[J. Thomas Scharf (1886)] They employed from three hundred to three hundred and fifty hands, and their weekly pay-roll amounted to about three thousand dollars. These mills were burned on the 25th of August, 1883, with a loss of $180,000, upon which there was an insurance of $131,-840. The proprietors decided not to rebuild at Anns-ville, but moved their business to Bridgeport, Conn. The burning of these mills was the largest and most destructive fire that ever occurred at Peekskill, and their removal was felt as a great blow to the prosperity of the place. The Peekskill Blast-Furnace, located at the mouth of Annsville Creek, was built in 1853 by the Peekskill Iron Company, a corporation of which the principal members were Warren and Uriah A. Mur-doch, of New York, and Seth Allen of Peekskill, the last named gentleman being the agent and manager. The furnace was operated a number of years success-fully, and manufactured a superior quality of pig-iron. It was connected by a narrow-gauge railroad, about six miies in length, belonging to the company, with the Croft Iron Mine in Putnam County, and from ore from this mine and other mines belonging to the company in Dutchess County and at Lake Champlain, the iron was manufactured. The present owners of the furnace are the estates of T. J. F. Flint and Luther Clark, both of whom were New Yorkers. Owing to the decline in the price of iron the furnace