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Godalming

Coordinates: 51°11′N 0°37′W / 51.18°N 0.61°W / 51.18; -0.61
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Godalming
Market town and Civil parish
Church of St. Peter & St. Paul, Godalming
Godalming is located in Surrey
Godalming
Godalming
Location within Surrey
Area9.68 km2 (3.74 sq mi)
Population21,804 (Civil Parish 2011)[1] or 22,689 as to its Built-up Area[2]
• Density2,252/km2 (5,830/sq mi)
OS grid referenceSU9744
• London30.5 miles (49.1 km)
Civil parish
  • Godalming
District
Shire county
Region
CountryEngland
Sovereign stateUnited Kingdom
Post townGODALMING
Postcode districtGU7
Dialling code01483
PoliceSurrey
FireSurrey
AmbulanceSouth East Coast
UK Parliament
List of places
UK
England
Surrey
51°11′N 0°37′W / 51.18°N 0.61°W / 51.18; -0.61

Godalming /ˈɡɒdəlmɪŋ/ is a historic market town, civil parish and administrative centre of the Borough of Waverley in Surrey, England, 4 miles (6.4 km) south-south-west of Guildford and 30.5 mi (49.1 km) south-west of London. It traverses the River Wey in the Greensand Ridge – a hilly, wooded part of London's Metropolitan Green Belt. In 1881, it was the world's first place to have public electricity supplies and electric street lighting.[3]

The town has visual appeal, favourable transport links and high proportion of private housing.[4] In 2007 it was voted fourth-best UK area in which to live.[5] Waverley borough, which includes Godalming, was judged in 2013 to have the highest quality of life in Britain,[6] and in 2016 to be the most prosperous.[7]

Godalming shares a three-way twinning with Joigny in France and Mayen in Germany. There are friendship links with the US state of Georgia (James Oglethorpe of Godalming founded the colony of Georgia) and with Moscow.

Etymology

The root God derives from the Gothic endonymn 𐌲𐌿𐍄𐌰, now known to us as Goth. It shares similarities with the Old Prussian [a] and Lithuanian [b] cognates of the word, suggesting the origin of the East Germanic people who settled there before the Anglo-Saxons.

The suffix -al is the Middle English cognate of the Old English prefix el- which means "foreign," "strange," "different" or "other." It was likely originally used in the descriptive context as el-helma

Helma is the Old English word for "those that till (the land), i.e. "farmer."

The suffix -ing is a cognate of inge, an ethnonym for the Ingaevones.[c]

History

Pre-1300

The spire of Church of St. Peter & St. Paul with Charterhouse School visible in the distance

The town has existed since Saxon times (see also Godalming (hundred)), and probably earlier. It is mentioned in the will of King Alfred the Great in 899, where it and Guildford are gifted to Alfred's nephew, Æthelwold. The name itself has Saxon origins: "Godhelms Ingus", roughly translated as "the family of Godhelm", and probably referring to an early lord of the manor.

Godalming grew in size partly due to its location halfway between Portsmouth and London, which encouraged traders to set up stalls and inns for travellers.[citation needed]

Godalming appears in 1086 Domesday Book as Godelminge, and held by William the Conqueror. Its Domesday assets were two churches (both held by Ranulf Flambard) worth 12s, three mills worth £2 1s 8d, 25 ploughs, 40 acres (16 hectares) of meadow, and woodland worth 103 hogs – totalling £34.[9] Its population was roughly 400. The manor belonged to the King, but a few centuries later it was in the hands of the Bishop of Salisbury under a charter from King Edward I of England.[10]

1300–1800

In 1300, the town gained the right to hold a weekly market and an annual fair. Its major industry at the time was woollen cloth, which fed Godalming's prosperity over the next few centuries, until a sudden decline in the 17th century. Then people applied their skills instead to the latest knitting and weaving technology and began producing stockings in a variety of materials, and later to leatherwork.

