The public in the early 19th century had probably not heard of whole populations being obliterated. But even when the so-called civilized Greeks took over the island of an enemy, they exterminated the male population, and either killed the women and children or reserved them as slaves. Modern reporting increases awareness of the realities of war. When one to three million Cambodians, much of the whole population, were obliterated by the Khmer Rouge from 1970 to 1975, the entire world could observe the results.
A so-called ethnic cleansing, later classified as a genocide, took place in areas controlled by the Bosnian Serbs, who were mostly Orthodox Christians in 1995. Both Muslim Bosnians and Roman Catholic Bosnian Croats were targets for extermination. According to the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY), the ethnic cleansing campaign included exterminations, unlawful confinement, murder, rape, sexual assault, torture, beating, robbery, and inhumane treatment of civilians. It also included targeting political leaders, intellectuals, and professionals; the unlawful deportation and transfer of civilians; the unlawful shelling of civilians; the unlawful appropriation and plunder of real and personal property; the destruction of homes and businesses; and the destruction of places of worship.
In the case of Mormon’s final battle, the numbers were also staggering—as many as 230,000 in one battle, assuming each unit was full to begin with. Except for 24 survivors, twenty-three leaders, each together with their ten thousand, were all “hewn down.” These kinds of things do happen, probably more in the ancient world than today, but no era in history is immune from such slaughter.
Regarding uncertainties about the location of this final battle, much has been said. But in the end, one might wonder why it is that we simply do not know the place of that battle. One might also ask what significance its GPS location might have, if any.
In comparison, it might help to point out that we do not know the location of Mt. Sinai, where Moses saw God and received the Ten Commandments. Likewise, we do not know the location of the Mount of Transfiguration, where Moses and Elijah appeared to Jesus, Peter, James and John. Nor do we know the mountain on which Jesus gave the Sermon on the Mount. In none of these cases is the specific location crucial, but rather knowing what happened there is.
Also, there is no compelling reason why Moroni should have buried the plates of Mormon at the same location where this final battle had taken place 36 years earlier. All those years, Moroni had wandered to avoid contact with his enemies, who would have killed him if they had found him.
Book of Mormon Central, “Where is the Location of the Hill Cumorah? (Mormon 6:6),” KnoWhy 489 (November 29, 2018).
Book of Mormon Central, “How Could So Many People Have Died at the Battle of Cumorah? (Mormon 6:14),” KnoWhy 231 (November 15, 2016).