[The following is a letter from the Donner Party. It was written by 13-year-old Virginia Reed, daughter of James Reed, who was one of the party’s leaders. This is an excerpt from a letter to her cousin Mary on May 16, 1847, which described the ordeal. For historical accuracy, I have chosen to leave the (insane amount of) misspellings and poor grammar.]
Died not long after thay started we got out of provisions & had to put Martha at one cabin James at another Thomas at another & Ma & Elizea & Milt Eliot & I dried up what littel meat we had and started to see if we could get across & had to leve the childrin o Mary you may think that hard to leve theme with strangers & did not now wether we would see them again or not we could hardle get a way from them but we told theme we would bring them Bread & then thay was willing to stay we went & was out 5 days in the mountains Elie giv out & had to go back we went on a day longer we had to lay by a day & make snow shows & we went on a while and coud not find the road & we had to turn back I could go on verry well while i thout we wer giting along but as soone as we had to turn back i coud hadley git along but we got to the cabins that night l froze one of my feet verry bad & that same night thare was the worst storme we had that winter & if we had not come back that night we would never got back we had nothing to eat but ox hides o Mary I would cry and wish I had what you al wasted Eliza had to go to Mr Graves cabin & we staid at Mr Breen thay had meat all the time & we had to kill littel cash the dog & eat him we ate his head and feet & hide & evry thing about him o my Dear Cousin you dont now what trubel is yet a many a time we had on the laste thing a cooking and did not now wher the next would come from but there was awl wais some way provided
Source:
Stephens, John Richard. “Victims of History.” Weird History 101: Tales of Intrigue, Mayhem, and Outrageous Behavior. New York: Barnes & Noble, 2006. 160. Print.
Further Reading:
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