A willingness to shift industries meant that Godalming continued to thrive. For example, papermaking was adopted in the 17th century and paper was still made there in the 20th century. The quarrying of Bargate stone also provided important income, as did passing trade: Godalming was a popular stopping point for stagecoaches and the Mail coach between Portsmouth and London. In 1764, trade received another additional boost from early canalisation of the river, linking the town to Guildford and from there to the River Thames and London on the Wey and Godalming Navigations.

In 1726 a Godalming maidservant called Mary Toft hoaxed the town into believing she had given birth to rabbits. The foremost physicians of the day came to witness the freak event and for a brief time the story caused a national sensation. Eventually Toft was found out after a porter was caught smuggling a dead rabbit into her chamber; she confessed to inserting at least 16 rabbits into herself and faking their birth. Toft died and was buried in Godalming in 1763.[11]

Court testimony of 1764 attests to how purchasing one of the mills in Godalming and dealing in corn and flour brought a substantial income.[12]

From 1800

So successful was Godalming that in the early 19th century it was much larger than Guildford, and by 1851 the population had passed 6,500.[citation needed] Already it was becoming a popular residence for commuters,[citation needed], as it had been connected to London by rail in 1849 and to Portsmouth in 1859. Today Godalming railway station stands on the Portsmouth Direct Line. The first mayor of Godalming was Henry Marshall.[n 1]

When James John Hissey, the English topographer and travel writer, passed through the town at the turn of the twentieth century, he was not very complimentary about the town, saying:

We reached the town of Godalming. I had an idea – how I came about it I cannot say – that Godalming was a pleasant and picturesque town; my drive through it effectually got rid of that idea. I saw nothing pleasant or picturesque about it, even allowing for the determined and depressing drizzle that dulled the outlook. Perhaps I saw things crookedy on that day, but to me, certainly, Godalming looked a one-streeted affair of commonplace houses and shops, with not even a feature amongst the lot worth noticing, not even its old market-house.[13]

Public electricity supply

Introduction of street lighting to Godalming, November 1881 (from The Graphic)

Godalming claimed world attention in September 1881 as the first town in the world to install a public electricity supply.[14] It was Calder and Barrett who installed a Siemens AC Alternator and dynamo, powered by a waterwheel at Westbrook Mill, on the River Wey. There were several supply cables, some laid in gutters, which fed seven arc lights and 34 Swan incandescent lights. Floods in late 1881 caused problems and later Calder and Barrett withdrew from the contract.[15] It was taken over by Siemens, under which the supply system grew and several technical problems were solved. But in 1884, the whole town reverted to gas lighting as Siemens failed to tender for a contract to light the town.[16] This followed a survey they undertook that failed to show adequate support for the business to be viable. Siemens had also lost money on the scheme in the early years, but was prepared to stay on in order to gain experience. Electricity returned to the town on January 1, 1903.[17]

Geography

Civil parishes in the borough of Waverley

Guildford is 4 mi (6 km) north-north-east[18] and London 30.5 mi (49.1 km) north-east of Godalming. The Weald, a remnant forest of small wooded settlements, adjoins the town to the south-west. The North Downs Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty is 2.9 mi (4.7 km) north of the town centre.[18]

The next railway stations up and down the line are at Farncombe, which has a single residential street connection to Godalming across a strip of Lammas lands, but remains part of the town, and Milford, separated by a green buffer and less dependent in shopping and education.[19]

Elevations, geology and soil

Elevations vary between 36 m (118 ft) AOD by the Guildford Road Rugby Union ground and Broadwater lake at the River Wey's exit from Godalming into Peasmarsh, Shalford, and 106 m (347.76 ft) AOD where Quarter Mile meets Hambledon Road (both residential) in the south-east. Hurtmore Road is also residential: Upper Green/Hurtmore is at 102 m (334.64 ft) AOD. Immediately north and south of the town centre, steep hills reach 95 m (311.67 ft) AOD from 40-45m (131.23-147.63 ft) AOD in the town centre itself.[18]

