Just Creepy: Scary Stories - 3 True Scary Hitchhiking & Wilderness Stories

Episode Date: July 29, 2024

These are 3 True Scary Hitchhiking & Wilderness Stories Linktree: https://linktr.ee/its_just_creepy Story Credits: ►Sent in to https://www.justcreepy.net/ Timestamps: 00:00 Into 00:00:18 Story 1 00:10:31 Story 2 00:32:58 Story 3 Music by: 'Decoherence' by Scott Buckley - released under CC-BY 4.0. www.scottbuckley.com.au https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wM_AjpJL5I4&t=0s Business inquiries: ►[e-mail] #scarystories #horrorstories 💀As always, thanks for watching! 💀

I once picked up a hitchhiker during my college years, and it turned out to be one of the weirdest days of my life. I was born and raised in the same town for 19 years, and only moved away for college to the big city, about an hour and 20 minutes away. After completing my freshman year, I packed up my dorm and hit the road for home, where I planned to spend the next couple of months relaxing and maybe working before the next semester began in the fall. The highway stretched out before me like a familiar friend, its twists and turns etched into my memory like a well-worn map. I had driven this route countless times, from my hometown to the city and back again, the miles blurring together like a well-rehearsed script. But on this particular trip, something different stood out, a lone figure standing on the side of the road, thumb outstretched in a futile bid for attention. He was almost standing on his tippy toes. really waving that arm out into the road.

I had never seen anything like it, so I figured it was just his method of waving down a car. At first I thought nothing of it, assuming he was another hapless soul trying his luck on the busy highway. But as I drew closer, something about the guy's demeanor struck a cord with me. He looked lost,

not just stranded but genuinely adrift, like a ship without an anchor or rudder. His clothes were clean, if not a little rumbled. and his eyes held a hint of desperation that tugged at my sympathies. He couldn't have been much older than me, and for a moment I envisioned myself out there, desperate in the sun, hoping a kind soul might stop,

even just for a second. Before I knew it, I was pulling over, tires crunching on the gravel shoulder. The hitchhiker's eyes lit up with gratitude as he approached my window. As he got closer, I could start to see some finer details, young, right around my age.

very clean as if he had showered that morning, but also very fidgety. Something was a little off about his demeanor. Hey, thanks for stopping, man, he said, his voice laced with relief. I'm just trying to get to the next town over. Had this stupid fight with my girlfriend. I need to get home before she, well, before she does something stupid. I raised an eyebrow, intrigued despite myself. Sorry to hear that, I said, trying to sound non-committal,

but I guess I am headed that way, so I can. give you a lift. His face relaxed into a grateful smile. Thank you, man. I owe you one. As he climbed into the passenger seat, I couldn't help but notice the faint scent of sweat and anxiety clinging to him like a shroud. His eyes darted around my car, taking in the familiar surroundings with a mixture of curiosity and unease. He looked like an animal caught in a trap or something. I didn't really know what to make of it. So, uh, what What's your name? I asked, trying to break the tension. John, he replied, his voice a little hesitant.

And you are? I gave him my name, and that seemed to put him at ease, at least a little bit. As we pulled back onto the highway, the silence between us grew thick and heavy, like a fog that refused to lift. I glanced over at John. His eyes fixed on the road ahead. His jaw clenched in a tight line. Something about this guy just didn't add up,

but I quickly pushed that thought aside. It's the worst thing that could happen, right? It's only an hour away. So what happened with your girlfriend? I asked. John just looked over at me with pure disdain. It's not really any of your business, he said back. I nodded and bit my lip, already feeling like this was a huge mistake.

Why the hell did I bother to pick him up anyway? I was a young man with relatively new-age ideals, and I thought I was doing a service for, my fellow man by just giving him a ride. Looking back, it was stupid because I know I only picked him up because he was young, figuring young people were safer. The reality was, there was no one more dangerous or unpredictable than some 19- or 20-year-old kid. We wrote in silence for a bit. I felt put off, like I had lost control of the interior of my own car. I felt like I was being held hostage by this guy's weird, brooding presence. So I did the one thing I was good at.

I kept talking. So, uh, your girlfriend, what's she going to do if she beats you home? John scoffed and shook his head. What won't she do, crazy lady? He said, looking out the window. She'll flip the whole place upside down, steal all my crap, even the dog, and then break anything she doesn't see as valuable enough to take. Damn, was all I could say.

Yeah, so if you could hurry the hell up, that'd be great, John said, a little louder than necessary. I settled into my seat, rolled my new problem around in my head, and wondered how the hell I was going to deal with all this. There was probably no way to get him out of the car now that he was inside it, and it's not like I could call the cops to my car out here in the middle of nowhere over a person I voluntarily allowed to get in my vehicle. I had very limited options to deal with this crap, but I fancied myself a college student, a pretty smart guy, so I resolved just to figure it all out as I punched the gas pedal, cruising from 65 to 75. The answer hit me.

Do exactly as he said. Just hurry up. We were already 15 minutes into the drive, well outside city limits, with less than half an hour of driving left. I dropped him off the second we hit town and called it a wash. No harm, no foul. As I started hauling ass, he got a bit more normal. It was almost like I was on his level now. We started talking a little bit.

He told me that he and his girlfriend were from Washington or somewhere far away but had been scoping out my state to see if they'd enjoy living here. They were staying with John's cousin in some small town out near where my hometown was while checking out the neighborhoods in the city. They had their disagreement. John's girlfriend left him on the side of the road. He walked to the edge of the city where the heat and nothingness took over, jammed his thumb out, and that's where I found him. I pressed a little further for some juicier details, as I could tell this guy was a chronic jerk, wondering if he had done something to warrant being left behind. Sure enough, he totally copped to it.

He said that while they were looking around at houses, they ran out of drugs, meth, I would assume, and she had a desire to re-up the supply. John wanted to keep looking at houses, still riding his high, and that's when it all started. Within an hour, they were having a shouting match, and apparently John slapped his girlfriend around a bit because she knew what she was saying.

It was really unclear, kind of very vague, but the gist was that John claimed his girlfriend had some secret way of talking crap to him because it was so hurtful he had a good reason to put hands on her. It was some of the most craziest stuff I'd ever heard. The guy sitting next to me was like Joe Cool, literally bragging about smacking around a girl. I suddenly felt very guilty for bringing him closer to her at all.

