Each succeeding party actuated by like anxieties and precautions,
departed with its charges, leaving pitiable destitution behind; leaving
mournful conditions in camp,--conditions attributable as much to the
work of time and atmospheric agencies as to the deplorable expedients
to which the starving were again and again reduced.
With trembling hand Georgia turned the pages, from the sickening
details of the _Star_[18] to the personal observations of Edwin Bryant,
who in returning to the United States in the Summer of 1847, crossed
the Sierra Nevadas with General Kearney and escort, reached the lake
cabins June 22, and wrote as follows:
A halt was called for the purpose of interring the remains. Near the
principal lake cabin I saw two bodies entire, except the abdomens
had been cut open and entrails extracted. Their flesh had been
either wasted by famine or evaporated by exposure to dry
atmosphere, and presented the appearance of mummies. Strewn around
the cabins were dislocated and broken skulls (in some instances
sawed asunder with care for the purpose of extracting the brains).
Human skeletons, in short, in every variety of mutilation. A more
appalling spectacle I never witnessed. The remains were, by order of
General Kearney, collected and buried under supervision of Major
Sword. They were interred in a pit dug in the centre of one of the
cabins for a cache.
Pages:
288
289
290
291
292
293
294
295
296
297
298
299
300
301
302
303
304
305
306
307
308
309
310
311
312