Forgotten Short Story - Utah War won by Mormons.
January 9, 2010 10:42 PM   Subscribe

What was that short story about an alternate history of the Utah War?

So I read a lot of anthologies of science fiction short stories. A few years (decades?) back I read a story of an alternate history of the Utah War in which a famous gun maker sided with the Mormons and provided them with some sort of machine gun with which they held the American invaders at bay. Do you have any idea what story this is? What book or books it can be found in?
posted by Seamus to Media & Arts (7 answers total) 3 users marked this as a favorite
 
Is it possible you are thinking of the novel How Few Remain? It's not exactly what you describe, but there's a rebellion in Utah and, separately, Custer makes use of Gatling guns.
posted by Conrad Cornelius o'Donald o'Dell at 11:03 PM on January 9, 2010


Response by poster: Nope. Not it, unfortunately. Every search I tried led to Turtledove and How Few Remain, but this was definitely a short story in an anthology.

I thought the firearms maker might be John Browning, but he was born in Ogden only 2 years before the war. This also threw a monkeywrench in my googling.
posted by Seamus at 11:10 PM on January 9, 2010


A longshot, but it wasn't Route 666 by Kim Newman, the original novella that sets up the world-changing events that lead to the Dark Future background (bizarrely named, as it's alt-history) that Games Workshop produced in the 1980s and 1990s?
posted by Hogshead at 4:48 AM on January 10, 2010


Best answer: Lee Allred's "For the Strength of the Hills"?
posted by MonkeyToes at 6:55 AM on January 10, 2010


Best answer: More on Allred's story:

"Allred, Lee. "For the Strength of the Hills".
Divergence: 1857 CE
What if: After a Mormon gunsmith invents the equivalent of the Gatling gun, the 1857 Utah Expedition to quell the Mormon "rebellion" triggers the Civil War.
Summary: With virtually the entire US Army embroiled in a guerrilla war in the Utah Territory, the South secedes.

Published: In L. Ron Hubbard Presents Writers of the Future: Volume XIII (ed. Dave Wolverton), Bridge 1997 (1573180645).
— Serialized in Irreantum Winter 2000-01 and Spring 2001.
Awards: Finalist: 1997 Sidewise Award for best short-form alternate history.
Bookstore: Listed by Amazon.com in paperback (Writers of the Future Vol. XVIII)."
posted by MonkeyToes at 6:58 AM on January 10, 2010


I had never heard of this, but the Utah War has always been an area of fascination for me. So thanks!
posted by Hactar at 9:53 AM on January 10, 2010


Response by poster: MonkeyToes, how could that not be the correct answer?
A story about Mormons in an anthology named after the head of Scientology. My question seems better every minute.
I checked my shelf, and there are a few Writers of the Future, just not that one. Half-Priced Books shall see me frequently until this one is solved definitively.
Thanks!
posted by Seamus at 1:17 PM on January 10, 2010


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