would you get person not right now I wouldn't but ask me three or four weeks from now maybe it was April of 1847 when the last relief party entered the camp everything was eerily quiet the camp's still buried under deep snow the only evidence of the dozens of members of the Donner Party were the butchered bodies skull sawed open to get at the brains pieces of human flesh bloody bones and body parts pressing further into the camp rescuers found the severed and split head of George Donner the leader of the Donner Party but his wife Tamsin was nowhere to be found after following some mysterious tracks away from the Donner camp the rescuers were shocked to find German immigrant Louis piece Berg still alive barely and hunkered down amidst a pile of human remains preparing a pot of brains and liver case Berg would later be made infamous as the murderous cannibal of the Donner Party who headlines and gossip claimed not only eight people but liked it that was still to come but from the beginning he freely admitted to eating the body of Tamsen Donner to survive and while the rescuers were horrified at how readily Keys Berg confessed to cannibalism he was not the only member of the Donner Party forced to eat the dead far from it cannibalism with catabolism cannibalism cannibalism cannibalism Falcons tails that they became cannibalism what really happened to the Donner Party honestly until about two months ago I didn't really know I had the same Donner starter pack knowledge most Americans have which is that a bunch of pioneers got trapped in some snow and probably had to eat each other in my mind it was all very Oregon Trail very pas got bitten by a snake and died of dysentery then two things happened first I started reading books about the Donner Party with the idea that the true story was going to end up being tamer and less salacious than I thought probably only some light and historically unproven cannibalism haha no the story is so much worse than I imagined you're gonna wish this was a dysentery and snakebite situation second since this happened in California I decided to visit if I could and take you along though I assumed since they were trapped deep in the mountains obviously there would be nothing left to see but maybe there was a memorial somewhere I could visit here's our next revelation did you know the lake where they were dropped that fatal winter is now a full town that is Donner themed I did not Donner Lake Donner Memorial Park Donner downhill ski resorts Tahoe Donner Golf Course Donner Lake Lodge Donner Lake Kitchen Donner Lake watersports I think the food establishments named after the Donner Party are maybe the strangest before we visit let's lay out the basics of this story so many other people died on the wagon trail West why was this group situation so dire so charismatic ly bad as to make them famous it's one of those situations where one major thing goes wrong okay to go wrong getting a little dicey three major things go wrong and you're enshrined forever as a pop culture horror trope first thing that went wrong was the group left the Midwest too late this hodgepodge of 87 travelers and families loosely led by George Donner and his brother Jacob should have left st. Joseph Missouri by May first but they didn't they left weeks late their guidebook was written by a man named Lansford Hastings and Lansford said if you don't leave before May first quote you are very liable to be detained by impassable mountains of snow until the next spring or perhaps forever which was great advice unfortunately the Donner Party didn't listen to bad advice from Lansford Hastings they listened to other terrible advice also from Lansford Hastings Lansford Hastings sucked I believe that's the historical term here's why in his guidebook Hastings made California out to be a paradise for the taking acres upon acres of verdun fertile farmland the stuff of dreams California was at the same time u.s. President James Polk was foaming at the mouth to take California from Mexico it was manifest destiny Anglo Americans god-given right to move west and just take it many wagon travelers were moving to Oregon because it was generally easier to reach but Lansford Hastings had an ulterior motive to divert them to California instead he was working with a Swiss immigrant named John Sutter creator of the town Sutter's Ville Hastings had been promised a significant number of lots in the new city meaning he would make beaucoup bucks off the immigrants buying those Sutter's Ville Lots if he could bring them to California so in his guide he wrote of a a shortcut later called the Hastings cutoff that he claimed made the trek to California hundreds of miles shorter the cutoff had travelers leaving the Oregon route in present-day Wyoming cutting through the mountains crossing the Great Salt Lake desert and rejoining the original route at the Humboldt River thing is Hastings had never actually traveled this route he had just seen it on some dusty old maps but as he was the only guide for most immigrants they including the Donner Party believed in his wisdom despite warnings from other pioneers who had navigated the Hastings cutoff the Donner Party took the supposed shortcut at one point Hastings himself made an appearance leading another group but he abandons the donners real quick like oh yeah looks like you can't bring wagons this way right laters The Donald Party crosses the dry merciless Great Salt Lake desert that took lives killed oxen depleted their supplies and now they've added a whole nother month to their journey by the time the Donner Party got to Truckee lake the place that's now Donner Lake it was early November their rundown almost out of supplies and at the far end of the lake is a massive granite rock wall with just a small notch through which they're supposed to pass and was that snow why is there so much snow we've arrived at the third major problem the Pineapple Express not that pineapple Express the meteorological phenomenon also known as the Madden Julian oscillation long explanation short cold air sucks up warm moist air causing rain and snow to get dumped on the west coast meaning apocalyptic blizzards with over 20 feet of snow in the Sierra Nevada mountains so it was choo choo all aboard the pineapple Express for the Donner Party there was no way their wagons would make it through that narrow snowy notch later known as Donner Pass the party had no choice but to build makeshift cabins and at the lake in an attempt to wait out the snow to be clear these weren't families looking for a glamping situation these weren't tough-as-nails travelers who started out their journey west in peak physical condition to save their oxen strength most of