Jubilee Hall - Melbourne Street

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Jubilee Hall - Melbourne Street

Bratton’s Jubilee Hall was built to commemorate Queen Victoria’s Golden Jubilee in 1887. It was built as a community meeting hall in Bratton, “for their amusement, pleasure, instruction and advantage”, on land signed over by Lord Bath on 2nd August 1887.

Originally it had none of the amenities that it enjoys today. It wasn’t until 1960 that running water was installed following complaints to the Parish Council from the WI. The local paper reported the event on 21st October 1960, thus:

‘Last Saturday, six men and a small boy were seen vigorously digging the necessary trench. At the end of a strenuous afternoon, fortified by cups of tea, the mission was accomplished. Water flowed from a tap in the kitchen sink after 80 years. They also repaired the fence and unstopped a drain. Darkness descended as six men and a small boy trudged home, tired but content in the knowledge of a job well done. In a few hours a job was done that had waited while men invented motor cars, wireless, television, atom bombs and rockets to the moon, with two world wars thrown in. Such is progress.’

Further improvements were made to the Hall when it was extended in 2002, for HM The Queen Elizabeth II’s Golden Jubilee, with local fundraising boosted by a grant of £250,000 from the National Lottery.

There are two carved stone plaques on the outside wall commemorating the two Jubilees. In 2022 these were joined by three mosaics, designed and crafted by members of the local community, to commemorate HM The Queen’s Platinum Jubilee. Little could Elizabeth II have known, when she acceded to the throne on 6th February 1952 at the age of 25, that she would surpass her Great Great Grandmother’s record-breaking reign to be the first British monarch to celebrate 70 years on the throne.

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Bratton History Association.

The Bratton History Association aims to provide all those curious about local history with an opportunity to meet, exchange ideas, and discover more about the history of Bratton and Wiltshire. Activities include monthly meetings, talks by professional historians, visits to places of interest to historians, and our own local history project.

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