In rock and mineral structure, the soil is Gault Clay superimposed by Upper Greensand, Claygate Beds and Bagshot Sands. Throughout the narrow east–west middle valley of Godalming and its wide north-east suburbs (Farncombe and Catteshall), the rocky head geological deposit is also found: angular rocks and soil derived locally from extensive frost-shattering and subsequent movement of the material down valley slopes.[20]

There is mainly slightly acid, free-draining soil, for instance on the upper slopes of Godalming, while the lower parts have slowly permeable loamy/clayey, slightly acid, but base-rich soil. This includes the town centre.[21]

Local government

Surrey County Council

Surrey County Council, headquartered in Reigate, is elected every four years. Godalming is represented by two councillors.[22]

Election Member[22]

Ward

2017 Penny Rivers Godalming North
2021 Paul Follows Godalming South, Milford and Witley

Waverley Borough Council

The southeast façade of Godalming Borough Hall in 2016

The town is divided into five wards; Binscombe, Central and Ockford, Charterhouse, Farncombe and Catteshall, and Holloway.[23] Godalming has 10 representatives governing the Borough of Waverley, headquartered in Godalming:

Election Member[24]

Ward

2019 Paul Rivers Godalming Binscombe
2019 Nick Palmer Godalming Binscombe
2017 Paul Follows Godalming Central and Ockford
2019 Anne-Marie Rosoman Godalming Central and Ockford
2019 Steve Williams Godalming Charterhouse
2019 Steve Cosser Godalming Charterhouse
2019 Penny Rivers Godalming Farncombe and Catteshall
2019 George Wilson Godalming Farncombe and Catteshall
2019 Joan Heagin Godalming Holloway
2010 Peter Martin Godalming Holloway

Godalming Town Council

See Godalming Town Council website

Landmarks

The Pepperpot, Godalming's former town hall
17th Century Gable Ends

Godalming Town Council's area has 138 listed buildings, of which 82 are within the town centre itself, and 18 of which are monuments.[19] These include Tudor timber framed buildings, 17th-century brickwork buildings and a wide selection of other buildings. One of its most famous landmarks is 'The Pepperpot' which is Godalming's old town hall.

Significant buildings in the town include Edwin Lutyens's Grade II* listed Red House,[25] and an English public school, Charterhouse, which stands 0.7 mi (1.1 km) from the town centre, on Charterhouse Hill, which is half-separated from Frith Hill by a steep ravine. Its main building is Grade II listed[26] and the chapel, built by Sir Giles Gilbert Scott, is Grade II* listed.[27]

Winkworth Arboretum, a few miles to the south, has a collection of rare trees and shrubs.

Town halls

The 19th-century town hall, nicknamed The Pepperpot due to its cupola, is a distinctive octagonal building in the High Street. Its uniqueness has made it emblematic of the town. Built in 1814, it took over from the medieval Old Market House, which had held the site since the early Middle Ages. It was in this Market House and its predecessors that the local Hundred Court met and discussed local matters for over a thousand years. The upstairs rooms continued to be used for civic gatherings until 1908. The Pepperpot later housed the town museum and continues to be used as a public function room. The arched area at street level has been used as a market place.[28] Its successor, Godalming Borough Hall, fronts onto Bridge Street.[29]

Jack Phillips memorial cloister and gardens

The radio operator of RMS Titanic, Jack Phillips, was born and lived in Farncombe, worked in Godalming and was then at sea. He is famed for remaining at his post, sending repeated distress calls, until the ship sank.[30] Phillips is remembered in several ways around the town, including a section of Godalming Museum, a memorial fountain, a cloister and garden walk near the church, and a public house named in his honour.

Transport

Godalming wharf at the end of the Navigation

Rail

Godalming railway station is on the Portsmouth Direct Line between London Waterloo and Portsmouth, served by South Western Railway.[31]

Road

Roads running through or close to Godalming are:[32][33]

The town is served by buses between the town centre and the main residential areas provided by Arriva Southern Counties and Stagecoach South. A community transport service is provided by "Hoppa". Chaired through difficult early days by Brian Richards,[34] Waverley Hoppa has burgeoned into a low-price provider of minibus and MPV personalised transport for the elderly, the disabled, the young and other travellers with problems.

