From the stunningly restored judge's apartments to the dingy servants' quarters below you can explore the gaslit world of a most unusual Victorian household . Damp cells remind you of the building's true purpose, along with the vast courtroom where your imagination in captured by the echoing trial of William Morgan, local duck thief.Visitors to the building are accompanied by an eavesdropping audiotour of voices from the past; you will hear their tale, from Mary the hardworking maid, to Reverend Richard Lister Venables, Chairman of the Magistrates and employer of the famous diarist Francis Kilvert.
The sea has played an important role in the history of the town and this is acknowledged in two galleries within the museum, the `Ebb and Flow' exhibition and the Maritime Gallery. The predominant feature of this gallery is the history of the lifeboat in the town, from its first unnamed boat in 1852 (originally provided by the Shipwrecked Fishermen and mariner's Benevolent Society) up to its present brand new life boat, the Hayden Miller and its new lifeboat station.
