Georgetown Keeps a Forest With a Mystery at Its Center

Georgetown has one of those public forests where the walk and the story arrive together. Muller Hill State Forest covers 3,090 acres in the Town of Georgetown. DEC describes forest access roads used seasonally by snowmobilers and cross-country skiers, plus a short accessible trail to Muller Pond and the old mansion site.

The pond is pleasant on its own, but the mansion story is the part people tend to repeat. Madison County tells it as “The Mystery of Muller Hill.” Louis Anathe Muller, sometimes written as Lewis Anathe Muller, came from France to New York City in 1807, bought about 2,700 acres in what is now Georgetown, and oversaw a fortified house on the hill.

The details make the place feel stranger than a normal ruins marker. County history says Muller rented a house in Hamilton in 1808 while 150 people cleared 300 acres and built the home. It describes a one-story house of more than 2,100 square feet, with reports of five marble fireplaces and a secret escape from the basement. The same account says nobody knows for sure whether Muller was even his real name.

DEC adds another layer: workmen built with native cherry timbers, Bronder Hollow became a small self-sufficient community, fruit trees were planted, water was diverted to a trout pond, and a fence was raised to keep game in and intruders out. The mansion burned in 1907, and not much of the house remains.

That leaves Georgetown with a state forest that feels half trail outing and half old rumor. You can go for woods, pond, snow, and quiet. Then the hill reminds you that a Frenchman with bodyguards once tried to build a guarded little world there and then vanished from the local story.