David Koresh

His mother was 14 when he was born in Houston in 1959, and for much of his childhood he was handed between relatives who let him believe his grandmother was his mother. School went badly. Dyslexia and poor eyesight put him in special education classes, other boys tormented him, and he left Garland High School in his junior year for a run of jobs he either quit or lost. What he had instead was the Bible, which he could recite at length, and a guitar. He joined his mother's Seventh-day Adventist congregation, told the pastor that God intended him to marry the man's 15-year-old daughter, and was expelled. In the summer of 1981 he drove to Waco.

At Mount Carmel he outmaneuvered George Roden for control of the sect, then took the property back after Roden was committed to a state hospital for an axe killing. He taught that he alone could open the Seven Seals of Revelation. In February 1993 the ATF came with a warrant concerning firearms violations. Four agents and six Davidians died that day, and 51 days later 76 people died in a fire, more than 20 of them children. BriefHistory has the siege. What belongs here is the man the government thought it was arresting, and the argument that outlived him.

He was never convicted of anything. He died with the charges against him untested, and that is the frame every allegation has to sit inside. The allegations are also on the record. His House of David doctrine annulled the marriages of couples who joined and reserved the women for himself. A former member swore in an ATF affidavit that he had fathered at least 15 children by various women and girls, some of them below the age of consent. A Texas child welfare investigation in 1992 found no evidence and closed. Bruce Perry, the psychiatrist who treated the 21 children released during the siege, reported no signs of sexual abuse but wrote that the children spoke openly of 11 and 12-year-old girls being David's wives. Koresh, on tape, acknowledged fathering more than 12 children by several wives.

How the fire started is still argued. The Justice Department's 1993 review concluded that the Davidians lit it. Survivors and critics said the assault did. In 1999, after six years of denials, the FBI conceded it had fired pyrotechnic tear gas rounds that morning, and Janet Reno appointed John Danforth to find what else had been withheld. Danforth's 2000 report cleared the government of starting the fire and faulted officials for hiding the rounds. It settled nothing. Timothy McVeigh chose the second anniversary for Oklahoma City, and Waco has been a fixed reference point for American anti-government movements ever since.

David Koresh's life against the full span of the corpus.

• The Serpent's Root other
  The teaching Lois Roden let him deliver at Mount Carmel — it split the group 1983
• The rebuilt Mount Carmel Center building
  Outbuildings salvaged into one long structure housing the whole community 1990
• National radio sermon speech
  Broadcast on March 2 in exchange for a promise to come out that he did not keep 1993
• Exposition of the Seven Seals other
  Begun during the siege — he told his lawyer he would surrender once it was finished 1993
• Voice of Fire album
  Released after his death from recordings made with the group's band 1994

• August 17, 1959 aged 0 Born Vernon Wayne Howell in Houston His mother was 14 and unmarried. He was raised for years by his grandmother.
• 1981 aged ~22 Arrives at the Mount Carmel Center outside Waco Expelled from his Seventh-day Adventist congregation, he joined the Branch Davidians that summer.
• 1983 aged ~24 Begins claiming the gift of prophecy Lois Roden let him teach. Her son George considered him an interloper.
• November 3, 1987 aged 28 Gunfight with George Roden at Mount Carmel Howell and seven followers went to photograph an exhumed corpse. Roden was wounded.
• April 12, 1988 aged 28 Tried for attempted murder His seven followers were acquitted and the jury hung on his own verdict. Prosecutors dropped it.
• August 28, 1990 aged 31 A California judge grants the name change to David Koresh David for the king, Koresh for Cyrus. He had filed in Pomona on May 15.
• 1992 aged ~33 Texas child welfare investigators close an abuse inquiry The months-long investigation turned up no evidence and the case was closed.
• February 28, 1993 aged 33 The ATF raid on Mount Carmel Four ATF agents and six Branch Davidians were killed. Koresh was wounded. Who fired first has never been resolved.
• April 19, 1993 aged 33 The fire ends the 51-day siege Seventy-six people died, more than 20 of them children. Koresh was 33.

• Timothy McVeigh 1968–2001
  Domestic terrorist whose Oklahoma City bombing became one of the deadliest attacks in American history. invoked by
• Bill Clinton b. 1946
  42nd president whose centrist politics, economic agenda, and impeachment shaped the post-Cold War era. president during the siege
• Jim Jones 1931–1978
  Peoples Temple founder whose 1978 Jonestown murder-suicide killed over nine hundred followers. compared to
• Joseph Smith 1805–1844
  Founder of the Latter Day Saint movement, one of the most consequential religions to originate in the United States. earlier American prophet