Still, I ponied up at a cool, 80 miles per hour, rocketing to my hometown and hopefully away from this crazy situation. I didn't do much more talking those last 20 miles, just gripping and ripping the wheel as fast as my car could allow. I was going so fast that John was literally sliding around in the seat, gripping the handle above his head. We blew into town, and I drove to the first place I could think of, the local police department. It was an old brick building on the corner of Main Street, very inconspicuous. So I'd just talked a bit to distract John as I pulled in. I shifted into reverse and quickly gestured to

the building. Here you are, I said. The hell is this? He asked me. I thought you said you'd take me to my house. This isn't even the right town. Sorry, man, this is where I live. So it's as far as I'm going to go. I figure you might be able to get a ride or use a phone here. The hell, is this even a police station, he questioned. I nodded. I am not getting out of the car, he said with a smile. No way. Okay, fair enough. I wouldn't either if I was a woman beater piece of crap, I said, adrenaline in my voice, chest pumping hard. I'd never spoken to a stranger this way and honestly thought it was going to come to blows. What is that, what this is about, he questioned. I told you to mind your business. I am minding my business. Now get the hell out of

my car, I demanded. John nodded and looked around for an option of any kind. All he found was the door handle. You're lucky, you're smart too. If you pulled this crap anywhere outside of town, I'd saw your head off and steal your car, he said with a smile. It's what I did to the last guy. At this point, my legs were shaking. He was out of the car, so I wanted to quickly create that distance. I looked behind him at the police station, doing something of a pump fake to make him think that there were cops coming up behind us. It totally worked. He whirled around, and I punched the gas, backed up, and rolled onto the street,

not even checking for traffic behind me. I drove off, did circles through town for a bit, just to make sure there was no chance this guy saw the direction I went home in. He didn't really tell me or do anything crazy after that. He was in a police parking lot after all. He just stared me down, and that was the last time I ever saw him. The weirdest part of it all to me

was that he didn't look or even really act like a drug addict. He could have passed for a totally normal guy, totally sober. It probably helped him when he needed to lie about whacking his girlfriend around. I honestly hope that jerk never made it home. Yamava Resort and Casino at San Manuel

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I spent 16 years in the Marine Corps, and when I got out around the 2017 holiday period, I felt kind of lost. I drove Uber for a while, helped an old platoon mate get his landscaping business up and running, and then dipped my toe into celebrity bodyguarding. But if working those jobs taught me anything, It's that I'm just not a people person. Working with Marines is different. There was structure to it, discipline,

and no offense to the general civilian population, but y'all are animals, not that Marines aren't. But driving people around, dealing with paparazzi, and having suburban housewives demand more respect than most Marine Corps officers, was a whole other level of ass pain. It got to the point where I was seriously considering moving into private security. which was something I promised myself I'd never get into. But then, funnily enough, the ex-marine I spoke to,

who had a link to the industry, ended up suggesting something completely different. Once I heard it, I couldn't keep my mind off it. He said he knew a guy that had been in a similar situation, needed to transition back to civilian life, but more conventional jobs just weren't clicking for him. The guy worked a ton of different jobs, hated every one of them,

then almost at random, he decided to try being a wilderness guide for a little while. That was four years ago. His buddy had been a guide ever since, up near Marble Mountain, and said it was the best decision he ever made. I asked the ex-Marine guy a whole bunch of questions about it, and he told me what he knew. He said his buddy basically worked for himself, set his own hours, and had the freedom to pick his own clients.

Then all he did for a living was hike with folks, camp with them, and impart all the survival skills he'd learned in the military in the process. People paid him handsomely, too. It wasn't just some minimum wage thing. I guess his veteran status helped him out in that respect, but he was making great money all the same. We talked about the whole private security thing too, but after we went our separate ways,

it was the wilderness guide thing that really stuck in my mind. About three months later, I was driving up to Fresno for a job interview at a small veteran-owned wilderness tours company. The interview went great. I impressed the boss enough to get me hired, and I've been at that place ever since. I guess the reason I'm telling you all of this

is because I thought working up in Fresno would be the beginning of my quiet and peaceful life as a civilian. I'd done two tours in Iraq, one tour in Afghanistan, saw my fair share of casualties, and lost count of the number of times I've been shot at. I'll always be a Marine, but I was happy not to be.

have that life anymore. I didn't want the violence, the craziness, or the danger. But in taking one particular job at this wilderness guiding company, I somehow ended up having a brush with something far stranger and far more frightening than anything I ever came across in the Marine Corps. It all started when my boss got a call from a solo hiker that will just call Chuck. Chuck wasn't the guy's name, but for a whole bunch of reasons, internet crazies being just one. I'm going to change the names of some people and places to protect the affected. Chuck wanted to hire a wilderness guide to take him to a certain hilltop out in one of the forests east of Fresno. He wanted to hike out there, camp overnight, and then head back the way he came. The easiest route to the place was about 18 miles

off road, and since Chuck wasn't an experienced hiker, I figured we could do around nine miles the first day, then make camp, then walk the other nine miles the next day before getting to the place he actually wanted to camp. He was in his mid-30s, wiry, and not the most athletic of people. So when we met for the first time to walk him through the journey we'd laid out for him, I knew that I'd made the right decision to take it easy on him. We'd be gone for three nights. We'd provide everything he needed in terms of food, water, and equipment. All he needed to do was show up in suitable clothing, and we'd take care of everything else. That first meeting was a Tuesday afternoon. and it was an important one too because if either of us decided that we wouldn't be comfortable guiding someone into the wilderness, then the hike was a no-go.

We never took anyone we figured would be in danger to themselves while out in the wilderness, not just because we were afraid of lawsuits, but because it's straight up irresponsible. But then, when Chuck stopped by the little strip mall office that we were operating out of, he seemed fine. He paid attention during the briefing, respected the fact that I had the final say when he had the final say when he was operating. came to keeping him safe, and was polite and well-spoken while he agreed to our other terms, too. There wasn't a single warning sign that gave us any indication of what might happen, or what he might do. And so that Friday morning, I met Chuck at the office, and we drove down towards our line of departure together in my truck. We set off just after 6.30 in the morning, so neither of us were in the mood for talking on the drive out to the park. But after we got going on the

hike, we got into a little small talk. Chuck asked about my time in the Marine Corps, and I told him a story or two, PG, 13 of course, so as not to freak him out or anything. After that, I asked what Chuck did, and he told me that he was some kind of professor, not the teaching kind, though. He was like the researching kind at a university. He told me he specialized in physics, but I'll be damned if I could tell you exactly what he said. It was something like something, something theory. and I actually laughed out loud when he asked if I'd heard of it or not. He didn't figure I had, but he asked all the same. Then he gave me a little breakdown of the kinds of things he researched.

