Archaeologists Dug Up the Donner Family's Camp. None of the Bones They Identified Were Human.

Archaeologists Dug Up the Donner Family's Camp. None of the Bones They Identified Were Human. In the winter of 1846 about eighty-one emigrants bound for California were trapped by snow in the Sierra Nevada after taking a shortcut sold to them by Lansford Hastings. About half of them died, and the survivors told the relief parties what the living had eaten. In 2004 archaeologists began digging the Donner family's own camp at Alder Creek and sifted the ashes of the hearth: more than sixteen thousand bone fragments. None of the ones they could identify were human. This film follows the documents: Hastings's Emigrants' Guide, the letters home from the trail, the Wasatch and the salt desert, the death of John Snyder, the snowshoe party, Patrick Breen's diary, the four relief parties, Virginia Reed's letter, the California Star, McGlashan's 1880 history, the stumps, and the Alder Creek excavation. A note on accuracy: the archaeologists themselves call the human question inconclusive, and the film says so. Cannibalism at the camps is documented by survivors and rescuers; the bones show what they can show. Keseberg was accused of murder and never tried; the film gives no verdict. CHAPTERS 0:00 The hook 0:47 Springfield 1:47 Hastings 2:49 The parting 3:31 The letters 4:03 The Wasatch 4:42 Eighty miles 5:33 The Humboldt 6:04 The men left behind 6:33 Stanton 6:59 The snow 7:35 Alder Creek 7:59 Eighty-one 8:26 Breen 8:50 The snowshoes 9:46 California 10:24 The first relief 10:47 Milt 11:07 The second relief 12:01 Tamsen 12:15 Keseberg 13:05 Forty-eight 13:51 Virginia Reed 14:17 Hastings 14:44 The newspapers 15:06 McGlashan 15:47 The stumps 16:17 The memorial 16:29 Alder Creek 17:13 Sixteen thousand fragments 17:55 Not proof 18:40 What the bones show 19:04 Your verdict 19:20 Close Fifty-seventh film in a series on the archive behind the famous stories. Same method as the rest: the official version, then the documents. SOURCES Lansford W. Hastings, The Emigrants' Guide to Oregon and California (1845). Patrick Breen, diary, 1846-1847 (Bancroft Library). Virginia Reed to Mary Keyes, 16 May 1847. California Star, 13 February 1847. C. F. McGlashan, History of the Donner Party (1880). Dixon, Schablitsky and Novak, An Archaeology of Desperation (2011); Dixon et al., American Antiquity 75 (2010). IMAGE CREDITS Library of Congress; Historic American Buildings Survey; Albert Bierstadt; C. R. Savage; Wikimedia Commons contributors. All public domain, via Wikimedia Commons. #DonnerParty #OregonTrail #WildWest #Archaeology #History