Air

Godalming lies almost equidistant, 31 mi (50 km), between Heathrow and Gatwick, the two main international airports in South East England. Fairoaks and Farnborough are the closest airfields, but no scheduled services are available from them.

Waterways

The Godalming Navigation terminates at the Bridge Road bridge by the United Church.[35]

Localities

There is residential accommodation in the town centre and adjoining neighbourhoods: east Catteshall to the east, Aaron's Hill and Ockford Ridge to the west, Farncombe, Charterhouse and Frith Hill to the north, and Holloway Hill, Busbridge and Crownpits to the south. Sometimes Milford is classed as a suburb of Godalming.

In general the southern roads towards Busbridge and western ones towards Hurtmore, by Charterhouse School, are the neighbourhoods with the highest average housing prices.[36]

Catteshall

Catteshall is a directly attached neighbourhood and commercial estate in the east of Godalming civil parish, formerly a hamlet between Godalming and the villages of Unstead and Thorncombe Street. Catteshall Manor is at the top of the hill and the former Ram Cider House at the bottom. The name is thought to come from Gattes Hill – a gate to the hill. Two buildings are listed: Ram Cider House and Catteshall Grange, as the manor house is on the higher land now in Busbridge Civil Parish.[19]

Catteshall houses high-tech firms such as Cloud Computing Provider MTI Technology, the business data specialists The Content Group, and the new Surrey Data Park, home to Aegis Data Centre.

Frith Hill

Immediately north of the Lammas lands, Frith Hill is a hillside and hilltop residential neighbourhood that includes seven listed residential buildings: a converted water tower liked by the architectural expert Nicholas Pevsner, two small cemetery chapels, railings and gates form three separate Grade II listings on the town-side hill slope.[19]

The Red House, Frith Hill

The Grade II* Red House was built in 1899 by architect Edwin Lutyens, using Flemish bond brickwork, for a retired clergyman and school housemaster for nearby Charterhouse School. It has been described as "an early seminal work by Lutyens".[25][37]

Binscombe

Formerly a hamlet distinct from Farncombe and with closer links to Compton, Binscombe expanded from the 1930s onwards with the addition of the Binscombe Housing Estate. It predates both Godalming and Farncombe as a settlement, originating in the Iron Age if not earlier, and continuing into the Roman era as a likely villa site with an associated cemetery. As such it may have had links with the Compton Roman villa and the Roman temple at Wanborough, and so have constituted a comparative local hub within sparsely settled Roman Surrey. Continuity between this and later Saxon settlement is not clear. There is possible evidence of the villa dwelling coming to a violent end.[38]

The name Binscombe, deriving from 'Budenscumbe' or Bȳda's/Bȳden's valley, is first attested in 1227.[39] A notable manorial lord of Binscombe, traditionally linked with the Westbrook estate in Godalming, was Theophilus Oglethorpe (1650–1702), soldier, MP and Jacobite.[40]

Binscombe Farm is of medieval origin. There is a nearby Quaker burial ground in use from 1660 to 1790, where the Quaker leader George Fox preached.[41] A number of other houses date from the 16th century or earlier. Binscombe's centre is designated a conservation area of special architectural or historic interest.

A casualty of the First World War, Charles Wheatley of the Royal Field Artillery, who died aged 28 in a training exercise accident in the field below Binscombe Ridge on 15 March 1915, is buried in Eashing Cemetery.

Binscombe has a church which opened in 1965, a school, a doctors' surgery and adjacent pharmacy, and a parade of shops, including a dentist's and barber's. It appears never to have had a public house, although an "off-sales beerhouse" opened in the late 19th century, gradually evolving into a village shop, which closed in 1964.[42] However, the White Hart in Bourne Road can be said to be within Binscombe's boundaries.

Binscombe is adjacent to the Charterhouse area and its famous public school, but separated from it by a steep offshoot of the North Downs.

