The second grant lay partly in Wallkill, partly in Hamptonburgh, divided unevenly by the Wallkill River, William Bull, Esq., the great-great-grandson of the first one of the name here, lives upon the western portion, and the stone house known as Hill-Hold on the eastern part, belongs to the descendants of the third son of William Bull--Thomas Bull, Robert McLeod Jackson and Margaret Eleanor Jackson and their mother, Margaret Crawford Jackson, wife of Robert McDowell Jackson, son of William Wickham Jackson. The stones in the house were cut in the fields by the builder, Thomas Bull, as he had time for the work between planting and reaping. It was years before he was ready to build. Paneling was brought from England for the east and west sides of the two large first-floor rooms. Also solid mahogany balls for the newels and mahogany balusters. The walls are two feet thick, with open fireplaces throughout the house and massive chimney stacks on the east and west. This house also stands on a rock, is in good repair and has a beautiful situation on a hill. Thirty years ago Mr. Charles Backman bought the road house by Stony Ford bridge, known as the Sutton House, with race track, and began to improve Orange County's fine trotting stock. Little by little he bought the adjoining farm land until he owned 640 acres and remade the mile of road from Stony Ford to La Grange into as fine a highway as are the best State roads to-day. His house was visited by many noted people, among them General Grant when President, and General Benjamin F. Tracy, now ex-Secretary of the Navy. Mr. J. Howard Force now owns the place. General Tracy owned for a few years a farm in Goosetown or LaGrange, which he named Marshland and greatly improved. This also was a stock farm for fine horses; it is now in other hands. Mr. Backman bought part of the Valentine Hill farm originally belonging to Andrew Wilson, who was a private in Colonel James McClaughrey's regiment of Little Britain. In October, 1777, he was one of the hundred men sent out from Fort Montgomery to intercept the British, who were 5,000 strong and commanded by Sir Henry Clinton in person. Here is a dispatch from Governor Clinton, dated October 7, 1777, the day after the fort was taken: "We received intelligence that the enemy were advancing on the west side of the mountain with design to attack us in the rear. Upon this ordered out Colonels Bruyer and McClaughrey with upwards of 100 men towards Doodletown with a brass field piece, with a detachment of sixty men on every advantageous post on the road to the furnace. They were not long out before they were attacked by the enemy with their whole force; our people behaved with spirit and must have made great slaughter of the enemy." [Illustration: George W. Carpenter.]