San Sevaine Flats

San Sevaine Flats is a small area of flatland east of Cucamonga Peak in the San Gabriel Mountains in San Bernardino County, California. The area is in the Cucamonga Wilderness in the San Bernardino National Forest, 1.24 miles south of Bonita Falls on South Fork Lytle Creek and north of Rancho Cucamonga, California. It has an elevation of 1,690 meters, or 5,545 feet.[1]

San Sevaine Flats
Highest point
Elevation5,545 ft (1,690 m)
Coordinates34°12′43″N 117°30′36″W
Geography
LocationSan Bernardino County, California, U.S.
Parent rangeSan Gabriel Mountains
Topo mapUSGS Cucamonga Peak

History
The San Sevaine Flats are named after Don Pedro Sainsevain.

Before the flat acquired its current name it was the hideout of the outlaw Tom McCauley better known as James or Jim Henry of the Mason Henry Gang. When the American Civil War ended in April with Lee's surrender at Appomattox the gang with a price on their heads, came under pressure from the Union Army and law enforcement officials in Central California. They moved into pro secessionist Southern California and split up. Henry with part of the gang moved into the eastern San Gabriel Mountains at San Sevaine Flats from which they began rustling, committing robbery and murder as they did. Henry was killed by a posse led by San Bernardino County Sheriff Benjamin Franklin Mathews on September 14, 1865, at San Jacinto Canyon, just over what was then the San Diego County line, in what is now Riverside County, California.[2][3]

The flat was named (but misspelled) for Don Pedro Sainsevain, who with his brother bought part of Rancho Cucamonga in 1865 and set out a large vineyard. He moved to Cucamonga in 1870 and ran the vineyard and winery with Joseph S. Garcia. In 1874 the Sainsevain brothers purchased land in Hawker Canyon four miles east of Etiwanda and built a large stone house and a reservoir there.[4]

References
  1. San Sevaine Flats, California; from www.topoquest.com, accessed 2/23/2013
  2. M. David DeSoucy, Sheriff Gary Penrod, San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department, Arcadia Publishing, 2006. pg. 16. account of Henry shootout.
  3. According to the Los Angeles Tri Weekly News: On Sept. 14 1865 the sheriff with a posse of three soldiers and two or three citizens ran across Henry sound asleep near San Jacinto Canyon, 25 miles from town and killed him after he made some resistance wounding one man. Secrest, California Bad Men p.144-146
  4. Sullivan, Charles Lewis (1998). A companion to California wine: an encyclopedia of wine and winemaking from the mission period to the present (1998 ed.). University of California Press. ISBN 978-0-520-21351-7.
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