A New Look at the Donner Party

ETTER FROM CALIFORNIA A New Look at the Donner Party The Native American perspective on a notorious chapter in American history is being reveaied by the excavation and study of a pioneer campsite ULIE M. SCHABLITSKY n late October 1846, an early Donner Party are remembered for out for CaUfornia from Springfield, snowstorm stranded 22 men, cannibalizing their dead in a lastrditch Missouri, in 1846. Hoping to make Iwomen, and chUdren in Alder effort to survive. the Sacramento VaUey by autumn, Creek meadow in CaUfornia's Sierra Almost 10 years ago, I arrived at they feU behind schediile after takr Nevada. The squaU came on so fierce- Alder Creek meadow, a few mues outr ing an untried shortcut through the ly and suddenly that the pioneers had side of Truckee, CaUfomia, with my Great Salt Lake Desert. When an just enough time to erect sleeping excavation codirector KeUy Dixon, of October snowstorm hit, the party was tents and a small structure of pine the University of Montana, and just 100 miles from their destination. trees covered with branches, quUts, a team of coUeagues to search Most of the migrants sought and the rubber coats off their backs. for archaeological evidence of shelter in cabins near Truckee Living conditions were crowded, and that miserable winter. The Lake (now Donner Lake), their wool and flannel clothes were story of the Donner Party is a while the famiUes of brothers useless against leaks and the damp famiUar tale, weU knovm from George and Jacob Donner, ground. As time passed, seasoned the accounts of survivors and their teamsters, and trail wood became so hard to find that rescuers. But, as in many cases, vndow Doris Wolfinger made the stranded pioneers, known as the archaeology provided a differ Donner Party, were often without fire ent perspective and forced us to In Alder Creek meadow for days. Huddled under makeshift reevaluate what we thought (top), archaeologists shelters, the migrants ate charred we knew about this dark chap- excavated many bones, bone and boiled hides until they ter in Westem history such as this horse bone with chop marks (left), that turned to more desperate measures The Donner Party was a wagon attest to the desperation of to survive. Today the people of the train of about 80 pioneers who set the hungry pioneers. www.archaeology.org 53 George Donner Jr. (far left), son of Jacob Donner, survived the winter of 1846-47, when he was just 10 years old. The Donners might have fared better had they accepted the help of the Washoe tribe, pictured here in 1866. 1980s and early 1990s. Using metal ter in the otherwise heroic tale of pio- detectors, he found a mid-nineteenth- neers who settled the American West. century site there, but was cautious I pictured hundreds of wagons, packed about declaring it the Donner camp ftdl of provisions, with calico-clad in the absence of human bones or any children bouncing along the Oregon remains of a campfire. Building off Trail to a better Ufe. Not unexpectedly his work, my research focused on the Van Pelt saw the story of the Don- layout of the camp, close study of the ners—and all westward expansion, for pioneers' fragmented belongings, and that matter—as a self-serving expedi- the decision to winter at Alder Creek. identifying evidence of cannibalism. tion for land and wealth. To him, their By the time the pioneers were One can imagine the morbid appeal troubles were symptomatic of greed foxind in late February 1847, half the of discovering human bones with rather than bad luck. members of the Donner Party had butchery marks among other, more Van Pelt urged me to seek out the died. Both survivor and rescue party genteel artifacts such as floral deco- welmelti, or the tribe now known as accounts note human bodies disar rated teacups, but I felt uncomfort^ the northern Washoe, to ask what ticulated and butchered. Survivor Jean able and even guilty about consider their oral history says of the Donners. Baptiste Tioideau, George Donner's ing the grim possibilities. "They were there, and probably saw hired hand, admitted to eating the Part of this anxiety comes from them," he said. Van Pelt also warned remains of his employer's fouryearold being a Generation X archaeolo- me against the negative energy that nephew. Even before the last survivor gist trained in the age of NAGPRA lingers in such places of suffering. He made it out of the mountains, the Cali- (Native American Graves Protection removed from his neck an elaborately fomia Star newspaper wrote, 'A woman and Repatriation Act), a federal law carved shell pendant given to him by sat by the body of her husband, who that protects Native American graves. a Florida shaman. On it, two animal had just died, eating out his tongue; Both the government and my men- spirits, called spilya ("coyote" in the the heart