One night, about two weeks after you left, a knock came at his door, and your mother entered.  To this lonely wretch her coming seemed like an angel’s.  She was cold and wet and freezing, yet her first words were, that she must see her children.  Keseberg understood that she intended to start out that very night, and soon found that she was slightly demented.  She kept saying, “O God!  I must see my children.  I must go to my children!” She finally consented to wait until the morning, but was determined that nothing should then prevent her lonely journey.  She told Keseberg where her money was concealed, she made him solemnly promise that he would get the money and take it to her children.  She would not taste the food he had to offer.  She had not tasted human flesh, and would hardly consent to remain in his foul and hideous den.  Too weak and Chilled to move, she finally sank down on the floor, and he covered her as best he could with blankets and feather bed, and made a fire to warm her; but it was of no avail, she had received her death-chill, and in the morning her spirit had passed heavenward.

I believe Keseberg tells the truth.  Your mother watched day and night by your father’s bedside until the end.  At nightfall he ceased to breathe, and she was alone in the desolate camp, where she performed the last sad ministrations, and then her duty in the mountains was accomplished.  All the smothered yearnings of maternal love now burst forth with full power.  Out into the darkness and night she rushed, without waiting for the morning.  “My children, I must see my children!”

She arrived at Keseberg’s cabin, overwrought mentally, overtaxed physically, and chilled by the freezing night air.  She was eager to set forth on her desperate journey without resting a moment.  I can see her as he described her, wringing her hands and exclaiming over and over again, “I must see my children!”

The story told by Mrs. Farnham and others about finding your mother’s remains, and that of Thornton concerning the pail of blood, are unquestionably false.  She had been dead weeks, and Keseberg confessed to me that no part of her body was found by the relief (Fallon) party.

My friend, I have attempted to comply with your request.  More than once during this evening I have burst into tears.  I am sorry almost that I attempted so mournful a task, but you will pardon the pain I have caused.

Keseberg is a powerful man, six feet in height, with full bushy beard, thin brown locks, and high forehead.  He has blue eyes that look squarely at you while he talks.  He is sometimes absent-minded and at times seems almost carried away with the intensity of his misery and desolation.

He speaks and writes German, French, Spanish, and English; and his selection of words proves him a scholar.  When I first asked him to make a statement which I could reduce to writing