Things to Do in Portsmouth, RI: Beyond the Newport Name

Green Animals Topiary Garden: The Oldest Topiary Garden in the Country

Green Animals Topiary Garden sits on a 7-acre estate overlooking Narragansett Bay, purchased in 1872 by Thomas E. Brayton, treasurer of the Union Cotton Manufacturing Company. The topiary work that gives the garden its name did not start until 1912, when superintendent Joseph Carreiro began sculpting the first figures; George Mendonça later joined the staff after 1938 hurricane damage and became co-creator of the menagerie, staying on as grounds manager until 1985. Brayton's daughter, Alice Brayton, renamed the property Green Animals and expanded the topiary collection during her residence from 1940 to 1972.

Today the garden features roughly 80 sculpted trees, including a teddy bear, a camel, a giraffe, an ostrich, an elephant, a unicorn, a reindeer, a dog, and a horse with rider -- and it is documented as the oldest topiary garden in the United States. Following Alice Brayton's 1972 bequest, the property has been managed by the Preservation Society of Newport County, the same organization that runs the famous Newport mansions, which is why you will often see Green Animals mentioned alongside them even though the garden itself is in Portsmouth. One more genuine footnote: Jacqueline Bouvier, later Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, held her debutante party at the estate in 1947-48.

The Battle of Rhode Island and Butts Hill Fort

On August 29, 1778, the Battle of Rhode Island -- sometimes called the Battle of Newport, even though it was fought within Portsmouth's own boundaries -- unfolded on Aquidneck Island. Per the American Battlefield Trust, American forces under Brigadier General John Sullivan (cited troop figures vary, with roughly 10,100 given for the immediate force and a total engagement figure of around 16,800 cited elsewhere) faced a British garrison of roughly 6,700 men under General Sir Robert Pigot. Sullivan had been besieging Newport and withdrew the day before after a planned French naval and land assault fell apart in storms; fierce fighting broke out when British forces pursued the retreating American rear guard. American casualties totaled 441, including 181 killed; British casualties reached 260 killed. Neither side won decisively, but the battle is documented as one of the first combined American-French military operations of the Revolutionary War.

The most historically significant detail is the 1st Rhode Island Regiment, sometimes called the Black Regiment, which fought here as a racially integrated unit of European Americans, American Indians, and many African Americans -- an early and notable example of integrated American military service, worth presenting factually rather than as a footnote. Butts Hill Fort, a real fortification with surviving remnants, was central to the battle and remains a documented historic site in Portsmouth today. Portsmouth Abbey School's 525-acre campus at 285 Corys Lane sits on the actual site of the battle -- a genuine, address-verifiable link between a working school campus and this history, though visiting the fort remnants and the surrounding historic district is the more direct way to experience the site itself.

Newport Car Museum: A Name That Belongs to the Wrong Town

The Newport Car Museum opened in 2017 and reportedly draws about 50,000 visitors a year -- and despite what its name tells you, it is physically located in Portsmouth, not Newport. It is a genuine, notable attraction on its own terms, but the naming mix-up is worth flagging outright for anyone trying to find it on a map: if you are searching for it as a Newport address, you are searching in the wrong town.

Prudence Island: A Ferry Ride Into Narragansett Bay

Portsmouth's town boundaries extend well beyond Aquidneck Island itself to include several islands in Narragansett Bay -- Prudence Island, Patience Island, Hope Island, and Hog Island. Prudence Island is the largest, with its own small year-round community and its own portion of the Narragansett Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve. Its most notable landmark is the Prudence Island Lighthouse, built in 1823 and still a documented historic site today.

Getting there takes some planning: the original Prudence Island Ferry ceased operating on September 14, 2014 after failing to renew its lease with the Town of Bristol, and service today runs under A&R Marine's Prudence & Bay Islands Transport, using a newer pier and vessel. Worth noting precisely: the ferry departs from Bristol, not from Portsmouth itself, even though the island is part of Portsmouth. Treat the 2014 transition as historical rather than an ongoing dispute -- though at least one more recent reference to a Public Utilities Commission hearing amid concern about the island's ferry services turned up in research without an independent date or confirmation, so it is disclosed here rather than ignored or overstated. Confirm current ferry schedules and any service disputes directly with Prudence & Bay Islands Transport before planning a trip.

Island Park: The Amusement Park a Hurricane Erased

Island Park is a real neighborhood and beach area in Portsmouth today, and almost nothing about it looks like what it once was: from 1897 until 1938, it was a major trolley-accessible amusement park, reachable via the Newport-Fall River Street Railway. The Cashman family bought it and renamed it Cashman's Park in 1925, expanding it into a real destination -- two carousels, one built by the Barker family in 1898 and another by the celebrated carousel maker Charles I. D. Looff in 1905, a roller coaster called The Bullet built in 1926, tethered hot-air-balloon rides, boat rentals, a dance hall that hosted major bands, a fun house nicknamed Brownie's 101 Troubles, a shore dinner hall, inter-island swimming races, a shooting gallery, and acrobatic performances. Dance marathons were held there too -- one lasted a documented 111 hours.

The park survived a 1927 fire, 1929 storm damage to the roller coaster, and a 1933 dance-hall fire, but it did not survive the hurricane of September 21, 1938, which sent a 12-foot wall of water surging up the Sakonnet River and destroyed it for good. That hurricane killed roughly 600 people regionally -- including 18 deaths specifically at Island Park, a sobering, dated local casualty figure distinct from the broader regional toll. Today Island Park survives only as a neighborhood and beach-area name; no trace of the amusement park remains as an operating attraction, which makes it exactly the kind of thing worth knowing before you visit rather than a place you would find anything by simply showing up.

Glen Farm and the Newport International Polo Series

Glen Farm hosts the Newport International Polo Series -- another Newport-branded name attached to a Portsmouth address, in the same vein as the car museum above. It is a real, ongoing local event drawing spectators to watch international-level polo, and it is worth knowing that despite the name on the marquee, the matches themselves are played on Portsmouth ground.

US Sailing: The National Governing Body of Sailing Calls Portsmouth Home

US Sailing, the national governing body of sailing in the United States, is headquartered in Portsmouth -- a fact worth knowing for anyone with an interest in the broader sailing scene on Narragansett Bay, given Newport's own long-standing reputation as an American sailing capital. It is an institutional anchor rather than a ticketed attraction, but it places Portsmouth squarely inside the sport's governance and history, not just its neighboring town's regattas.

Sunset Cove: Where Jimmy Buffett Played His Last Show

On July 2, 2023, Jimmy Buffett gave his final public performance at Sunset Cove restaurant in Portsmouth -- a well-corroborated fact reported by CBS Boston, the Boston Globe, and Boston.com, among other outlets. It was entirely impromptu: bandmate Mac McAnally was already booked to play that night and contacted restaurant owner Mike MacFarlane to say Buffett wanted to come up and perform a few songs. Several hundred patrons happened to be there for it, watching Buffett and his Coral Reefer Band with no advance notice. MacFarlane later described it as very impromptu, saying the wow factor was unbelievable. Buffett died about two months later, on September 1, 2023, at age 76, following a prolonged illness. Sunset Cove is a working restaurant, not a museum built around the moment, so anyone visiting is going for a meal first -- but it is a genuine, specific, dateable piece of Portsmouth's recent history that most visitors never hear about.