Wiltshire and Swindon History Centre Chippenham
The newly built Wiltshire and Swindon History Centre is located in Cocklebury Road Chippenham, SN15 3QN, located just past the railway station and Wiltshire College. It is considered your passport to the past it has a rich and diverse heritage. The new History Centre, brings together the archaeology, archive, buildings record, conservation, and museum advisory services together with the county local studies library to create a centre whose sum is much more than that of its parts.

If you are researching your ancestors or trying to find out more about a town or parish in Wiltshire or Swindon, or if you want professional advice and guidance on other heritage issues, this is the ideal place to contact or visit. A large proportion of the Lyneham history research, which is now published on this website, was sourced from this History Centre and its previous location in Trowbridge.

Local Studies Library – Wiltshire Studies
It is a major resource for the study of Wiltshire’s heritage. The Wiltshire and Swindon Archives Service and County Local Studies Library provide to the user two highly complementary resources, and the new Centre offers the chance to have a more integrated service. The Service provides specialist advice to local history societies, research groups and individuals on both research and publication. The Service also acquires and gives access to the County Historic Photograph Collection, in liaison with the Wiltshire Museum Service. The aim of the Service is to acquire, preserve and give access to publications related to Wiltshire. The collection of published Wiltshire material includes 18,000 monographs, 2,600 reels of microfilm including newspapers dating from 1736, 35,000 microfiches, over 40,000 photographs and 11,000 journals.

The Library actively collects, preserves and makes available for research all Wiltshire publications, including videos, CDs, tapes and CD-ROMS. Material on adjacent counties and extensive collections on archaeology, museology, family history, architecture and history are intensively used by heritage officers as well as being widely used by the public.

Access to services
The Wiltshire and Swindon History Centre is open to the public 9.30 am – 5.30 pm, Tuesday to Fri, excluding public holidays. These opening times primarily relate to the archives service and local studies library. Appointments are not compulsory but it is a good idea to let staff know in advance of any planned visits to make the most of the time available for research. The Centre operates a computerised user registration system, so a form of identification including name and address, is required.

The Wiltshire Buildings Record is open to the public 9.30 am – 5 pm, Tuesdays, but may be open at other times by appointment.

The Archaeology Service is open to the public, they do not have 'drop in' sessions but appointments can be made either by telephoning 01249 705503 or by email: archaeology@wiltshire.gov.uk

It is also possible to access archaeology’s Sites and Monuments Record; the archive and probate records catalogues; the Wiltshire Studies library collection and the catalogues of some museum collections on-line.

To save you some time, if you visit the Access to Archives website you will be able to search the online database to get the document reference numbers for the information you require prior to the visit. See www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/a2a for archive catalogues including those not yet available on the Wiltshire County Council site.

Wiltshire and Swindon History Centre
www.wshc.eu
Cocklebury Road
Chippenham
SN15 3QN
Email: heritageadmin@wiltshire.gov.uk
Tel: +44(0)1249 705500
Our opening times are as follows:
Tues - Fri 9.30am - 5.30pm
Sat - 9.30am - 5.00pm - last orders for viewing original documents is 1pm to be returned by 2pm.