The man who ate Democrats was Alfred Packer (1842-1907).
In 1873, he guided a party of 20 men into the San Juan Mountains, continued in heavy snows against advice, and returned alone, saying his companions had abandoned him.
Months afterward, search parties discovered the bodies of the missing men, most stripped of flesh. Packer was tried, found guilty of murder, and sentenced to 40 years of hard labor.
Before he left the courtroom, he was assured of a place in posterity when the judge told him sternly, “Packer, you depraved Republican son of a bitch, there were only five Democrats in Hinsdale County, and you ate them all!”