Located at the Great Oxbow of the Connecticut River, with vast tracts of beautiful and fertile intervale, the area was a favorite of the Indians.

[5] Prior to European settlement, the Newbury area was the location of a village called Cowass or Cowassuck of the Pennacook tribe.

[6] Cowass in Abenaki is "Coo-ash-auke," meaning "place of pine trees," and was a general name these people gave to the upper Connecticut River Valley and Lakes region.

[7] In 1704 the Pennacook at Cowass kept several captives from the Deerfield Raid in the village, including Stephen Williams who was kept with Sachem George Tahanto[8][9][10] The area was first settled by English colonists in 1762 by Samuel Sleeper and family.

Meanwhile, pioneer farmers had to carry their grain 60 miles (97 kilometers) by canoe to Charlestown, New Hampshire to get it ground into flour.

The principal industry, however, along the alluvial meadows was raising beef cattle and sheep, and the production of wool and dairy goods.

It developed as an adjunct of the railway town across the Connecticut River at Woodsville, the once bustling village within Haverhill, New Hampshire.

In the summer of 1913 a large fire destroyed 21 buildings in Newbury, including a church, the public school, the hotel and a number of businesses and residences.