Again, I can't say that I could ever recall any of it. It all sounded like mumbo-jumbo to me, but you could tell that he was a seriously intelligent dude, and that the work that he did was pretty important. Not long after, we got onto why he wanted to go out onto this particular hilltop. and for the sake of ease I'll just call it Beartooth Mountain. Generally speaking, we didn't ask exactly why people wanted to visit this or that mountain, because the answer was usually a variation on.

We heard it's got nice views. Beartooth was no different. It had awesome views and was definitely much easier to get to than most other peaks. But I guess I just found myself curious if it had some kind of deeper significance to him. I feel like Chuck was open and honest with me right up until we hit that. point of the conversation because for the first time I felt like his answer was a little dodgy. He said an uncle used to take him camping out that way when he was a kid, which on the surface sounded like a good enough reason. But if that was me, and I wanted to take my little nephew

somewhere camping to introduce him to the great outdoors, Beartooth Mountain is so isolated and such a tough hike that it's just about one of the last places I'd think to take him. Between Stanislaus, Yosemite, Sierra, and Sequoia, the parks and forests around Fresno got to be home to at least a thousand different campgrounds, most of which are very family-friendly. So for the guy's uncle to march him all the way out to Beartooth, I figured that he was either ex-military or verging on abusive. But no, they got along great, and he wasn't any sort of veteran. Chuck just said that he and his family enjoyed the outdoors. Enjoying the outdoors is one thing, but making your kids march out into the deep woods over difficult terrain. That's like survivalist level kind of stuff.

And like I said, Chuck didn't strike me as any survivalist. But you see, while I might have been thinking all of that, I'm not dumb or rude enough to just come out and say it. If a client doesn't want me to know why they want to go someplace, and they decide to make something up on the fly to protect their privacy while remaining polite, then what kind of jerk would that make me to go and pry any further? So the way it went was more like him saying the thing about his uncle, me just being like,

cool, all right, and then the topic of conversation just kind of naturally flowed onto other things. Chuck was pretty good company, actually, at least for that first day and night anyway. Like I said earlier, he definitely wasn't used to the physical strain of hiking long distances, but he showed a heck of a lot of character, At times, I was in no doubt that we'd hit our nine-mile goal by day's end, and when we did,

he was about ready to sleep standing up and was snoring by 9.30, and that was fine by me. I'd rather get an early night than stay up talking or drinking like some clients want to, and end up paying for it in the morning. So after dousing the fire and setting up a few bear alarms, I decided to get myself an early night too, thinking that the next day was going to be some more relaxed hiking. But I could not have been more wrong. The next morning Chuck was awake and ready to roll before I was, which was great. And as the day went on, he seemed to get more and more keyed up the closer we got to our destination.

He was like a kid in the back seat of a car on the way to Disney World, basically asking me, are we there yet? Every half hour or so. Until finally, we hit the crest of a hill, broke through some trees, and there she was, Beartooth Mountain. Like I said, I've switched. up some of the names here to save you any trouble. But Beartooth really did look like a big old bear's tooth, just this badass-looking mountain with a sharply curved rocky peak. It's pretty

common for clients to get excited about arriving at their destination, and if Chuck's story was true, then I understand why he was psyched to be reunited with a place that had all kinds of nostalgia about it for him. But to me that's not how he acted. It was more like a religious thing, like how I imagine a person would act if they saw something sacred. I kind of feel like if that was me I'd have done a little vocal reminiscing or something, you know? Like, I remember this one time Uncle Bob said X, or this reminds me when Uncle Bob did Y. But that whole time, Chucky never once brought up any kind of memory or story from his childhood. I was so curious at that period that I even asked him if any memorable trips came to mind, or if he had any particular treasured memories or anything

like that, not in a confrontational way, just, you know, making conversation. He gave me some wishy-washy answers like, oh, I guess it just feels good to be back, but by then I could tell something was kind of off, not so off I wanted to turn around or anything. Like I said earlier, a client is entitled to their privacy, you know? I just hope that things wouldn't get any weirder. But boy, they did. I figured Chuck might have a particular place that he wanted to camp, so on the approach, I asked him if he had any place in mind. It turns out he did have a place in mind, a very specific place, and to find it, he pulled out a laminated computer printout that had a bunch of notes written on it in Sharpie. I could read maps well enough to know that I was looking

at Beartooth Mountain and the surrounding area, but then I had no idea what all the notes and stuff said. Some of it looked kind of like math. Other parts looked like some kind of shorthand. And before I could ask what any of it meant, Chuck pointed to a spot on the map that had a colored dot on it. There was a bunch of these colored dots all over the map, maybe 10 or 12 of them, all spread out about a mile or two apart.

But Chuck pointed to just one and said that he wanted to camp somewhere around there. I told him I could take him to any spot he wanted, give or take about 50 yards. But I also wanted to know what all the colored dots meant. Chuck replied that they were all places he and his uncle used to camp back when he was a kid. And that was the point that I actually started buying into Chuck's story a little. I got an ex whose kid was real quiet and shy, but very organized and hyper-focused on whatever he was doing. I can't remember if there was a specific name for what he had, but I know that he was probably on the autism spectrum.

My point is, I figured Chuck might have been the same way, and that's why he seemed a little off. But once again, I was there in a professional capacity. So to get paid, I just had to get him to Beartooth and get him out again. If it wasn't impacting our safety, then it didn't really matter to me. So I got Chuck to the campsite he wanted, then after studying his map a little to make sure that we were in exactly the right place, we set up our tents, made a campfire, and then made dinner. Once he knew we were in the right place, whatever the hell that meant. Chuck seemed to calm down a little bit. But unlike the first night, when he crashed almost straight after dinner, he was still up around sunset when I myself was starting to get drowsy. We just talked till

then, and not about anything in particular either, just this and that. And like I said, he seemed chilled out again. Nothing he did or said gave me any cause for concern. I felt like a new stepdad or something, telling him not to stay up too late, but he said he wanted to enjoy the night's sky a little and wouldn't be too tired come sun up. I said all right, climbed into my tent and then went to sleep. A couple of hours later, I woke up to hear the sound of a tent unzipping. I remember sitting up just to make sure that it wasn't my own tent being unzipped, and then realized that the noise must have been coming from chucks. Now I cannot over-emphasize how common it is for dudes to wake up in the middle of the night and need to take a leak. So 99 times out of

100, hearing someone's tent opening up after dark, is no reason to be concerned. But even so, I called out to Chuck to see if all was good, and he replied that he was fine before saying, Thanks, man, I know this might sound kind of cheesy or whatever, but... The way he said it, it sounded real heartfelt, you know, like he really appreciated me looking out for him like that. I was half asleep at the time, so I just told him, No problem, buddy, and then went back to sleep, thinking it was nothing more than what it was. Nowadays I think he was thanking me for a whole lot more. The next morning, I woke up, put my boots on,

and then the first thing I always do each morning when I'm on a trip like that is check on the client. I never just stick my head into their tent or anything, and I don't unzip their tent if it's zipped up neither. I'll just stand outside, gently trying to wake them up. I called Chuck's name once, twice, then three times, and nothing even moves inside the tent. At that point, I'm starting to worry that Chuck has had some kind of medical emergency, so I kneel down, unzip his tent, and open up the flap to find that it's empty. I'm still trying to rationalize things, so I assume Chuck has gone for a walk or something.

