Genealogy Australia

The market town of Hungerford has been greatly influenced by its position, lying as it does on the Bath Road, the Kennet and Avon Canal and the Great Western Railway. The coaching era brought prosperity to which the canal added after 1810. The railway, however, had the opposite effect, by taking trade and people to bigger towns to the east. The second half of the 19th century was a testing time for Hungerford, though it was spared the worst of Victorian redevelopments, but from the early 20th century it has seen a resurgence of prosperity and growth.