IT is amazing how many famous people have lived in Marlborough and whose various quests in life helped change history.

A total of nine places where some of these famous people lived have been marked with blue plaques, which also record the sites of famous events.

Going on a circular walk to look at all the plaques is a good way of seeing the town.

A leaflet called Marlborough A Town Walk, is available from the library and Marlborough Town Council offices.

It lists where the plaques can be discovered and gives a brief run-down on the town's architecture.

Probably the most unrecognised characters whose names are recorded on the plaques are the two inventor brothers Thomas and Walter Hancock who share a plaque at 3 and 4 High Street.

Thomas Hancock was the inventor of the process known as vulcanisation that made sticky rubber gum useable.

He later went into partnership with a Scot called Mackintosh and to this day we wear "macs".

Walter Hancock was the inventor of the steam passenger road carriage, one of the first ever road vehicles.

The plaque on the front of the town library records that it was formerly St Peter's School where Eglantyne Jebb, founder of Save The Children, taught.

At 29 The Green there is a plaque recording that author of Lord of the Flies, William Golding, was brought up there. It's likely that much of his book was based on his own childhood experiences in Marlborough.

A plaque in St Peter's Church made redundant in the 1970s and now a community centre records that Cardinal Thomas Wolsey, later Lord Chancellor of England, was ordained there in 1498.

At 48 High Street a plaque records that the site was the home of a tanner where it's believed the Great Fire of 1653 that consumed the town was started.

Another plaque commemorates the Battle of Marlborough, a civil war clash in which 53 houses were destroyed.