the party had walked the entire trip men women and children but after a much longer journey than they expected they found themselves at Truckee lake hungry and dangerously cold running out of options for survival in mid-december a party wearing snowshoes set out to reach johnson's ranch a remote outpost that would have food and supplies the 15 members of the snowshoe party made frustrating slow progress by day four they had only traveled 14 miles having climbed a sheer rock face to get to the knotch while battling the following hunger hypothermia hyperthermia or overheating from extreme physical exertion while also wearing layers and layers of clothing and snow blindness where ultraviolet rays reflect off the white snow causing severe pain headaches nausea and eventual blindness by the sixth day Charles Stanton their best guide had died there were two Miwok Native Americans with the word named Louis and Salvador who knew the land slightly better but they spoke almost no English these problems combined to send the group miles off course starvation was beginning to set in it's possible to live much longer in starvation situations but the extreme number of calories they were burning on no food was taking its toll by the eighth day a man named Patrick Dolan suggested they draw lots to see who would be killed and eaten and then he himself drew the short straw whoa that is a bold gamble that did not work out for you buddy they didn't end up killing him but things rapidly deteriorated from there on the ninth day of their journey this is Christmas Eve Franklin graves died at the party's camp cradled by his daughter Sarah and Marianne as he died he begged them to eat his flesh in order to survive Antonio a young Mexican man already died earlier that day Patrick short straw Dolan died on Christmas Day and 13 year old Lemuel Murphy died the next day merry Christmas to all and to all a potentially cannibalistic situation by the morning of December 27th the remaining snowshoe party members were ready to butcher the dead that day everyone except the to me walks Luiz and Salvador ate the dead they split up in groups at separate fires so that nobody would have to eat their own family or watch others eat their family this wasn't frenzied eating either they carefully work to butcher and dry the meat to make it portable so it would last for the remainder of their journey and after 14 days out the party was able to move again they climbed practically vertically up a rock and snow-covered Gorge by this time their feet were bleeding through their tattered leather shoes wherever they walked they left bloody tracks behind them by January 4th they'd run out of food again and party member William foster brought up eating the two Miwok men Luis and Salvador as Daniel James Brown the author of the indifferent stars above put it when killing to survive it's easiest to kill whatever or whomever you are at least attached to cattle before horses dogs before people strangers before acquaintances acquaintances before friends friends before family the Miwok men were strangers who could be food the idea was dropped but understandably Lewis said Salvador were like um okay we're gonna peace out silently in the dead of night because these white people are about to murder and eat us from here things went even more downhill for the people who remained there now practically naked and barefoot Sarah graves his husband Jay died and the group roasted his heart on a stick in front of her so that's a nice detail their pain and hunger drove them to insanity William foster suggested to William Eddie they should kill Amanda action for food and he refused on the grounds that McCutchen was a mother so foster suggested butchering Mary Anne and Sarah graves because they were not mothers aa pioneer women have children and you might die in childbirth don't have children and your friends will eat you Sarah Mary Ann and Amanda didn't have to worry because a few days later the party came across Lise and Salvador and William Foster promptly killed them that night they gave them a respectful burial in keeping with their cultural practices no they didn't they ate them remember when I told you you would wish this was all dysentery and snakebites well here at last the final seven walking corpses at this point stumbled into a native my village where they were finally fed a sort of a corn mush and Amaya who guided them on to Johnson's ranch over the next three months for rescue parties would be sent back to Truckee lake to try and gather those left behind with varying degrees of success so as I'm learning about the sheer level of cannibalism that happened here much worse than I imagined I think a more and more interested in how a modern town named Donner with all the recreational sports hotspots also named Donner reckons with this very dark legacy we're at the Donner Museum now and at a certain point it was rebranded the emigrant trail museum which makes it seem like they were trying to avoid the c-word California no I'm kidding copper mining no [Music] here's the big question evidence of cannibalism is there proof of cannibalism among the Donner Party list for the ends cannibalism is well documented in the written record however archaeologists have yet to find the evidence of it at campsites I don't really understand that there's so much written record of cannibalism happening like I don't know what they're expecting to find like little bones with teeth marks in them I think we know that they had to eat some people hi sorry about the whole starvation cannibalism thing why did women survive I think it's because we have more body fat relatable it's 22 feet high because that is how high the snow was when they were trapped here snow I wouldn't do very good with that fascinating secret about this pioneer Memorial here is that it's also basically a headstone this is the spot that the green family had their cabin and after the rescues and deaths another expedition came through gathered up all the bones and clothing in the area dug a pit in the middle of the abandoned cabin and set the whole thing on fire essentially cremating everyone and everything and then 71 years later they built this more there is more cannibalism than I expected in this museum there's a lot of cannibalism specifics but there is cannibalism there may not have been cannibalism specifics at the dotter museum but that's what I'm here for do you ever look at your life and go huh that's what we've chosen to do with your one wild and precious life okay now the family is left behind at Truckee lake also resorted to cannibalism after eating their oxen dogs leather and shoelaces the second relief party picked the absolute worst place to