I don't see any boots, so I'm assuming that he's wearing them, and that he's off taking an early morning whiz or something. So off I go, searching for Chuck, having to kind of mentally talk myself out of a panic. I circled the camp, calling out his name, but Chuck's nowhere to be found. So I walk a larger circle, calling out a little louder, and that panicked feeling is coming back as more and more time goes by. I keep walking that loop, mentally preparing myself for some kind of emergency, when something catches my eye. And at first, I couldn't quite believe what I was seeing, or actually, it was more like I didn't want to believe it. Between these two trees, about 50 yards down the slope,

was a pile of clothes, and it looked like they were sitting on a pair of boots, too. As you can imagine, my first thought that goes through my mind is, Chuck's gone nuts, stripped naked, and then walked off into the woods, which was not something I wanted to have to deal with. Someone going missing. That's bad, really bad. Someone going missing after taking off all of their clothes. I think we can agree that that's a whole other level of crap hitting the fan. So right after I see the clothes, and I'm 100% sure they're chucks, I start off on emergency procedures. So that's call the Rangers, call my boss, call everyone I possibly can, then get a head start on searching for our client. Situations like that are always time-critical, but then my situation was even more so,

for obvious reasons. So I went running back to where Chuck's clothes were and started looking for any signs of a trail. Now, here's where I'll admit that I've never been much of a tracker, so all I really did was walk off in the direction I figured he might have gone. But I didn't find anything but empty woods. I had to wait until the rangers showed up before we could cover any real ground. Then, by the time the cops and the search and rescue folks arrived, there was no reason for me to be there anymore. Once I'd given an officer a statement, I felt awful. Having a client go missing like that is the nightmare scenario for any wilderness guide. It's our one job to keep people safe, and when we fail at that one thing, it's like a punch

in the gut. I talked to my boss at length about the whole thing, and he gave me a week off to get my head straight. He was closing the office out of respect for Chuck's family, and since he was a big part of the volunteer search parties, there was only one other person to take on the workload. So better we just close and help out. I wanted to be there myself, but my boss, being the wise man that he is, told me it would be better if I stayed away and put my faith in the Rangers, the state S-A-R, and everyone else

they had out there looking for Chuck. I was just one. And what was one guy versus all kinds of helicopters, sniffer dogs, and specially trained trackers, who'd put even force recon guys to shame? I was told over and over again that it wasn't my fault, that I'd done everything right, and that I had nothing to feel guilty over. But then came the day when, even with the cops being so cool and respectful, I could tell people were starting to doubt my innocence.

The day the cops came to ask me a few questions, I figured it was just all follow-up stuff, or questions they hadn't thought to ask me yet, or whatever. But then there came a point during the questioning where I realized that I wasn't being looked upon as an innocent party anymore. I guess the detectives were just eliminating potential suspects, but it was pretty damn chilling, knowing that they were considering the possibility that it was me that was to blame for Chuck going missing. I actually said to them at one point, Look, I'm an open book, I got nothing to hide, and I'll come help with the search effort if you want me to.

They acted innocent, like they were only there to ask a few questions and nothing more. But I could tell that they were putting on the good cop routine, in hopes that I'd slip up and change. my story. That way, they could justify focusing on me as their number one suspect. I told my boss what was happening, or what I thought was happening, and he just told me to sit tight and ride it out. After that, I got pretty much all my info from him directly, and over the weeks that followed, this is what he told me. I was only completely eliminated as a suspect when the the cops found no DNA but chucks on his abandoned clothes, which suggested that he just got up in the early hours of the morning, walked down the hilltop a little, and then walked off

into the woods before taking off all of his clothes. The search and rescue tracker dogs followed his scent trail to a shallow stream, then lost it, suggesting that he washed himself in the water for some reason. Some suggested this was deliberate, as in he knew it would confuse the the tracker dogs when it came time to look for him. But that made it seem like Chuck was in his right mind when he was walking off through the woods without a stitch of clothing on him. And to the likes of me and my boss, Chuck must have totally lost his mind if he thought that he could do something like that and not be in real danger. I asked my boss if the cops must have known something that we didn't about Chuck's state of mind. He said he had no idea, that he'd been involved in a couple of

missing person cases before, and that Chuck's made no sense to him whatsoever. In the other two cases, the person was found safe and fine within 24 hours, and both involved were hikers who got a little too confident after wandering off the trails. People figured that the same thing would happen with Chuck, as without any suitable shoes. There's no way that he couldn't have gotten so far that the search teams wouldn't pick him up, but that's the thing. No one found a single trace of him anywhere in the surrounding area. area. It was like he just dropped off the face of the earth. After a few weeks, the search was

called off, and although California's Park Service promised that they'd continue to keep an eye out for him, people eventually just accepted that Chuck was gone. I tried to move on. I tried to just file it away with all the other bull crap I filed away over the years, but all the unanswered questions almost drove me crazy. I got a lot of closure with the stuff that I went through in the Marine Corps, least before I separated, the top brass were pouring a ton of money into counseling, psychologists, and all kinds of things to fix the mental wounds, and not just the physical ones. But that whole process of reconciling what's happened to you, that's all way easier when you have some actual answers.

X was in a certain place, and then Y happened, and Z was the result. But with the Chuck thing, nothing made sense. There were no answers. His disappearance was never solved, and thinking about it caused me a hell of a lot of grief for a long, long time. And on top of that, Chuck's not the only person to have gone missing in that area of the forest. There have been a bunch of unexplained disappearances in that area, and sometimes I can't help but wonder if they're somehow connected to Chuck's.

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Start selling on Deepop, where taste recognizes taste. On January 21st, 1842, James and Esther Packer welcomed the first of their three children into the world. He was born in Pennsylvania's Outer. Allegheny County, not far from the city of Pittsburgh, and they named him Alfred. When Alfred was around 10 years old, his father moved the family to Orange County, Indiana, where he found work as a cabinetmaker. Alfred was slow to adjust to the sudden relocation, struggled to find friends among the local children, and developed profound melancholy as a result.

