[4] He emigrated in 1819 with a letter of introduction to Stephen Van Rensselaer III, courtesy of the American Minister in London.

In 1820, he invented an improved plow, which took first premium at three county fairs, and a cultivator,[3] which was said to have been the first to be put into practical operation in the country.

[6] The factory was located on north side of the Wynantskill Creek in South Troy, about a half-mile northeast of today’s Troy-Menands bridge.

[8] The Burden Iron Works produced the first ship spikes and the first horseshoes made by machinery in the world.

The company forged the hull plates for the USS Monitor, the Navy's first iron-clad battleship, which engaged the Confederacy's Merrimac in 1862 in the first battle of its kind.

At great expense, Burden had the grounds filled in, and the river dredged, so that the company's docks were accessible to large vessels.

[8] A network of railroad tracks wove through the property to move train loads of sand, iron ore from the Lake Champlain region, and limestone from the downriver city of Hudson.

He originated a system of reservoirs along the Wynantskill Creek to hold the water in reserve and increase the water-supply to power the mills.

In order to find the necessary power to run his foundry, in 1851 Burden designed and constructed a 60-foot wheel that could generate 500 horsepower.

[10] An accomplished mechanic, he could make a better piece of work than any man in his shops; and could deal a heavier blow with a sledge than any of his strikers at the forge.

[9] The Henry Burden family papers are located at the William L. Clements Library, University of Michigan in Ann Arbor.

The boat was lost on its first trial due to pilot mismanagement, and Burden turned his attention to ocean navigation.

[9] Besides increasing the length of the boats, he suggested, for the convenience and accommodation of passengers, the erection of sleeping-berth-rooms on the upper decks, being a decided change from the holds of vessels, where they had previously been placed.

His views on navigation being known, some gentlemen of Glasgow issued, with his permission, a prospectus of "Burden's Atlantic Steam-Ferry Company."

On January 23, 1821, at Saint Gabriel Presbyterian Church in Montreal, Québec, Henry Burden wed Helen McOuat (1802–1860), whom he had known in Scotland.

At one time Henry Burden employed almost one-eighth of the population of the city of Troy, and "spent a lifetime in devising means for lightening toil".

[9] Margaret Elizabeth Burden Proudfit (1824–1911), Henry's and Helen's first daughter, wrote a long biographical account of her family.