It was chartered in 1855 and acquired by the Boston and Albany Railroad in 1870, only to face its gradual demise beginning in 1959.

The line formed a cutoff between the New York Central and Hudson River Railroad towards New York City and the Boston and Albany Railroad, toward Pittsfield, Springfield, Worcester, and Boston.

[3] In 1936, the "BA" Tower in Ghent which controlled movements between the NYC Harlem Division and the B&A Hudson Branch was closed, and the segment between Ghent and Chatham became exclusively part of the Upper Harlem Division.

As the NYC merged with the Pennsylvania Railroad in 1968 to form Penn Central Railroad, PC renamed it the "Claverack Secondary Track" and kept cutting the line back farther west, while abandoning all passenger service on its Upper Harlem Division north of Dover Plains.

When Conrail took over in 1976, it continued the cutbacks, with the line moving farther west from Claverack, while the UHD segment was abandoned between Millerton and Ghent, transforming it into little more than a freight spur between Ghent and Chatham.