Familial relationships became strained, and during his 16th or 17th year, Alfred left home in the middle of the night, leaving a note which read, Never Coming Back. He rode to Minnesota and worked as a shoemaker for a few years. But in April 1861, the eruption of the fiery civil war would forever alter Alfred's fate. He enlisted in the Union Army during April of the following year and was assigned to Company F of the 16th Infantry Regiment, but was eventually discharged after just two years of service following a diagnosis of epilepsy.

Alfred then traveled west in the hopes of finding his fortune and held a variety of jobs such as hunter, ranch hand, and wagon teamster. Yet, wherever he went, Alfred proved deeply unpopular with his co-workers, allegedly owing to his argumentative personality, his near-pathological lying, and his reputation for theft. By the time Alfred arrived in Utah territory, he'd discovered a profitable profession which suited his contempt for both authority and discipline, that of a wilderness guide. For thousands of years, certain individuals have specialized in guiding unwary travelers

across vast and perilous stretches of terrain, and such people were mentioned frequently during the earlier chapters of American history. For instance, Lewis and Clark's 1804 expedition through the American West relied heavily on the knowledge of a Shoshone woman named Sakagawiya, and the likes of Jim Bridger and Kit Carson made their names trading on their knowledge of the Western frontier. A generation later, migrants seeking to flee the aftermath of the Civil War found that skilled wilderness guides were essential to surviving the journey west, and as a result, a capable guide could expect to make vast amounts of money. Alfred rather fancied the idea of becoming a self-employed wilderness guide,

but in truth, he was a dangerously inept navigator. He drew the eye of many a dissatisfied customer and was responsible for at least two fully loaded wagon trains becoming lost on their way to Oregon. He was ignorant, obnoxious, and incompetent, yet the demand for wilderness guides was so high that despite his reputation, he continued to find paying work. One such group of potential employers was headed by a man named Robert McGrew, who intended to prospect for gold near a place called Breen Ridge, Colorado, in the winter of 1860. The party consisted of 20 men whose journey would take them from Utah's Salt Lake City to the San Juan Mountains, around 300 miles to the southeast. It would prove a hazardous journey, and the men were in dire need of a capable guide. So, once they reached Provo, a man named George T.R. was sent out to find one. He returned with a 23-year-old prospector who just so happened to know the route to Colorado like the back of his hand.

yet this prospector was none other than Alfred Packer. Packer was not 23 years old. He was actually 31 in November of 1873, and as previously stated, he was relentless in his fabrication. Although Packer had a small degree of mining experience, he was no prospector, nor had he ever been to the San Juan Mountains, but sensing the desperation of McGrew's party, he saw an opportunity to profit. Packer told them that for the price of $25, around $700 in today's money, he could lead them to the gold country south of the Colorado territory. The group accepted, and off they went. Almost immediately, Packer's incompetence became painfully obvious to McGrew and his companions. Those who made it to Colorado later said that Packer was not once, but twice, caught stealing rations from other travelers.

But since it appeared that his services were indispensable, he was shown mercy. each time. The group's slow progress also meant that by the time they reached the more hazardous sections of their route, they were beset by harsh winter weather. Heavy snow hid the path ahead, forcing the party to rely almost entirely on their compass for direction, and due to Packers' inexperience, it wasn't long before they became lost completely. When their rations ran out, the men ate horse feed. When the horse feed ran out, they ate their horses. But in the third week of January 1874, the party came across an isolated island of salvation in the form of a Native American encampment. Chief Ure, also known as the White Man's friend, made his winter encampment in the Uncompagre

Valley near modern-day Montrose. He was famous for his generosity to needy travelers, and supplied McGrew's party with food and lodgings, by which they could regain their strength for the journey to come. However, Chief O'Re strongly recommended that the party postponed their expedition until spring, since they were likely to encounter dangerous winter weather as they reached the San Juan Mountains. The natives knew that to undertake such a journey would be to risk certain death, and Chief O'Rei offered to shelter their party until early spring, whereupon they could continue their venture in relative safety. The party of 20 convened to discuss their options, but 11 of them refused to accept the chief's offer. In their view, delaying their expedition until early

spring would roll out the red carpet to other less risk-averse prospectors. Delay their journey, and they miss out on the lion's share of the gold. A few days following his arrival at Chief Orey's camp, Robert McGrue approached him with their final decision. 11 of them would continue on towards the Los Pinos Indian agency, which was the closest outpost to the camp, and proceed onward to Breen Ridge from there. Chief Ure stated that he respected the party's courage and provided them with food for their journey, as well as safe directions to bypass the mountains. However, just hours into their journey, Alfred Packer announced that he had a better idea. Instead of bypassing the mountains by way of Indian territory, Packer proposed the group

take a much more direct route through the mountains. Obviously, most of the party understood Packer was an incompetent navigator, but at this juncture, it seems their desire for enrichment outweighed any kind of common sense. Five of the party continued along the safer route, but six others, Packer included, decided to risk the snowy passes of the San Juan Mountains. Aside from Packer himself, the group consisted of Shannon Wilson Bell, James Humphrey, Frank Butcher Miller, George California Noon, and Israel Swan. and a handful of his loyalists proceeded to aid Packers' group in their initial departure, but once the snows grew too deep for heavily laden packhorses, they unloaded Packers' supplies,

and then headed back to Chief Ure's encampment. Packer and his party then continued along the Gunnison River and began climbing the higher paths which led into the mountains, but this, as many have reasoned, was pure insanity. The men had less than two weeks rations, no snow shoes, no flint to light a fire. and wore clothing that was thoroughly unsuited to the intense Colorado winter. Finally, on April 16, 1874, a full 65 days following the departure of Packers' party, a lone figure stumbled out of the woods near modern-day Saguace, Colorado. As they sat eating breakfast, a group of Ute tribesmen spotted the man limping towards them.

He carried with him a rifle, a knife, a steel coffee pot, and a satchel. When they rode out to meet him, they found a man on the verge of total starvation. It was Alfred Packer, who had somehow survived the journey into the mountains. The men sat him down at the table and gave him some food, but upon attempting to chew and swallow it, Packer promptly vomited. The tribesman feared that Packer was ill with some kind of infectious disease, but he assured them that his condition was the result of prolonged starvation and that he was of no danger.

