had declared once for all not only its independence but its despotism.” Furthermore, “[i]t is very well known in Salt Lake City that no man lives there who would not be dead tomorrow if Brigham willed it so.” Ludlow spent considerable time with Orrin Porter Rockwell, who had been dubbed the “Destroying Angel” for his supposed role as Brigham Young's assassin of choice. Ludlow wrote a sketch of the man which Rockwell's biographer, Harold Schindler, called “the best of those left behind by writers who observed the Mormon first-hand.” Ludlow said, in part, that he “found him one of the pleasantest murderers I ever met.” Ludlow wrote that “[i]n their insane error, [the Mormons] are sincere, as I fully believe, to a much greater extent than is generally supposed. Even their leaders, for the most part, I regard not as hypocrites, but as fanatics.” For instance, “Brigham Young is the farthest remove on earth from a hypocrite; he is that grand, yet awful sight in human nature, a man who has brought the loftiest Christian self-devotion to the altar of the Devil…” A warning that must have seemed especially poignant was this: “[T]he Mormon enemies of our American Idea should be plainly understood as far more dangerous antagonists than hypocrites or idiots can ever hope to be. Let us not twice commit the blunder of underrating our foes.” Racist opinions Ludlow occasionally expressed the racial bigotry rampant throughout his day in his writings. Contrary to his progressive nature, inquiring mind, and abolitionist politics, describes “motherly mulatto woman” as possessing “the passive obedience of her race;” or Mexicans in California as originating from “a nation of beggars-on-horseback… the Spaniards, Greasers, and Mixed-Breeds…;” or Chinese immigrants in “a kennel of straggling houses” with Ludlow imagining them “finally… swept away from San Francisco, and that strange Semitic race… either exiled or swallowed up in our civilization…;” or “the natural, ingrained laziness of the Indians.” Native Americans were a particular target, calling them “copper-faced devils”, and he looking with scorn on “the pretty, sentimental, philanthropic prayers” that constituted much of the contemporary literature about the “noble savage.” Ludlow believed the “Indian” was subhuman — an “inconceivable devil, whom statesmen and fools treat with, but whom brave and practical men shoot and scalp.” San Francisco During his stay in San Francisco, Ludlow was a guest of Thomas Starr King, the youthful California preacher and passionate