The Donner Party

The Donner Party was a group of American pioneers organized by brothers George and Jacob Donner who set out for California in a wagon train from Springfield, Illinois. Delayed by a series of mishaps, they spent the winter of 1846–47 snowbound in the Sierra Nevada. Some of the emigrants resorted to cannibalism to survive, eating those who had succumbed to starvation and sickness.The journey west usually took between four and six months, but the Donner Party was slowed by following a new route called the Hastings Cutoff, which crossed Utah's Wasatch Mountains and Great Salt Lake Desert. The rugged terrain and difficulties later encountered while traveling along the Humboldt River, in present-day Nevada, resulted in the loss of many cattle and wagons and contributed to divisions within the group. By the beginning of November 1846 the group had reached the Sierra Nevada where they became trapped by an early, heavy snowfall near Truckee (now Donner) Lake, high in the mountains. Their food supplies ran low and in mid-December some of the group set out on foot to obtain help. Rescuers from Sacramento, California, attempted to reach the emigrants, but the first relief party did not arrive until the middle of February 1847, almost four months after the wagon train became trapped. Forty-eight of the 87 members of the party survived to reach Sacramento.


Georgia Donner, Eliza Donner, and Mary Brunner in 1850, survivors of the Donner Party

James and Margaret Reed, survivors of the Donner Party