The tribesman then asked Packer what had happened to lead him to starvation, and this is what he told them. Packer explained that he had been hired by five prospectors to guide them to Breckenridge. However, during the course of their journey, he began to suffer a terrible bout of snow blindness and began to lag behind. Packer then claimed that when it was clear that he could not continue, his employers abandoned him, leaving him with nothing but a rifle, a few rounds of ammunition, and two cans of preserves. From then on, he had been forced to find his way back to civilization alone, and after exhausting his meager rations, had eaten roots, rosebuds, and even the leather of his

own shoes, to escape death by starvation. It made for one hell of a story, and most who heard it displayed a great deal of sympathy for the haggard-looking wanderer. Yet to other more senior members of the tribe, Packer's story did not match his condition. Packer had not been the first unwise traveler to have erred under the might of the Colorado winter, but others who'd emerged from the forests of the San Juan foothills had been so malnourished, they appeared skeletal. Alfred Packer, on the other hand, looked relatively healthy, and the bloating around his cheeks and chin suggested that he'd been binging on cheap whiskey. Under the assumption that Packer was dead broke, the Indian agency's Justice of the Peace purchased his Winchester rifle for the

generous price of $10. The filthy, pre-owned rifle could have been purchased for considerably less, but the money was partly intended to help poor Packer get back on his feet. Having seen enough horrors to last a lifetime, Packer claimed his days as a wilderness guide were over, and that he intended to return home to Pennsylvania. But upon his arrival in the nearby town of Saguace, Packer began a veritable spending spree. He purchased a horse for $70, spent $78 on whiskey and tobacco in Otomir's general store, then dropped $100 to book the finest hotel room at Dolan's saloon for the foreseeable future. The amount of money Packer spent is the equivalent of thousands upon thousands of dollars today, which raised the question. Just where

exactly did an apparently destitute man get so much money. Packer remained in Saguatch, spending like a sailor in Dolan's saloon until one day, three men walked through its swinging doors. Packer recognized them in an instant. It was Preston Nutter, one of the nine men who had chosen to winter at Chief Oray's camp rather than face certain death on the trail to the San Juan Mountains, and behind him stood two other members of Robert McGrew's original party. Nutter approached Packer at his table, and asked where the other members of his group were. Packer recounted his story of abandonment, but Nutter was skeptical. It would have been extremely unwise for men so unfamiliar with the region

to have abandoned their only guide, even if they did display signs of incompetence. Sure, the men had been foolhardy to try and brave the Colorado winter, but they were not insane. Nutter also found it odd that Packer was given one of only two rifles the group was in possession of, even though he was already armed with a revolver. Yet the final straw came when Nutter noticed a skinning knife hanging from Packer's belt. It was a knife belonging to a man named Frank Butcher Miller, one of the five party members that accompanied Packer on their final leg of the journey. When Nutter asked how Packer had come to be in possession of it,

he claimed that Miller had simply stuck it in a tree, then walked off without it. Packer then claimed that after asking Miller if he wanted the knife, he was told he could have it. But Nutter didn't believe a word. He'd spent enough time with Frank the butcher to know that he prided himself on his ability to cleanly and efficiently butcher an animal. He'd carried that same skinning knife with him on hundreds of hunts,

and to say it was a precious possession would be a major understatement. Nutter knew something was wrong, terribly wrong, and in the face of Packer's obvious deceptions, he became irate. He was said to have lunged at Packer, demanding he speak the truth, and since he was quite visibly the aggressor, He was tossed out of Dolans, then barred from entry until the week's end. Meanwhile, back in Colorado, the five-man splinter group who rode on towards the mountains rather than winter with Chief O'Re arrived at the Los Pinos Indian Agency.

They were greeted by the agency's administrator, General Charles Adams, who told them he'd already met with a man named Packer, who claimed to have been abandoned by his fellow travelers. Oliver Len Heiser, who headed the five-man group that did not contain Packer, claimed this was impossible. The prospectors Packer had been riding with were good, decent men, who would have never abandoned one of their number, no matter how much of a burden they were. Suspecting some kind of foul play, and knowing Packer to be a compulsive liar, Len Heiser convinced General Adams to have Packer arrested, but the general himself chose a far shrewder course of action. Adam sent a trio of soldiers out looking for Alfred Packer, but after finding him in Saguachi, they didn't simply put him in cuffs. The lead soldier initially consoled Packer regarding his recent tribulations

and complimented him on the survival skills it must have taken to make it down from the mountains alive. Packer was accustomed to such treatment by that point and welcomed it graciously. The soldier then informed Packer that they wished to hire him at a very generous rate to help recover the missing members of his party. Packer seemed reluctant at first, but following a reminder that proving his innocence to the authorities was a far superior option than vigilante townsfolk assuming his guilt,

he agreed to join the search party. When he arrived back at the agency, Packer was immediately brought before General Adams, who had allowed Len Heiser's party to witness his questioning. Adams demanded an explanation for the conflicting stories, but an indignant Packer repeated his claim that he'd been abandoned while snowblind and professed deep surprise upon learning his fellow travelers were missing. Adams then questioned him regarding his Saguace spending habits,

but Packer defended himself by claiming the money was a loan from a sympathetic citizen. Upon hearing this, General Adams dispatched another group of writers to Sagwachi, who learned that not only had Packer not received any loan, but he'd been spotted with several different wallets during his stay in town. Following the rider's return and confirmation that Packer was lying, General Adams and Len Heiser's party began discussing what should be done. Yet as they debated, the arrival of two Ute tribesmen prompted an uproar in the camp. The two tribesmen had been hunting just a few miles from the Indian agency,

and after reaching the crest of a hill had come across strips of dried human flesh they'd found lying on a rock, and nearby was the exact same trail Alfred Packer had used during his march for survival. When confronted with the strips of flesh, Packer appeared to break down completely and began begging General Adams for mercy. He then promised to make a full and frank confession. After reportedly stating, It would not be the first time that people have been obliged to eat each other when they were hungry. Packer claimed that after his party ran out of food,

they began, and I quote, eyeing each other in a most unsettling manner. A few days after this dreadful leering commenced, Packer claimed he left camp to gather dry firewood and returned to find four of his traveling companions, standing around the lifeless body of the fifth. Israel Swan, who was said to be the oldest of the five men, was killed instantly when he was struck from behind with a hatchet. In the process of dismembering Swan's body,

Packer claimed the group found several thousand in cash on his person, and after dividing the money between them, they began roasting and eating chunks of the dead man's flesh. The men ate well that night, so well that just two days later they were once again completely out of food and racked by ravenous hunger. They tried hunting and set snares for rabbits and other small game, but after fresh meat eluded them, a conspiracy was struck.

