106 The Old Market House, and Great Fire at Marlborough. 
of the Lambes with which Sir Thomas Phillipps has kindly favored 
me; this may account for the old knight’s removal to Stratford; 
there are no memorials of the Lambe Family there, nor do they 
appear to have ever held the estate of the Dean and Chapter at 
Stratford; the Letters of Administration alluded to, seem, however, 
to decide the question as to which of Sir John’s sons continued 
the elder line of the family, and was the grandfather of Thomas 
and Meliora Lambe. 
Epwarp Witton. 
West Lavington, March 15th, 1856. 
Che Old Aarket Anse, and Great Fire 
at Marlborough. 
By F. A. Carrnineton, Esq. 
There have been, within the last three hundred years, four 
successive Market Houses in the town of Marlborough, of which 
our illustration represents the third, built in 1653, and taken down 
in 1793.1 
The earliest notice of these buildings, that the writer of the 
present article has met with, is to be found in the Chamberlains’ 
accounts of the town for the year 1575, (18th Elizabeth), which 
contain an item of extensive repairs done to the “Guildhall” in 
that year. 
This Elizabethan building appears to have been removed about 
the year 1630. There is in the Corporation books, under the date 
of April 5th, 1631, “An Order? for erecting and building a new 
Market-house ;” and in the Chamberlains’ account for that year 
is an entry— 
‘Paid for building the Market House............ 350 0 0” 
and in the following year, there is an entry of a payment of 
1 For the loan of the copper-plate, from which the Illustration is taken, the 
Society is indebted to the kindness of Mr. William C. Merriman, of Marlborough. 
2 Printed in Waylen’s ‘‘ History of Marlborough,” p. 125. 
