The Donner Party Part 8

Part Eight of Ric Burns' American Experience documentary - "The Donner Party"

Category:

Education

Tags:

• Donner Party
• Ric Burns
• Ken Burns
• Pioneers
• California
• Cannibalism

[Aetheryn23]

I find it... marginally disturbing and ironic that he opened a restaurant in California after the ordeal.

[woodbinedrinker]

Keseberg probably murdered some of the last victims.

[MrMrmagoo34]

@lacouerfairy Im thinking you get to a point where you just are so hungry you cant control it

[superoflex]

@superoflex This documentary really made me think about how it is and how it was. I think today we all take advantage of what we have. Back the all they had was their dreams and hopes. We still have that, but we have a lot more tools to make them come true.

[superoflex]

Try not to take short cuts.



[sanfranman123]

What? You don't like finger sandwiches?

[lacouerfairy]

I'm not so afraid of death that I would eat another human being. I'd rather die. But then again, I've never been in that situation. They were probably so mentally damgaged by that point, that they didn't even know what the heck they were doing anymore.

[diddims]

@Hechos68 First of all, no. The Breen family did no such thing. Second of all, the Breens passionately denied ever eating human flesh. I apologize if I'm taking this too seriously, but this ridicule of people who survived because they were forced to cannibalize the dead seems disrespectful and immature. Would you find it funny if you were in their situation?

[diddims]

@bfor42 First of all, no. Keseberg was delirious and hardly well-fed. Although he admitted that he chose human flesh over the legs of some starved oxen because it tasted better, it nobody recalled him saying that. Second of all, would *you* truly come to enjoy eating human flesh after months without any guarantee of good food? Would you find it amusing? Do you have the maturity to understand desperation?

[bfor42]

Keseberg was gnawing on a leg bone when they found him. He had a huge belly and couldn't stop belching. His first words to the search party were, "What took you so long?" Then, he asked them if they brought any steak sauce with them.

[diddims]

@trueopaque Yeah. I highly doubt that anybody would ever develop a taste for human flesh, the freakish psychopaths aside. Keseberg was merely honest about it; he had little choice. Even before this, he was reviled not only stealing but for battering his wife, Philippine, and even their toddler daughter, Ada, if not their newborn son, Louis. He'd lost his Ada and Louis, Philippine and six of their eight daughters predeceased him, and he died a ruined man.

[trueopaque]

@goodkarma33 That's harsh. He had only wanted to stay alive by any means, so that kind of ridicule is not nice.