Since Frank Butcher Miller still had a great deal of fat on him, Packer claimed Shannon Bell, James Humphrey, and George Noon convinced him that it was the butcher's turn to be carved up. He too was murdered with a single hatchet blow to the skull, ambushed while stooping to pick up firewood. It was then that Alfred Packer acquired the butcher's skinning knife, fastening it to his belt before he feasted on its owner's still-warm cadaver. Packer then claimed that as the four remaining travelers pushed on towards Los Pinos, they became lost in a blizzard. Once again they became ravenously hungry, and this time it was James Humphrey's turn to be ambushed,

butchered, and consumed. Packer added that George Noon was murdered before Humphrey's corpse had even been stripped of all meat, and the killing was wanton. Now they had a taste for human flesh. Once the blizzard had cleared, Alfred Packer and Shannon Bell continued their journey towards Los Pinos. They agreed never to speak of their ghastly hunger, nor the manner in which it was sated. They would say that their companions died of exposure and that each was afforded a Christian burial. Packer also claimed that being the only two survivors of the five-man party,

he and Bell made a pact that neither man would murder or consume the other. According to Packer, it took just days for this pact to unravel. After three more days of trudging through the mountains, frost-bitten and exhausted, Packer claimed that he and Bell set up camp next to a lake near a large grove of hemlock tree. The two men managed to light a fire, but after a few hours of lying under their blankets and trying not to freeze, Shannon Bell went berserk. Packer claimed Bell threw off his blankets, screaming that he couldn't take it anymore. Then after snatching up his rifle, he lunged at Packer and attempted to bash in his skull. Packer described how he deflected the blow before striking

Bell in the head with the hatchet, then fearing that he might starve to death before reaching civilization. Packer cannibalized Bell's corpse and continued on his journey with the dead men's accumulated wealth. Following another day's walking, Packer claimed he mounted the crest of a hill. Upon spotting the Los Pinos Indian Agency in the distance, he threw away the remaining strips of human flesh, but admitted that he did so with, quote, a fair degree of hesitation. After listening to Packer's version of events in full, General Adams called for a discussion of the matter between the surviving prospectors and agency officers.

This prospector stated they didn't believe a word of Packer's story and asked the general to aid them in the formation of a search party so that the truth might be uncovered. With agency clerk Herman Lauder at the lead, the five Utah prospectors followed a handful of agency officers for 50 miles across the hills, ironically with Packer acting as their guide. Then, after two weeks of searching the snowdrifts near Lake Fork, Packer announced that he was lost, forcing a frustrated Lauder to order the return to the agency. However, at some point during the journey back, Packer armed himself with a knife and attempted to murder Herman Lauder. Fortunately, Lauder was able to defend himself, and after the other members of the search party

restrained him, Packer was arrested. The failed attempt snuffed out any and all doubt that Packer was an innocent man, with General Adams ordering his immediate transportation to Sagwachi's jailhouse. During this period of detention, Packer changed his story. He now claimed that after days of hiking with virtually nothing to eat, Israel Swan could go no further. They found a pine-shaded gulch next to a lake and set up camp. A short time after this, Packer asserted that Swan passed away from a combination of hunger and exposure. The following is an extract from his signed confession, Old Man Swan died first and was eaten by the other five persons about ten days out of camp.

Four or five days afterward, Humpf died and was also eaten. Sometime afterward, while I was carrying wood, the butcher was killed as the other two told me accidentally, and he was also eaten. Bell shot California with Swan's gun, and I killed Bell. I covered up the remains and took a large piece of his meat along and traveled 14 days into the agency. Bell wanted to kill me with his rifle, struck a tree, and broke his gun. Yet while he was in jail, observers challenged his credibility and noted that Packer,

far from being a victim of cold or starvation, had set some kind of diabolical trap. Finally, in August of 1874, an illustrator from Harper's Weekly was hiking near a place known as Slumgullion Pass, just two miles southeast of Lake City, Colorado. Upon spotting a pine-shaded gulch surrounded by hemlock trees, John A. Randolph believed he'd happened across a prime spot to rest, but as he got closer, he made a horrifying discovery. Five rotting corpses lay strewn around the gulch. Randolph made a quick sketch of the scene,

then rushed to alert the sheriff in nearby Lake City, who now naturally was only too happy to receive news of the discovery. There was just one problem. From its description, the Gulch was the site of the final confrontation between Packer and Shannon Bell, but according to his story, Packer and Bell were alone, in which case, how had the bodies of the murdered and cannibalized men all come to rest in the same spot? The Lake City Sheriff rode out to what became known as Dead Man's Gulch, with around two dozen volunteers in tow.

The scene that greeted them was the stuff of nightmares. One deputy noted that it appeared as if extreme violence had befallen the men. Frank Miller and Israel Swan's bodies were little more than skeletons, with almost every strip of flesh having been carved from their bones. The bodies of James Humphrey and George Noon lay rotting and flayed, with their legs having been butchered entirely. Both had received blows to the head, with the shape of the wounds indicating a hatchet had been used to dispatch them.

Shannon Bell lay with his arms to his sides, his hands skinned, with skeletal legs spayed out beneath him. Someone had smashed open the top of his skull and removed his brain entirely. No attempt had been made to consume bone marrow, nor had any of the men's organs been consumed. Packer had simply gone from man to man, stripping the soft, sweet, nutrient-rich muscle from their bones before eating it. The remains of the fallen prospectors were buried where they lay, and when word reached the Sagwachi County Sheriff, he sent half a dozen deputies to the jail to confront Packer with their newfound evidence. But when they arrived at the makeshift prison cell on the outskirts of Saguatch, Packer was nowhere to be found. In order to prevent his summary execution by bloodthirsty vigilantes,

the town sheriff decided that Packer would be held in a makeshift cell on a ranch owned by the county. The cell was little more than a dilapidated log cabin. At the time of Packer's arrival, it was almost completely unfit for human habitation. Prior to the discovery of the missing prospectors, Packer had been held there for months with no evidence, no bodies, and no formal charges levied against him. Yet while there were many who were only too happy to see Packer under lock and key, just as many saw his detention as unjust. Some bemoaned. the extensive tax bill Packer's imprisonment racked up, while others argued it was unconstitutional to incarcerate a man merely suspected of a crime.

Such talk among the townsfolk appeared to have generated a great deal of sympathy for Alfred Packer because when the deputies arrived in late August of 1874, they found the cabin unguarded and deserted. Someone had helped Packer escape. As Sagwachi's sheriff organized both professional and volunteer tracking teams, local citizens discussed theories on what had motivated Packer to murder and consume his traveling companions. Many believed that he simply attached himself to the party under the false pretense of being familiar with the area, and that ultimately, the men had died because of his incompetence. However, a much more popular theory involved Packer leading the party of five into the mountains, with a premeditated plan to kill and rob them. Preston Nutter and Oliver Lenheiser were

highly vocal in their condemnations of Packer, and did their best to persuade the Saguachi townsfolk that the deaths were not some kind of tragic accident, nor was Packer a man of fortitude who'd simply done what was necessary to survive. Yet surprisingly, the details of Packer's cannibalism were not the primary issue. By the late 19th century, the American public was familiar with the tragic tale of the doomed Donner Party, delayed by a multitude of mishaps. The Donners spent the winter of 1846 snowbound in the Sierra Nevada mountain range. Some of the migrants resorted to cannibalism to survive, mainly eating the bodies of those who had succumbed to starvation, sickness, or extreme cold. But in one case, two Native American guides were deliberately murdered for this purpose.

