Brief by Central Staff
Colorado History – September 2002 – Colorado Central Magazine
While the prospectors were stranded and starving near Lake San Christobal in early 1874, did Alfred Packer murder his five companions so that he could eat their flesh?
Or was he telling the truth when he said that while he was out hunting, Shannon Bell had butchered the others for meat? Packer confessed to killing Bell, but in self-defense, and to eating human flesh afterward, since they were already dead, there was no game, and the snow was too deep for him to travel.
Those questions have come up ever since Packer went to jail in Saguache, then escaped, was captured nine years later, and was tried twice. At the first trial, he was found guilty of murder, but that was overturned on a technicality. At the second trial, he was found guilty on five counts of manslaughter.
And the trials have continued ever since, long after Packer’s death in 1907. Now there’s some new evidence, based on modern forensic analysis of the victims’ bones, and it may come up at the next Packer trial.
It will be held in Littleton, where Packer is buried, and it starts at 9 a.m. on Saturday, Sept. 14, at the Little Town Hall Center at 2450 Main St.
This trial, like one in Leadville in 1995, is partly a production of the Colorado History Group, and will include some of the same participants, among them Patricia Nelson Limerick, Tom Noel, and Walter Gerash.
The day also includes two meals, a walking tour of historic downtown Littleton, a visit to Packer’s grave, and a reception at the Littleton Historical Museum.
For more information, visit www.coloradowebsites.com/dr-colorado/calendar, or call 303-795-3950.
Cost is $50 per person (students with ID are $30, and attorneys are $60 apiece), to Historic Littleton Inc., P.O. Box 1004, Littleton CO 80160.