The town is the birthplace of General Gouverneur K. Warren, who was an important figure in the Union Army during the Civil War.

Commuter service to New York City is available via the Cold Spring train station, served by Metro-North Railroad.

On July 15, 1691, Dortlandt and Sybrant secured a deed to the tract from Wappinger leaders, totaling as much as much as 17,480 acres (according to recent historical analysis)[3] along the eastern bank of the Hudson River from the peak on Anthony's Nose to (and including) Pollepel Island, and east to a marked tree which would establish the tract's eastern border.

[3] This tract contained a large portion of modern-day Phillipstown, NY, including the entire the Village of Cold Spring.

In this testimony, Nimham states that Wappinger ancestors had sold a tract of "Low Lands on that Part of the Peeks kill [north of modern-day Annsville Creek]... and also a pine swamp containing... a few Acres called Kichtondacongh and a piece of low Land lying Southeasterly from Kichtondacongh called Paukeminshingh.

[5] A couple of sloops made regular weekly trips from Cold Spring to New York, carrying wood and some country produce, which came over this model road from the east.

It also manufactured cast iron steam engines for locomotives, gears, and produced much of the pipework for New York's water system.

The rise of steel making and the declining demand for cast iron after the Civil War caused the Foundry to cease operations in 1911.

[9] The Municipal Building, designed by Louis Mekeel, was constructed in 1926 to house the company's first firetruck, an American LaFrance.

[10] Mr. Willis Buckner, a former slave from the South, was a driver and groom for Susan and Anna Bartlett Warner at their farm on Constitution Island.

[9] In the early decades of the 20th century, blacks who stayed in this part of New York state migrated away from rural towns to nearby cities with waterfront manufacturing such as Peekskill, Beacon, Newburgh and Ossining.

Pete Seeger formed the Clearwater organization, an environmental group dedicated to advances in sewer treatment, industrial waste disposal, and addressing the discharge of major pollutants into the Hudson.

As Seeger appeared on stage to thank the audience for coming, fifteen drunks stood up waving little American flags, yelling “Throw the Commies out.” That night someone cut the sloop's moorings and there were threats to torch the boat.

[12] Towards the latter part of the nineteenth century artists, writers and prominent families came to Cold Spring, and mansions were built along Morris Avenue, including "Undercliff," the home of publisher George Pope Morris, and "Craigside," the home of Julia and General Daniel Butterfield.

A second larger church was built in 1867, designed in the Victorian Gothic style by architect and vestry member George Edward Harney.