Feeling that the Lamanites, who already were in ascendancy of the Nephites, would destroy the records if they fell into their hands, Mormon hid all the plates which contained said records in the Hill Cumorah. He hid all of them except a few which he gave to his son, Moroni, with instructions to engrave thereon certain things the nature of which is evident in the things Moroni thereafter wrote.
The spite which they had in their hearts for all Nephites, and their intense hatred towards them, were so keen and inexhaustible that the Lamanites, even after their victory at Cumorah, hunted and destroyed those of the Nephites who had escaped into "the country southward."