Binscombe features as a location in The Hog's Back Mystery (1933) by the detective-fiction writer Freeman Wills Croft. Binscombe is also the main location in John Whitbourn's Binscombe Tales (1998), a Twilight Zone style collection of stories.

Education

Educational establishments in Godalming include:

Independent schools

Statue of Thomas Sutton on Founder's Court at Charterhouse School
  • Charterhouse School is one of England's foremost historic schools. Along with Eton College and Harrow School, it was one of nine schools investigated for poor conditions and financial mismanagement under the terms of the Clarendon Commission established in 1861. The subsequent Public Schools Act passed in 1868 gave rise to the common term of reference and to an improved governance framework for seven independent schools. The school was founded in 1611 in a former Carthusian monastery near Smithfield in London and relocated to Godalming in 1872.[43] School buildings in the 200-acre estate include sporting and academic facilities and a chapel designed by Sir Giles Gilbert Scott. The Sixth Form is mixed (2:1 boys/girls) and most pupils board.[44]
  • Prior's Field School is an independent girls' boarding school founded at the beginning of the 20th century by Julia Huxley.[45] There are 450 pupils of which about a quarter are boarders (weekly or termly). The main entry points to the school are at ages 11, 13 and 16. Its most recent ISI inspection in March 2011 awarded the school the top rating, excellent, in all nine categories.[46]
  • St Hilary's School is an independent preparatory school for boys 2½–7 (around 90) and girls 2½–11 (around 200).[47]

College

  • Godalming College is in the Holloway Hill area of Godalming. Founded in 1975 on the campus of Godalming Grammar School, it caters for 16–19-year-olds and is state maintained.[48] Awarded Beacon status in 2006, it was the best performing state school for AS/A levels in the Surrey area in 2004; its Ofsted report for 2005 graded the college as "outstanding" in six of the seven key areas and "good" in the 7th.[49]

State secondary schools

Numbers in brackets show the percentage of pupils achieving 5 A–C GCSEs in total, including the key subjects of maths and English.[50]

  • Broadwater School in the Farncombe area of Godalming, caters for young people from 11 to 16 and has no sixth form (42, 29).
  • Rodborough Technology College in the village of Milford on the outskirts of Godalming, caters for young people from 11 to 16 and has no sixth form (64, 59).

State primary schools (including grant-aided)

All primary schools in Godalming are coeducational. Infant schools cover the age range 4–7, junior schools cover 8–11.

The figures shown in brackets are value-added (VA) measures of how pupils' performance has improved and aggregate score (AGG), the summed percentages of pupils achieving expected levels in English, maths and science (maximum possible 300).[51]

  • Loseley Fields Primary School (VA 98.9, AGG 195) is in Binscombe.
  • Busbridge C of E Aided Junior School, built over 100 years ago by members of nearby Busbridge Church, with which it retains close links. It admits 60 children a year, with preference for Christians, in particular children of Busbridge/Hambledon parish members (VA 100.9, AGG 279).
  • Busbridge County Infants School in Hambledon Road, Godalming, caters for some 150 children (2007).[52]
  • Chandler C of E Junior School in Witley civil parish caters for some 330 children.
  • Godalming Junior School in the Farncombe area of Godalming[53] has 230 children in eight classes (four per year, VA 100.6, AGG 275).
  • Milford School is an infants school.[54]
  • Moss Lane School is an infants school.[55]
  • St Edmunds Catholic Primary School is a voluntary-aided parish school covering primary and junior ranges (4–11). It has links with St Edmund's Church in Godalming and St Joseph's Church in Milford. A 2005 Ofsted report called it as "a good school with a well deserved reputation of providing a good standard of education".[56](VA 100.1, AGG 282)
  • Witley C of E Infant School is an infants school.[57]

Earlier schools

Community

The Kings Arms
at the centre of Godalming
Display in the Godalming Museum

Places of worship

The Parish Church of St Peter and St Paul's meets in a Grade I listed building. It has an early Saxon chancel and a Norman tower.[60] The Roman Catholic,[61] Quaker,[62] and Unitarian places of worship,[63] the former Congregational chapel,[64] and former Salvation Army hall[65] are all Grade II listed buildings. Godalming currently contains places of worship belonging to five denominations:

