Modoc County is a sparsely-populated county on the northeastern edge of the United States state of California, with a population of 9,686 people in 2010. The only incorporated city is Alturas, the county capital; the 1873-1874 Modoc War made the wilderness region famous, with the Modoc holding off numerous US Army forces for months and killing General Edmund Canby (a town in the county next to Modoc National Forest is named for him) and several other US troops.