she had already taken out, tors taught me to avoid burial sites. Sahaptin language), danced, actively broiled, and eat fo'cl!" But as with Though I understood the legal and creating order from chaos. It would many tales of the "Wild West, there are logistical reasons for this, only when protect me through the turmoil of deeper and more complex truths to I began to work as a professional the Alder Creek dig. Van Pelt said. be found in the four months the Don- archaeologist did I appreciate the ners spent trapped. Our archaeological Native American perspective. My onths before arriving in investigations revealed the nuances work with Pacific Northwest tribes Califomia, I studied maps, of daily life, the party's mounting des- taught me a respect for their culture Mhistorical narratives, and peration, and, surprisingly that these that changed my approach to human the notes from earlier archaeological unfortunate migrants were not alone remains, regardless of ancestry So investigations. Hardesty had found in the motmtains. before digging at Alder Creek, I the eastern edge of the site, but not its turned to the person who taught me western extent, so we planned to move he approximate location of the most about Native American cul- from the known to the unknown. The the Dormer Party encamp- ture, Jeff Van Pelt, a member of the first shovelfuls of dry soil were sterile, Tment at Máer Creek has been Confederated Tribes of the UmatÜla but inches belovv; we began to find known since the late nineteenth cen- Indian Reservation in Oregon. glass shards, once part of beverage and tury, but the precise camp spot had Wan Pelt knows the story of the sauce bottles, mixed with fragments of never been pinpointed. Don Hard- Dormers, but he held a different vie-w^ decorated and blue sheU-edge teaware. esty an archaeologist and professor point than I did. From my European- We also discovered a particularly rivet^ emeritus at the University of Nevada, American perspective, the Dormers ing artifact—a small piece of writing Reno, searched for the site in the were an unfortunate, hard-luck chap- slate, possibly used by the Donner chil- 54 ARCHAEOLOGY • May/June 2012 UTE CULTURE & BEADING WORKSHOP With Rebecca Hammond Create your own work of beaded art. Learn how history has shaped Ute artistic expression. August 5-11,2012 A THOUSAND YEARS The archaeological team, co-led by the author (right), located the hearth the OF TAOS HISTORY Donners had used that notorious winter. Explore the archaeology, history, and cultures of the northern Rio dren or adults in camp to make notes, In addition to delicate ceramics— Grande vaiiey of New Mexico. figure math problems, practice letters, seemingly out of place in the wilder September 25- or just doodle. This nineteenth-century ness, but right in Une with a Donner October 1,2012 notepad may have helped the children campsite—the assemblage included pass the time, and perhaps even made wagon hardware, even horseshoe nails their situation feel a little more normal. and oxen shoes, clear evidence that Deeper in the soil, just below these the animals that pulled the pioneers more recently discarded objects, we into the meadow never left it. At last, ROW (ANYON i found Native American stone tools— we had found our long-term pioneer AR(HAEOLOCKAL (ENTER | large basalt flakes and bifaces that campsite, but we were still looking for Discover the Past, Share the Adventure ¡3 reminded us who was there first. evidence of starvation and despera- 800.422.8975 The soil that held pioneerera arti- tion. So we turned to the most abtan- www.crowcanyon.org/travel facts contained occasional pockets of dant artifact on the site, bone. ash and charcoal that gave me hope The dig crew picked out thousands that an elusive Donner hearth might of tiny calcined (burned) bone frag- be near. As our team pushed south ments from the site. Whenever we through the site, the soil became found a "big" bone—a piece at least STOP! more ashy, and larger pebbles and the size of a thumbnail—I handed it pieces of lead shot appeared. My over to our faunal analyst, Guy Tasa of We have had complaints from trowel followed the edge of a dark the Washington State Department of subscribers who have received charcoal stain vnth a thin layer of Archaeology and Historic Preserva- fraudulent renewal notices, sub- ash: the hearth. Shannon Novak of tion. I waited for each of his verdicts scription offers, and invoices Syracuse University, one of the team's as he turned the bones around in his from companies who are bioarchaeologists, knelt beside me hand a few times, but all he ever said NOT authorized agents or was, "Medium to large mammal." This representatives of ARCHAEOLOGY with a whisk broom, further delineate magazine or the Archaeological ing the feature.

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