Kidnapped from that Land
The Government Raids on the Short Creek Polygamists

Martha Sonntag Bradley

Paper $14.95
ISBN 978-0-87480-528-4

"[Bradley's] masterful treatment...will not only become a standard reference for students of Mormon polygamy, but will also be appreciated by a larger audience as a much needed lesson on crosscultural understanding and religious tolerance."
--Sunstone

In the early morning hours of July 26, 1953, several hundred Arizona state officials and police officers moved into the polygamist community of Short Creek, Arizona, to serve warrants on thirty-six men and eighty-six women. Officials staging the raid believed they were rescuing the community’s 263 children from a life of bondage and immorality.

Kidnapped from that Land is the first book to bring together the story of the 1953 raid and two previous raids in 1935 and 1944. Martha Bradley tells the story with insight and compassion for the families that were fragmented by the arrests. She also deals with the complex legal issues that persist in both Arizona and Utah, where the practice of polygamy is a felony that is no longer prosecuted.

Kidnapped from that Land will appeal to those interested in the study of Mormon history, of polygamy, and of western regional and American social history.

Martha Bradley is assistant professor of history at Brigham Young University.