camp at the crest of the Sierra Nevadas which came to be known as starved him it's here that Elizabeth graves died in order to survive the eight Elizabeth's body they also includes her own young daughter Nancy who at the time had no idea she was eating her mother [Music] the Murphy cabin was built right up against this rock which it's a big rock you can see how it would block wind but I think it ultimately didn't work that well for them you know I like this I feel kind of bad about giving the State Park crap because this is a really awesome that you can come here and see this do you think of suffering and torture you think of dirty prison cells and torture chambers but nature can inflict just as much suffering and cruelty as humanity can the trees are misery and the birds are misery I don't think they sing they just screeching pain how is the psychology working when you've been systematically deprived of food and nutrition for months you're chewing on the animal skin that forms the roof of your house so you're willing to make yourself colder by taking the skin off the roof and just like chewing on the tanned flesh we're starving you were so hungry I haven't eaten since my breakfast Danish four hours ago and I am getting so cranky there's so much focus on the scandal of cannibalism but the psychology of cannibalism and survival cannibalism specifically is what is so interesting so what was the psychology of the Donner Party people die of starvation all the time all over the world and don't turn to cannibalism and murder they should go without saying but I want to make it clear there are many different kinds of cannibalism survival cannibalism and mortuary cannibalism fundamentally different things I didn't know that well let me tell you more there's XO cannibalism or eating someone outside of your community perhaps to intimidate or frighten a groups enemies there's endo cannibalism the consumption of a person inside of your community usually this was ritualistic in nature a mortuary cannibalism perhaps to absorb a loved one's wisdom or as part of the mourning process there's also symbolic cannibalism like when Catholics eat the body of Christ Matt and pathological cannibalism motivated by mental disorder think Hannibal Lecter or Jeffrey Dahmer but with the Donner Party we're talking about survival cannibalism resorting to cannibalism as a means to stay alive the Donner Party are far from the only ones to have done this in 1972 a plane carrying a rugby team from Uruguay crashed into the Andes stranding the survivors in the ice and cold after 10 days of desperate conditions the survivors resorted to cannibalize a near dead what's most interesting to me is why cannibalism happened so quickly with the Donner Party we know that if they have water people can survive a pretty long period without food have you seen a survivor make it in afraid with the case of the snowshoe party the ones going for help they had only run out of food something like six days prior but there's more here than meets the eye many of the adults had the belief they were staying alive to save the children half of the Donner Party were under 18 so they were surviving not just for themselves but for their family and loved ones desperately waiting for help back at the lake also and this blew my mind they believed that the people who were dying the people whose bodies they eventually ate had died of starvation when you see people around you dying of starvation you have to say to yourself I'd better eat them or of course I'm next to go but in reality those who died had probably died of hypothermia not starvation but they didn't know that they were so hungry it seemed logical and couldn't medically make that distinction anyway only 40 members of the Donner Party survived beyond that winter of 1847 well many of the survivors went on to live full and happy lives in California they were forever haunted by what they had been forced to do in the mountains I don't know what I was expecting to find I didn't even know this was here a month ago and now that I know that it's here I mean this is this is the dunk where the actual Donner Party cabins were right in this field behind me and it snowed out and there's no one here I really thought it was gonna be more like Salem here I thought it was gonna be more tacky more ostentatious more touristy but in fact it's kind of the shishi wellness focused mountain town and I understand why people would want to focus on cross-country skiing rather than eating your brethren out of desperation even though everything is named Donner the Donner Party seems to be an afterthought it's a Sunday where all of the families where all the cannibal cannibal tourists than anybody like cannibalism anymore I think maybe they they could have more people if they played up the cannibal angle more that's always the conversation that we're gonna have about the Donner Party or cannibalism what is the line how much is too much how gory of details do you get into in a way if you're a State Park cannibalism gets butts in the seats the the native tribes that lived here and the Chinese immigration and the immigrant trail yes those are all really fascinating parts of California history but sorry cannibalism is the the mean potato jokes aside if it's ever going to be possible to put jokes aside in this conversation [Music] the members of the Donner Party were bright industrious people who probably had more in common with us than we realize they're not unrecognizable relics of our past the 1840s are not unfathomably far away the gold rush was on the verge of beginning and Abraham Lincoln was a young politician who almost joined the Donner Party by the way slip that in there at the end did you know all this about the Donner Party am I the only one who didn't get the full Dahmer education even though we are horrified at what they had to do we aren't exempt from asking ourselves what we would do in the same a terrible desperate situation if your answer is never would I do such a thing wait until you and your children have been starving for a couple months and we'll check back in on that judgment thank you all for your support this past month during the great transition of our patreon thank you for bearing with us it is the best way for independent content like this to be made including our podcast death in the afternoon which is back first episode of season 2 is up now wherever or pods or potted final thoughts don't take any shortcuts and moving to California is hard this video was made with generous donations from death enthusiasts just like you [Music] the official name of where the Donner Party camped is now the Donner camp picnic area they really do the work for you