Horse Creek is an

unincorporated community An unincorporated area is a region that is not governed by a local municipal corporation. Widespread unincorporated communities and areas are a distinguishing feature of the United States and Canada. Most other countries of the world either have ...

Siskiyou County Siskiyou County (, ) is a county in the northernmost part of the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 census, the population was 44,076. Its county seat is Yreka and its highest point is Mount Shasta. It falls within the Cascadia bioregion ...

California California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the m ...

, United States. Horse Creek is located along California State Route 96 west-northwest of Yreka.

The Brite Brothers

On August 29, 1936, ex-convicts John and Coke Brite shot and killed

Deputy Martin Lange, constable Joe Clark and visitor Fred Seaborn in a drunken haze near the isolated cabin where they lived with their parents. The brothers had earlier beaten up the elderly Seaborn and his friend, Horse Creek resident Charley Baker, after the latter, who hoped to chase them off from the rented cabin, having used it for free storage before. Seaborn, a retired naval officer and the harbor master of the port of

Vallejo, California Vallejo ( ; ) is a city in Solano County, California and the second largest city in the North Bay region of the Bay Area. Located on the shores of San Pablo Bay, the city had a population of 126,090 at the 2020 census. Vallejo is home to th ...

was in Horse Creek to hunt deer with Baker. After the incident, the Brite brothers hid out in the

Siskiyou Mountains The Siskiyou Mountains are a coastal subrange of the Klamath Mountains, and located in northwestern California and southwestern Oregon in the United States. They extend in an arc for approximately from east of Crescent City, California, northea ...

for three weeks in fear of Siskiyou County's reputation for lynching murderers. They secretly gave themselves up to Siskiyou County District Attorney James G. Davis, who along with Dr. Earl Harris drove them to

Folsom Prison Folsom State Prison (FSP) is a California State Prison in Folsom, California, U.S., approximately northeast of the state capital of Sacramento, California, Sacramento. It is one of 34 adult institutions operated by the California Department of ...

for their safety. Davis, a native American, refused to prosecute, due to conflicting testimony of witness, believing they had been set up and were justified in self-defense for being set upon in the dead of night as they lie sleeping outdoors and clubbed by deputies, and was soon to be voted out of office. The Brite Brothers were convicted and sentenced to death, however appeals reduced the sentence to life in prison. They were both paroled in 1951, after efforts of author Earle Stanley Gardner's 'Court of Last Resort', but were soon back in prison, where they died.Kulczyk,David. (2008). California Justice: Shootouts, Lynching and Assassinations in the Golden State. Word Dancer Press. P101

References

Unincorporated communities in California Unincorporated communities in Siskiyou County, California {{SiskiyouCountyCA-geo-stub