Probably not. Until recent times the man in the family ate first and got the best of the supplies, the wife next, then the children in order of decreasing age. This is strictly about survival - if the man died the entire family was doomed, whereas if a child died that's unfortunate but it happens and they move on.

I'm not sure when that changed, i.e. when it wasn't necessary any more. The turning point was probably when population density got high enough that a family that lost the father could count on support from the neighbors. The Donner parties' backgrounds would dictate how they approached the issue.

PS. I got a stiff lecture from some 80-90 year-olds last year on where the phrase "don't throw the baby out with the bathwater" came from and how those things worked on isolated mid-western farms before the 1900s.