March 13: Alferd Packer is Arrested in Wyoming

March 13: Alferd Packer is Arrested in Wyoming

In 1883, Alferd Packer was arrested at a boardinghouse in LaPrele Creek, Wyoming. Alferd had been on the lam for nearly 10 years following a fateful winter, during which he and five others resumed a dangerous trek that had begun in Provo, Utah, and stalled near Montrose, Colorado. The men were on their way to the gold rush in Breckenridge.

The group got caught in a blizzard. Packer originally did not come clean regarding the incident, claiming he got separated from the other men while searching for food. Several months later, he blamed the weather as the culprit and that the other men were guilty of cannibalism. He also confessed to killing one of the men in self-defense.  After escaping, and spending several years eluding captivity, his second confession stuck to self-defense and a refusal to live off the flesh of men.

After being released following grassroots efforts by his supporters, he actually became a vegetarian and made his living selling autographed photos of himself and is interestingly honored throughout the state to this day.

2014 saw the First Annual Alferd Packer Festival in Saguache, Colorado, near where the bodies of the men were found. Their silent auction raises funds for Domestic Violence.

Recently, Packer’s original prison record from the Canon City State Penitentiary was auctioned off to the tune of $2,000. You can get a close view here.

You can bid on the Anaconda Mine Placer Claim, a piece of land that Packer may have traveled across.

You could also get an inspired cookbook so you don’t end up like our friend, Packer.