[J. Thomas Scharf (1886)] The number of men furnished by the town of Cort-landt under the call of the President of the United States, on April 16, 1861, for seventy-five thousand militia, and the act of Congres of July 22, 1861, call-ing out five hundred thousand men, can only be estfl maled,as the quota of the State was a little more than filled by eager volunteers, without its being necessary to apportion quotas to each town. The towns, however, did not supply many more or less men than they did in filling their quotas undersubsequent calls for nearly the same number of soldiers. A fair estimate, then, of the number of volunteers under these first calls from the town of Cortlandt would be about three hun-dred men. • Within R few days after the call of the President, on April 15, 1861, for seventy-five thousand volun-teers, a number Of young men left Peekskill and joined regiments forming in New York City, of which Hawk-ins' Zouaves was one. On the 27th of April a body of sixteen men, under the leadership of William A. Bleakley, of Verplanck's Point, left for White Plains and joined a company there, which afterwards be-came Company A of the Twenty-seventh Regiment. This was the first body of men to leave the town of Cortlandt for the war. The first regularly organized company in the town of Cortlandt was gathered together in Peekskill, and left for New York City May 2, 1861, under command of Benjamin R. Simpkins. It contained sixty-six men.