Burglary Suspect Caught with Community Help Says EPD

For the sake of history.. [Edit: For the sake of history, I’m leaving this. But the implied advocation of vigilante violence has been deleted.]
The Willits Triple Lynching of 1879

Fact!
In 1879, the idyllic hamlet of Little Lake in Mendocino County, California, which is now a neighborhood of Ukiah, was taken over by Elijah Frost, Abijah Gibson, and Thomas McCracken. These constantly drunken ruffians committed petty larcenies and generally made life unpleasant for the townsfolk.

The group’s leader was Elijah Frost, a member of the deadly Frost clan that was involved in a longtime Mendocino County feud with the equally homicidal Coastes family. Elijah’s father, Elisha, had been murdered on October 16, 1867, in the infamous “Little Lake Election Day Shootout.”

Prior to that shootout, the Frost clan arrived in Northern California from Missouri around 1858. Working as sheepherders and hog raisers, the always well-armed family was known as a bunch of troublemaking thugs. Their idea of a fun night out was getting roaring drunk and shooting up a Native American ranchero. The Confederate-supporting Frost family became even more obnoxious during the Civil War.

The Coates family arrived in Mendocino County at about the same time as did the Frost clan. The Coateses were from Pennsylvania and they supported the Union. Bad blood flowed between the families, and there were frequent beatings and public arguments, usually over politics. It all came to a head in one of the bloodiest shootouts in California history.

October 16, 1867, was an election day and the citizens of Mendocino County meandered into Little Lake to vote, have a drink, and do a little socializing. It was a warm day and Little Lake was crowded with families.

Members of the Frost family saw the Coates family pull up in a big farm wagon loaded with relatives. Elisha, Martin, and Isom Frost picked a fight with the Coateses that ended in a shootout that killed Albert, Henry, Thomas, Abraham, and Wesley Coates. Abner Coates shot Elisha Frost in the chest with a double-barreled shotgun. Three other participants were seriously wounded.

As a result of the shootout, Elijah Frost was left fatherless at age seventeen. Three years later, Elijah’s mother Amanda died. Although he was twenty-one years old, the wild Elijah and his three brothers were left in the care of their brother-in-law, James McKindley, who soon threw up his hands in frustration.

Elijah was apprehended a couple of times with stolen produce and livestock, but charges were dropped due to lack of evidence. In September 1875, Elijah, along with his wife Mary and fourteen-year-old brother Jimmy, started on a horse-stealing excursion, traveling around northern California, pilfering horses whenever it was convenient.

They made the mistake of stealing sixteen horses from a Shasta County rancher named Joseph Brock. Brock wasn’t the type to let anyone get away with stealing his livestock. Teaming up with Tehama County Deputy Sheriff O. A. Lovett and Butte County Sheriff S. L. Daniels, the men tracked down the rustlers, finally catching up with them a few miles from Oroville. Mary and Jimmy were released, but Elijah was sentenced to four years in San Quentin.

The people of Little Lake were taken aback when Elijah was released after serving only thirty-two months of his sentence. Prison had only intensified his obnoxious behavior. He teamed up with fellow thugs Abijah Gibson and Thomas McCracken, and the trio was off and running, committing petty thievery, break-ins, and senseless vandalism, and making a general nuisance of themselves to the people of Little Lake. The men enjoyed hotting and hollering and firing their pistols in the streets of the town. People became afraid to go out on the streets in fear that the drunken gang would harass them, beat them up, or worse.

The hooligans killed an entire flock of geese and tied their heads to the rails of a fence. When a man implied that the ruffians were responsible, his barn was burnt down.

The final straw came when the men were caught stealing a set of harnesses in September 1879. The shackled prisoners were taken to the town of Willits and jailed at Brown’s Hotel. While waiting for their September 4 preliminary hearing, the gang threatened revenge against anyone who testified against them.

The townspeople were terrified of what would happen if the men were released or escaped. They formed a vigilante committee to take care of the problem, and during the early morning hours of September 4, they made their move.

Little Lake citizens wanted to send a clear message to other ruffians and drifters who thought they could terrorize the town with impunity. The determined crowd took the three men (two were handcuffed together) to the customary site of summary execution, a local bridge.

Then, during a solemn moment, the men were pushed off the bridge, their necks snapping as a rope borrowed from a local farmer became taut above their weight. According to the local Dispatch Democrat, “During the proceedings not a word was uttered.”

Following the hasty execution, the bodies of the condemned men dangled from the bridge until Thursday afternoon. The jail guards could not identify a single man in the vigilante posse.

Culled from: California Justice: Shootouts, Lynchings, and Assassinations in the Golden State