This episode contains discussions of racism, starvation, cannibalism, and death, in some cases involving children.

If this isn't something you want to hear about, this may be a good episode to skip.

I also recommend listening to Part 1 and 2 before moving onto this, Part 3, as some details from previous parts will factor

in some of the decisions made in part three.

Humans are fascinated by gore and violence, but even more so the mysterious and unsolved.

Interest in these disturbing and unpleasant subjects is called morbid curiosity, and it has gripped hundreds of people throughout the ages.

I am one of those people. My name is Hallie,

and this is the Morbid Curiosity podcast. Oh, I'm a poor, wayfaring stranger traveling through Wayfair and stranger Traveling through

this world below

There is no sickness, toil, nor danger in that bright land, to which I go.

In the previous parts of this episode, we covered the westward journey of the Donner-slash-Reed

party, who were traveling by wagon train in 1846 from Springfield, Illinois, towards Sacramento,

California. They broke off from a larger caravan to take a shortcut across the Great Salt Lake Desert,

called the Hastings Cut-Off. The cut-off turned out to be

a disaster, and the party were nearly starved to death as they bushwhacked their way across the

Wasatch Mountains of Utah, slogged across the desert, and then struggled through the swamps

to rejoin the true California Trail. They made it to Truckee Meadows in the eastern foothills of the

sierras, but were marooned when an early snow hit, leaving drifts up to 10 feet or 3 meters on the

ground. They slaughtered their oxen, but food was still running low. Five people died just before Christmas.

Bayliss Williams, Jacob Donner, Samuel Shoemaker, Joseph Reinhart, and James Smith. In a desperate attempt to seek help,

15 of the healthiest members of the party set out to cross the Sierras on their own. Later known

as the Forlorn Hope Expedition, over half of the group died

...