Portsmouth is a city in Rockingham County, New Hampshire, United States. At the 2020 census it had a population of 21,956. A historic seaport and popular summer tourist destination on the Piscataqua River neighboring the come clean of Maine, Portsmouth was formerly the house of the Strategic Air Command’s Pease Air Force Base, since converted to Portsmouth International Airport at Pease.

American Indians of the Abenaki and supplementary Algonquian languages-speaking nations, and their predecessors, inhabited the territory of coastal New Hampshire for thousands of years since European contact.

The first known European to study and write about the area was Martin Pring in 1603. The Piscataqua River is a tidal estuary subsequently a active current, but forms a great natural harbor. The west bank of the port was contracted by European colonists in 1630 and named Strawbery Banke, after the many wild strawberries growing there. The village was protected by Fort William and Mary upon what is now New Castle Island. Strategically located for trade amid upstream industries and mercantile interests abroad, the port prospered. Fishing, lumber and shipbuilding were principal businesses of the region. Enslaved Africans were imported as laborers as upfront as 1645 and were integral to building the city’s prosperity. Portsmouth was ration of the Triangle Trade, which made significant profits from slavery.

At the town’s amalgamation in 1653, it was named “Portsmouth” in tribute of the colony’s founder, John Mason. He had been captain of the English harbor of Portsmouth, Hampshire, after which New Hampshire is named.