Other nearby places include Southam, Coventry and the villages of Ashby St Ledgers, Badby, Barby, Braunston, Byfield, Charwelton, Dodford, Dunchurch, Everdon, Fawsley, Hellidon, Kilsby, Long Buckby, Newnham, Norton, Staverton, Welton, Weedon and Woodford Halse.

Shakespeare would have known Daventry due to its relatively close proximity to Stratford-upon-Avon, and its position on the main route from the Midlands to London.

[24] During the English Civil War, the army of King Charles I stayed at Daventry in 1645 after storming the Parliamentary garrison at Leicester and on its way to relieve the siege of Oxford.

Fairfax's leading detachments of horse clashed with Royalist outposts near Daventry on 12 June, alerting the king to the presence of the Parliamentary army.

[27] Daniel Defoe described Daventry as a "considerable market town which subsists chiefly on the great concourse of travellers on the old Watling Street way.

Daventry, being located on the main roads linking London with the West Midlands, Holyhead and Lancashire, flourished as a coaching town.

There were many coaching inns in the town including the Wheatsheaf the Saracen's Head the Plough and Bell the Dun Cow and the Brown Bear.

[29] Reflecting Daventry's prosperity, many of the town's finest building were constructed during this period, including, most notably, the Holy Cross Church of 1758.

[30] The opening of the London and Birmingham Railway in 1838 signalled the beginning of the railway age; almost immediately the coaching trade slumped and Daventry entered a long period of stagnation and decline which lasted for over a century: In 1841 Daventry had a population of 4,565, from thereon it went into steady decline until 1911, when it bottomed out at 3,516, and then slowly recovered, reaching 4,077 in 1951, but did not recover to the 1841 level until later in the 1950s.

The transmitting station contributed to the town's population revival, as a number of BBC staff and their families moved into the area.

[34] A busy directional radio beacon (VOR), identifier "DTY", for aircraft is situated approximately four mi (six km) south of the town.

The success of the experiment persuaded the British government to fund the development of a network of full scale radar stations on the south coast of England, known as Chain Home, which provided a decisive advantage to the RAF in the Battle of Britain in 1940.

Signals from GB75RDF at Borough Hill, reflected from aircraft (all of which were flown by radio hams), were detected in a receiving set housed in a replica Morris van.

[37] Borough Hill was also the site of the Gee Eastern chain master transmitter mast: this was part of a radio navigation system used by the Allies during World War II.

Although Daventry was not formally designated as a New Town, its expansion bore many similarities to such developments: A planned expansion of the town was carried out as part of a three-way agreement between Birmingham City Council, Daventry Borough Council, and Northamptonshire County Council: Birmingham's role was to buy land, and build houses and industrial estates, Northamptonshire provided roads, schools and libraries, whilst Daventry provided drainage and sewage disposal.

[40] Work on the official expansion of Daventry began in the second half of the 1960s, when Birmingham City Council purchased nearly 1,000 acres (400 ha) of land to be developed for housing and industrial use.

The planning agreement had originally been intended to last for 30 years (until 1991) however Birmingham City Council decided to pull out of it half way through in 1976, due in part to spending cuts, but also as it had become clear that the town's plan was falling short of expectations: The target population had been 36,000 by 1981, but actual growth was much slower than this, nevertheless, between 1961 and 1981 the population had nearly tripled from 5,860 to 16,178; Subsequent growth in the following decades has been slower and driven mainly by private developments.

[42] In 1995 RAF Daventry was listed as a USAF communication facility by the then Minister of State for the Armed Forces Nicholas Soames in answer to a question from Max Madden.

[43] RAF Daventry is most likely the transmitter base at a former WW1 isolation hospital site on the Staverton to Newnham road which was eventually sold by the Ministry of Defence in 2007.

In 1974 the municipal borough was abolished and merged into the much larger Daventry District, which also included a large rural area.

The proximity of motorways and mainline railways has led to the development of an increasingly large logistics facility, north of Daventry.

The terminal is served by a direct connection to the Northampton Loop of the West Coast Main Line railway.

Due to the proximity to the M1, Ford[58] opened a large national spare parts distribution warehouse on the Royal Oak Industrial Estate in 1972.

A new national distribution centre was opened in 2004, run by DHL, for J D Wetherspoon on the Drayton Fields Industrial Estate, north west of the town.

Local and regional bus services are provided by Stagecoach Midlands[59] from their bases in Northampton, Rugby and until December 2016, Leamington Spa.

From September 1989, the County Council decided to close the newest of the three comprehensive schools (The Grange) and strip the Parker E-ACT Academy and Danetre and Southbrook Learning Village (DSLV) of their sixth forms.

Many children from Daventry are enrolled with the surrounding village schools, such as Byfield, Badby, Newnham, Woodford Halse, Barby and Welton.

Other groups such as Mixed people, Black British and Other ethnicities have also increased in size, migration being the main reason behind growth for the latter two.

[76] 2013 saw the opening of a purpose-built skate park[77] on New Street Recreation Ground, this was constructed in consultation with local youth groups and features challenges for boarders of all abilities.

On 7 June 2017 a major cycling event took place in the town when Daventry hosted the Grand Depart of The Women's Tour.