Marlborough Town Council
Situated at The Recreation Ground, St Margaret’s Mead, Marlborough SN8 4BA. Also accessible on foot via the Salisbury Road entrance to the Recreation Ground.
The building is available to hire by room at £18/hour. There's a small car park (12 spaces), an accessible lift to all floors and free WiFi.
See the hiring form for more details and terms & conditions.
Hiring form and charges 1 April 2025 to 31 March 2026
Hiring form and charges 1 April 2026 to 31 March 2027 | Word format
To make a booking in the first instance please contact Sue Fry on 01672 512487 or email suefry@marlborough-tc.gov.uk to discuss your requirements and availability.
Facilities include:
Main/sports hall - with badminton court and large wall mirror - for indoor games, exercise classes or parties
First floor - social area with seating, a pool table and table football, a large screen TV and computers (free WiFi)
First floor - kitchen equipped with fridge freezer, cooker (separate oven & hob), microwave and dishwasher with a serving counter through to the coffee bar area
First floor - coffee bar area (with a serving counter through to kitchen)
Lower floor - meeting/classroom with large screen TV. Includes basic tea & coffee making facilities
Lower floor - changing rooms with accessible shower and toilet
Tables and chairs available to hire
Gallery
Eight cells have been constructed for male prisoners and four for female prisoners, so arranged that when there are fewer female prisoners and more of the male sex, ten can be used for the latter and two for the former, with separate corridors. Beyond that, there are movable stalls for six prisoners, for use in case of emergency. The cells are heated by hot water, and as the windows in this particular case must not be provided to open, a means of ventilation has been furnished in the window sills, through which fresh air is brought in, over the hot water pipes. An exit for foul air has been provided in each cell, connected with a ventilator on the roof. Every cell is furnished with a food trap, which falls down and forms a table to receive the prisoner's fare; there is also a peep hole, and each door is fitted with Hobb's patent cell lock. The floors are of cement concrete, there are separate lavatories for male and female prisoners, and it is a most gratifying circumstance that there is not a spot of damp in any of the cell accommodation, nor, indeed, throughout the whole building, if we except the strong room, where, owing to the difficulty of getting air to play upon the walls, they have not yet become quite dry. The cells are, in fact, quite equal to those provided in places used for the permanent detention of prisoners, and they are superior to those found in many of such buildings. The safety of the prisoners has been secured, in the event of fire, by the construction over the basement of fire proof floors in concrete, with steel girders.
Advantage has been taken of the fall in the slope of the ground to place the cell accommodation in the basement along the south side of the building, where it is well lighted by windows with direct access to the air above the ground level. It gives a massive and imposing appearance to this portion of the south front. To the police entrance here access is gained through the quaint old door of the original "blind-house" with its grim appearance and interesting associations. The large lock and curiously twisted staples of the 1653 building are again used, and from their strong and massive character they appear likely to serve their grim purpose for many generations to come. An inner lobby leads into a large waiting room for warders. It is provided with seats and heated by hot water pipes. This apartment, like many others, in the building is "contrived a double debt to pay", and will also serve as a kitchen for the preparation of teas at gatherings of a festive character; a gas stove being provided, together with water and sinks for washing-up purposes. Out of this apartment opens the strong room, which will be invaluable for the purpose of storing the borough archives and other documents of permanent interest. It is a fire-proof apartment, and is provided with Chubb's steel fire and burglar-proof door.
The Council Chamber is a spacious, light and well-proportioned room 27½ feet in length, 18 feet in width, and 15 feet in height. It is lighted at the south end by a large stone mullioned window, with the arms of the borough emblazoned in the centre. The fire-place, for use when the heating apparatus is not going, is occupied by a slow combustion grate, know, singularly enough, as "the Marlborough" which is surrounded by Rouge Royal marble, and an oak chimney piece, extending the full width of the chimney breast. There is a private door from here to the back landing, leading to the bench of the First Court, and another doorway leading to a lavatory, for the use of the jury should they be locked up for the night. The room is lighted by a handsome brass pendant, of the same type as those in the Assembly Room. As to ventilation, it will be of the most efficient type, by means of an inlet of fresh air, passing over a hot-water radiator. The aspect of the room and its surroundings are far superior to anything hitherto enjoyed by the ruling authority of the borough, and the hope has been expressed, in more than one quarter, that with dawn of a new order of things from a structural point of view there will be a corresponding advance in the dignity and tone and business-like attitude of the members as a whole.
The demolition of the old building commenced exactly two years ago, and it became once apparent when the structure had been stripped of its outer case of lath and plaster, that the movement had not taken shape a day too soon. For a more complete death-trap in the form of a public building it would be difficult to conceive. With only one means of ingress and egress, and that in a corner of the hall, by way of a wooden staircase; with no possible exit through the windows; and the whole of the "walls" composed merely of wooden studs, with lath and plaster on both sides, the escape of a crowded audience would have been impossible in the event of panic. How near we have been in recent times to a terrible catastrophe became evident on the dismantling of the cell room, where it was found that a stove pipe carried up behind the match-boarding had actually ignited and charred the internal face of the woodwork over a considerable area without the fire having been detected; the presumption being that as the space was very confined the fire died out for want of sufficient air to feed it. It occurred immediately at the foot of the staircase which formed the only exit to the building, and, had it spread during the time the hall was being used, nothing could have averted a terrible sacrifice of life under circumstances too frightful to contemplate.
