ORRIN PORTER ROCKWELL, Part 3 of Chapter 9 of Blood Atonement by Ogden Kraut

DEPUTY MARSHAL ROCKWELL

From 1848 until his death in 1878, Porter acted as a deputy marshal peace officer of the Utah Territory, to keep law and order within the broad range of land that it covered. For the next 30 years he came into contact with every kind of peculiar people that lived or passed through the territory. To perform his duties in that office, he brought many men into the courts for trial and prison; but he also had to kill many men, as other marshals and deputies often, of necessity, had to do. Notwithstanding the reports of his critics, there is no proof that he ever wantonly killed anyone.

The Utah Territory had its share of outlaws and desperados just like the Montana, California, and Texas territories of the west. Crime was common and life was often cheap in these rough wilderness lands. It was the duty of such men as Porter to meet or challenge the lawbreakers in order to bring law and peace to those who wanted it. Porter is said to have “carried on his duties with no more or less callousness and hardness than was necessary in any other region,” and correctly so.