Our museum is in the old Town Hall in the High Street.

This structure was built in 1695 by Lawrence Hyde and served as a meeting room, courthouse, school and more recently as a library.

Our museum was founded in 1971 by Dr Stebbens the chairman of Wootton Bassett Historical Society.

A number of items in the museum predate this as the Ducking Stool and many pictures of local dignitaries have been there for at least 100 years well before the building was a museum.

Town Hall in colour - 2017 copy

The Town Hall was refurbished by Sir Henry Meux in 1889 and afterwards housed the local library set up by his wife Lady Meux.

Prior to 1889 the building was in a sorry state and in danger of being taken down. The refurbishment removed the shuttering from around the columns, installed more windows at each end and removal of the second floor which was used for storage. The “Blind House”, under the stairs, used to hold drunks while they sobered up, was also removed.

Town Hall - WB045 - Old Museum without end windows and bottom end boarded up (from a glass plate negative) small

The small hut on the left is thought to be where the market was run from. The gun from Sebastapol can be seen in front of the Town Hall. The large building to the left currently holds Lloyds Bank.