News this week about the Donner party to California, as reported by CNN, “Research: Donners didn’t resort to cannibalism” alleges that the Donners themselves did not resort to cannibalism during their fateful trip to the “Promised Land” of California, based on the fact that there were no burnt human bones found at the Alder Creek site where they camped.
However if you read the letters of Virginia E. B. Reed, one of the survivors, she clearly states in her letter of May 16th 1847 to her cousin Mary, “…thank the Good god we have all got throw [sic. ‘through’] and the onely [sic. ‘only’] family that did not eat human flesh…”
So it would appear that someone was eating human flesh. And if Virginia is correct, and the Reeds where the only family not to eat human flesh, then clearly the Donners did.