The medieval manor house and church were situated on the flat land which now forms Sheldon School's playing fields.

Dedicated to Saint Nicholas, it was designed by the famous Bath architect John Wood and is supposed to contain recycled material from the earlier church.

From 1875 a private venture grammar school existed in Chippenham, conducted in St. Mary Street by a Mr. Wilson and from 1883 by Mr.

Subjects included Shorthand, Animal Physiology, Chemistry, Physics, Hygiene, Carpentry and Dressmaking.

Tuck, in addition, gave talks on Wiltshire history and nature study; he also served as town councillor and was Mayor of Chippenham from 1931 to 1932.

The curriculum included Latin, French, Science, History, Geography, Grammar, Book-keeping, Shorthand, Arithmetic, Writing, Geometry and Freehand Drawing.

22 girls were admitted at opening, from the schools of Mrs Parry (Market Place), Miss Alexander (Monkton Hill), Mrs White (Marshfield Road), from private tuition and from local National and British schools.

In addition to Mr Edward Newall Tuck the headmaster, the staff included three masters and one mistress; there were 99 pupils.

[7] In addition to the buildings and playground, four acres of adjoining land were rented for playing fields.

From 1905, girls from elementary schools attended Cookery classes at the Cocklebury Road site.

In addition to the yearly fees paid by pupils, the school was financed by County and Government grants.

Hardenhuish Park was purchased from the Clutterbuck family by Wiltshire County Council in order to implement the educational requirements of the growing town.

In 1938, the Secondary Grammar School moved from Cocklebury Road to new buildings (since demolished), erected on the east side of Hardenhuish House.

In late 1940 and early 1941 the school took in a large number of evacuees from Wanstead, East London, who had already spent a year in Gloucester.

In 1946, Eric Minter was appointed the headmaster at Chippenham County Secondary Modern School.

In 1956, with pupil numbers at 547 (102 of these in the sixth form), constant growth of the area saw the major development of a new secondary modern school for girls to the south of Hardenhuish Church.

[3] In 1958, a field was purchased at the Folly to enable an approach road to be made to serve the new secondary schools.

In 1959, a secondary modern, Chippenham Boys' High School, was constructed lower down Hardenhuish Park.

[14] In 1960, more Grammar School buildings were erected behind Hardenhuish House due to the continual growth of Chippenham.

The three schools occupied some 40 acres of Hardenhuish Park and some 2,000 boys and girls attended from the Borough and from the district within a radius of about eight miles.

The headmaster George Morgan chose the name "Sheldon" (once a medieval village, then a manor), to reflect the school's having become coeducational.

Sheldon became the first school in Wiltshire to gain the national Investors in People Award, recognising the quality of staff training and development.

It also achieved the new Sportsmark award for the "outstanding quality of physical education and sporting provision", one of only 400 schools nationally to receive the accolade.

In 2000, Sheldon was identified as "excellent" by Ofsted (Her Majesty's Chief Inspector of Schools In England).

It had its third "outstanding" Ofsted report, the only comprehensive school in the south west to have achieved this accolade.

In 2006, Sheldon was re-designated Specialist School Status which helped to enrich and transform the scientific aspects of numerous subject areas.

In June 2011, 40 sixth formers contributed to a survey carried out by The Chippenham Vision[17] for the Spatial Planning Team at Wiltshire County Council,[18] to assess opinions.

Voting was on a range of key local issues in a questionnaire produced by The Chippenham Stakeholder Workshop, in September 2010.

This will ensure local people continue to have an integral role in shaping plans which will affect them and their communities".

It also mentioned that "To improve further, the inspectors highlighted the need for the very good teaching observed in the classroom to be taken to an even higher level".