The Expedition of the Donner Party and Its Tragic Fate

The Expedition of the Donner Party and Its Tragic Fate
ISBN-10
1414292481
ISBN-13
9781414292489
Series
The Expedition of the Donner Party and Its Tragic Fate
Category
History / Americas (North, Central, South, West Indies)
Pages
374
Language
English
Published
1911
Publisher
A.C. McClurg & Company
Author
Eliza Poor Donner Houghton

Description

Eliza Houghton (b. 1843) was the youngest child of George Donner, one of two Springfield, Illinois, brothers who organized the ill-fated California-bound emigrant party that bore their name. Eliza and her older sisters were rescued by relief parties that made their way to the stranded travellers at Donner Lake, but their parents perished, and the girls were left to make their way alone in the West. The expedition of the Donner party and its tragic fate (1911) begins with Mrs. Houghton's account of her childhood and the family's tragic overland journey, and rescue. She continues with her life as an orphan, first at Fort Sutter, and then with a family in Sonoma and with her older half-sister in Sacramento. She describes the impact of the gold rush and new immigration on the area, farm work and domestic work, and her own education in public schools and St. Catherine's Convent in Benicia. She writes at length of the emotional scars caused by contemporary rumors of cannibalism among the Donner Party and offers full accounts of Donner family history as well as the background of her husband, Samuel Houghton. An appendix contains several documentary sources for the history of the Donner Party.

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