News of such ghastliness spread fast among the American populace, but after a lengthy national discussion, many expressed a great deal of sympathy for the donners. While many argued that they themselves would not have committed murder, very few were able to categorically state that they would not have resorted to cannibalism, if placed in the same dire circumstances. So in the case of Alfred Packer, the most pertinent question was, did his companions die as a result of his incompetence, or was greed the motivating factor? By early spring of 1883, Packer had been on the run for almost nine years, despite being one of the most infamous individuals in the entire United States. There wasn't a single reported

sighting of him for almost a decade. That all changed when a man named Frenchy Kazan arrived in the Wyoming State Capitol of Cheyenne. Frenchie was a traveling salesman who roamed from town to town plying his trade from the back of a wagon, but Frenchie also happened to have been one of the original members of Robert McGrue's prospecting party who'd wintered at Chief Oire's camp during the winter of 1874. Frenchy's wagon pulled into Cheyenne in early March of 1883, and on Sunday the 11th, he and several other traders set up along the thoroughfare to do business with local townsfolk. Frenchie served dozens of customers that morning, many of whom were headed home from church, but when one man stepped up to his wagon and sought to peruse his goods,

Frenchie found his face to be curiously familiar. Don't I know you? Frenchie asked. The stranger returned his gaze, revealing piercing blue eyes that Frenchie was certain he'd seen before. No, sir, he replied. What's your name? Frenchie asked,

studying the man's rough, dark goatee and how his shoulder-length hair was slick with pomade. John Schwarza, the man replied, clearly irritated by Frenchie's incessant inquiries. Frenchie apologized, claiming he'd confused the stranger with an old acquaintance. Yet, in truth, there had been no such confusion. Frenchie Kazan was quite certain of the stranger's identity, and following the conclusion of their business, Frenchie rushed to the local sheriff's office and begged them to send a message to General Charles Adams of the Los Pinos Indian Agency.

A dangerous fugitive was present in Cheyenne, one that had been wanted for murder for the past nine years. and his name was Alfred Packer. General Adams and a handful of agency officers rode day and night until they reached Cheyenne. Then, following the confirmation of his identity, Packer was taken to Denver by train. On March 16th of 1883, Packer explained that he'd only escaped from Sagwache, due to his fear of imminent vigilante justice, and expressed a desire to give a second, much more truthful account of how he survived his ordeal in the San Juan Mountain. mountains. Instead of claiming that the men were gradually eaten as they died off one by one,

Packer now claimed that Bell had killed the others after ordering him to collect firewood. Packer departed in the morning, then returned in the late evening. According to the second of his signed confessions, this is what he found. I found Bell, who acted crazy in the morning, sitting near the fire, roasting a piece of meat which he had cut from the leg of Miller. His skull was crushed in with the hatchet. The other three were lying near the fire. They were cut in the forehead with a hatchet. Some had two or three cuts. I got closer to the fire, and when Bell saw me, he got up with his hatchet and charged towards me. When I shot him sideways through the belly, he fell on his face. I grabbed the hatchet and hit him on the top of the head. Packer claimed he

then dropped the revolver in a patch of deep snow and lost sight of it. After that, he constructed a crude shelter out of stray logs and then hunkered down to wait out a heavy storm. He claimed days went by, his hunger growing ever more intense, until finally, he could bear it no longer. I tried to get away every day, but could not, Packer said. So I lived off the flesh of these men for almost 60 days. General Adams then asked Packer why he hadn't told the truth during his first confession. I was excited, Packer reportedly replied. I wanted to say something. and the story as I told it came first to my mind. Finally, on April 6th of 1883, Packer pled not guilty at the opening of his trial in Lake City, Colorado.

The prosecution claimed that the only logical explanation for Packer's actions was that the killings were premeditated, while the defense argued against him being a murderer and claimed cannibalism was essential to his survival. After seven days of testimonies and examinations, he was found guilty of premeditated murder and sentenced to death by hanging. Packer was eventually spared the death penalty due to a legal technicality. He might have cheated death a second time, but he was still legally culpable for the deaths of his traveling companions. A second trial was held in Gunnison, Colorado, in June of 1886. Only this time, Packer was found guilty on five counts of voluntary manslaughter and sentenced to 40 years in prison. At the time, Packer's 40 years in prison constituted the longest

custodial sentence ever handed down in the United States and had stunned the American public. He was encouraged to lodge multiple appeals and sent letters to national newspapers claiming that he had been, and I quote, unjustly convicted by an unfair and unsympathetic judicial system, and by the ignorant conclusions and judgments of small-minded people. Eventually, on February 8th of 1901, Packer was paroled after serving 18 years of his 40-year sentence. Upon his release, he expressed a huge amount of gratitude towards a woman named Polly Pry. Polly Pry was the pen pen name of Leonie O'Brien, an ambitious young reporter with the Denver Post. Upon learning of Packer's military service, she used her platform to paint him as a courageous former soldier,

whose only crime was getting caught up with what she referred to as a regrettable situation. She called him a victim of circumstance who did what he had to do to survive, but one who had been, quote, crucified for violating civilized sensibilities by having to resort to cannibalism. The column inches she dedicated to Packer prompted the launch of a petition, one which made it onto the desk of the Colorado governor, Charles Thomas. Thomas was initially reluctant to involve himself in the situation, but after months upon months of pressure, one of his final acts as governor, was to have Alfred Packer paroled, under the condition he would not attempt to profit from his story. Six years following his release, on April 23rd of 1907, Alfred Packer passed away in Jefferson County, Colorado, age 65 years old. Some have cited his cause of death as being dementia, others blame a stroke,

and while rumors abounded that he became a vegetarian before he died, many reported Packer as living modestly and charitably during his final few years. Buried in Littleton, Colorado, Packer's grave is marked with a veteran's tombstone, listing his original regiment from 1862. But while he might well lie in a soldier's grave, his reputation will always be that of a charlatan, a murderer, and a cannibal. Lots of places can expose you to identity theft. Oh, no.

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