Yelde Hall

Town arms from 1776 on the Yelde Hall

The building was built in around 1450[2] and was originally used as a jail (in the cellar), as a courtroom (on the ground floor) and as a council chamber (upstairs).[1] The building bears a carving of the town arms with the inscription "JS 1776": the initials refer to John Scott who was the bailiff at that time.[2] The town council and burgess relocated to the Town Hall in the first half of the 19th century.[2]

The building became the offices of the Chippenham Savings Bank in 1822 and then became the drill hall for the Chippenham Volunteer Rifle Corps in 1846.[2] The unit evolved to become B Company, 2nd Volunteer Battalion, The Wiltshire Regiment in 1881 and B Company, 4th Battalion, the Duke of Edinburgh's Wiltshire Regiment in 1908.[3][4] The regiment relocated to the Little Ivy in 1911.[2] The building was also used as the headquarters of the Royal Wiltshire Yeomanry at this time.[3][5] The yeomanry moved its headquarters to Trowbridge in 1920.[5]

The Fire Brigade used the east end of the building from 1870 and then almost the whole building from 1911 to 1945.[2] After some restoration work in the 1950s, the building served as the Chippenham Museum from October 1963 until it relocated to the Market Place in 1999.[2]

The building then became the North Wiltshire Tourist Information Centre in March 2003[6] although that concern relocated to the Town Hall in February 2012.[7] It underwent a refurbishment in March 2012 and re-opened to the public as an extension of the Chippenham Museum and Heritage Centre in April 2012.[8]