John Paulding, one of the three who captured Andre, received for his distinguished services, as was meet, a fine farm situated in Peekskill that had been confiscated from its royalist owner; thus we see that virtue is rewarded, treason punished and the state plays the generous role without any expense to itself. Mr. Andrew Carnegie himself could not have managed the affair better. In September, 1777, the village was sacked and burned by the British and the neighboring country was pillaged. The chapel of St. Peter's was erected on the site of the military magazine destroyed at this time. The one historically interesting building that was left in the town, the old Birdsall residence, has gone the way of all flesh. It was Washington's headquarters whenever he was in this neighborhood, Lafayette dwelt under its roof, one of its parlors was used by the Rev. George Whitefield in which to hold services, but the building protruded into the street and the good people concluded that rather than walk around it any longer they would tramp over its grave. [Sidenote: _CORTLANDTVILLE._] In Cortlandtville is located the former residence of Gen. Pierre Van Cortlandt, erected in 1773. A tablet placed on the building says: "General George Washington with his aides slept in this house many nights while making Peekskill their headquarters in 1776, 1777 and 1778. It was the house of Pierre Van Cortlandt, member of Colonial Assembly, member of the 2d, 3d and 4th Provincial Congress, President of the Committee of Public Safety, a framer of the State Constitution, First Lieutenant-Governor of the State of New York, Colonel of manor of Cortlandt Regiment." The building is rather modern in appearance, suggesting comfort rather than strenuosity. Here the Van Cortlandt family found a safe asylum when the manor house on the Croton was no longer tenable. In March, 1777, General McDougal posted his advance guard here when the British took possession of Peekskill. Eighty of his men, under Lieutenant-Colonel Willet, receiving permission to attack some two hundred of the British that had taken possession of a height a little south of Cortlandt's, did so with such success that the enemy retreated, and the entire command, some one thousand strong, becoming panic stricken, betook themselves to their shipping under cover of the night and sailed down stream. A great oak which served the purpose of a military whipping post, still stands just east of the Van Cortlandt house.