Danite

The Danites were a clandestine organization within the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints formed in Missouri in 1838. They emerged among Mormon settlers during a period of intense local conflict and were designed to protect the church community and enforce internal discipline. The group operated in secrecy, with leaders and members sometimes taking oaths and using signs to identify one another. They were sometimes referred to as the Danite Band or the Destroying Angels in contemporary accounts.

During the 1838 Missouri Mormon War, the Danites were reportedly involved in intimidation, threats, and violent actions against individuals perceived as enemies of the church. They were linked to attacks on dissenters, property destruction, and episodes of communal retaliation. Accounts from opponents and later observers connect their activities to the broader escalation that culminated in Governor Lilburn Boggs’s Extermination Order of October 1838, which compelled the Mormon population to leave Missouri.

Following the exodus and the later resettlement of many Latter-day Saints in Utah, the formal Danite organization declined. Historians debate the scale and organization of the group, with some viewing it as a tightly coordinated secret society and others treating it as a label for broader vigilante actions carried out by members of the church.

Today, the Danites remain a topic in the study of Mormon history, illustrating the factional tensions of the 1830s in Missouri and the evolving dynamics of communal enforcement within the church’s early expansions.