dead, the victims who already had perished!...

Seven of the fifteen got through to the Sacramento Valley, among
these the young girl, Mary Graves, described as "a very beautiful
girl, of tall and slender build, and, exceptionally graceful
character." The story brought out by these survivors of the first
party to cross the Sierras from the starving camp set all
California aflame. There were no less than three relief
expeditions formed, which at varying dates crossed the mountains
to the east. Some men crossed the snow belt five times in all.
The rescuers were often in as much danger as the victims they
sought to save.

And they could not save them. Back there in their tents and
hovels around Donner Lake starvation was doing its work steadily.
There is contemporary history also covering the details of this.
Tamsen Donner, heroine that she was, kept a diary which would
have been valuable for us, but this was lost along with her
paintings and her botanical collections. The best preserved diary
is that of Patrick Breen, done in simple and matter-of-fact
fashion throughout most of the starving winter. Thus:

"Dec. 17. Pleasant; William Murphy returned from the mountain
party last evening; Baylis Williams died night before last;
Milton and Noah started for Donner's eight days ago; not returned
yet; think they are lost in the snow.

"Dec. 21. Milton got back last night from Donner's camp. Sad
news; Jacob Donner, Samuel Shoemaker, Rhineheart, and Smith are
dead; the rest of them in a low situation; snowed all night, with