fires up in the different rooms and setting things in order for the day.”
Oh, I don't doubt that Lee was a Mason. In his own writings Lee wrote
Originally posted by OnTheLevel213
Absent evidence in either direction, I'm willing to humor the idea that Lee was a Mason, especially since the OP is still so very far from right about anything else.
source
The next Sunday was a cloudy day, so the meeting was held within doors. Dickey had by this time raised his mob to fifty men, and made every arrangement to give me a warm reception. Two ruffians who were intoxicated had been selected to start the disturbance, or "open the ball," as they called it. I had just commenced speaking when one of these men began to swear and use indecent language, and made a rush for me with his fist drawn. I made a Masonic sign of distress, when, to my relief and yet to my surprise, a planter pushed to my aid. He was the man who employed Dickey. He took the drunken men and led them out of the crowd, and then sat by me during the rest of my sermon, thus giving me full protection. That man was a stranger to me, but he was a good man and a true Mason. His action put an end to mob rule at that place. After the meeting I baptized ten converts.
About the children that survived, they, along with the posessions of the parties with the wagon train, were divided up, starting with the highest ranking Mason and going on down to the lowest ranking Mason. John Lee, being the highest ranking Mason, took the best of the posessions and gave them to Brigham Young. Now all they had left to divide up was the children. That, too, was done in short time.
Again, doesn't sound like Lee got any of the children, or that Lee was the highest ranking and got first pick, or that it was "done in short time".
The children that were saved were taken to Cedar City and other settlements and put out among different families. I did not have anything to do with the property captured from the emigrants, or the cattle, until three months after the massacre, and then I took charge of the cattle, being ordered to do so by Brigham. There were eighteen wagons in all at the emigrant camp. They were wooden axles but one, and that was a light iron axle; it had been hauled by four mules. There were over five hundred head of cattle, but I never got the half of them. The Indians killed a number at the time of the massacre, and drove others to their tribes when they went home from Mountain Meadows. Bishop Klingensmith put the Church brand on fifty head or more of the best of the cattle.
The Indians got about twenty head of horses and mules. Brother Samuel Knight got a large sorrel mare; Brother Haight got a span of average American mules; Brother Joel White got a fine mare; Brother Higbee got a good large mule; Bishop Klingensmith got a span of mules. Brothers Haight, Higbee, and Allen each took a wagon. The people took what they wanted, and had divided and used up over half the property before I was put in charge.