Sport

  • Godalming Angling Society[70] was founded in 1881 and has fishing rights to six lakes and the River Wey from Lower Eashing to Guildford.
  • Godalming Town F. C. currently plays in the Ryman Division One South, level 8, of English football.[71] It was formed in 1950 and plays home games at Wey Court, Meadrow.
  • Old Carthusians F.C. of Charterhouse won the FA Cup in 1881 and later several FA amateur cups. It was formed in 1876 and plays home games at Charterhouse School Playing Fields.
  • Cricket has been played in Godalming since at least 1767.
  • Guildford Rugby Club (formed in 2002 by the merger of Guildford & Godalming RFC and Old Guildfordians RFC) plays in the London 2 South West league at the Broadwater Sports Club in Godalming.
  • Guildford Hockey Club is based at Broadwater School. The men's 1XI compete in the England Hockey League.[72]
  • Flat Green Lawn Bowls: Godalming and Farncomb Bowls Club plays at the Burys in central Godalming, Holloway Hill Bowls Club at Holloway Recreation Ground, and Milford Bowls Club at Chapel Lane, Milford.
  • Several Contract Bridge clubs play at various venues in the town.

Music and theatre

  • Godalming Band[73] has been active in its current form since 1937, there having been a previous town band established in 1844. The main band and Youth Band play at various community events and concerts throughout the year, some at the town's bandstand, in aid of the band and other local charities.
  • The amateur Godalming Theatre Group puts on three shows a year at the Ben Travers Theatre, Charterhouse School, Godalming: a spring musical, an autumn drama or comedy, and a Christmas pantomime or show. It also runs a youth theatre group.[74]

Community centres

  • The Denningberg Centre for the Elderly is named after Danny Denningberg (1923−2011), a local politician granted the Honorary Freedom of the Borough of Waverley in 2007. Denningberg was a community activist and fund-raiser who served on Godalming Borough Council in 1954 and then again from 1963 continuously through the formation of Waverley until 2003, when he retired. Denningberg was also Mayor of Godalming and Mayor of Waverley at times during his public career.[75][76]
  • The Wilfrid Noyce Community Centre in Godalming is named after Wilfrid Noyce (1917–1962), a master at Charterhouse and a mountaineer, who was on the expedition that made the first ascent of Mount Everest in 1953.[77]
  • The Clockhouse, or Milford and Villages Day Centre, is a day centre for people over 50. The money to build it in 1997 was raised from charitable donations and local fundraising.[78]

Godalming is home to The National Autistic Society (NAS) resource centre for the south east and the NAS horizons day centre.

Town lottery

The Godalming Town Lottery "GOLO" was launched in Godalming on 1 November 2008, by the Go-Godalming Association, a member of the Lotteries Council. Tickets are sold at local shops and pubs and the draw takes place on the last Saturday of the month. The first was on Godalming Town Day, 29 November 2008, at the Pepperpot. It is considered to be the first town lottery of its kind. Profits are donated to local causes, the first being the bandstand roof fund.[79]

Shopping

In a charter dated 7 June 1300, King Edward I granted the Bishop of Salisbury the right to hold a weekly market and an annual fair in the town.[80] Godalming remains a typical market town, with a market every Friday and a selection of independent and national retailers selling a wide variety of goods. There are several pubs, restaurants and cafes, occasional visiting French and Italian markets, and an annual Godalming Food Festival.[citation needed]

  • In Charles Dickens's novel Nicholas Nickleby, Nicholas and Smike walk to Godalming from London on their way to Portsmouth, and stay the night: "To Godalming they came at last, and here they bargained for two humble beds, and slept soundly."
  • The comic novel The Return of Reginald Perrin, by David Nobbs, contains the following: "Note: It is believed that this book mentions Godalming more than any other book ever written, including A Social, Artistic and Economic History of Godalming by E. Phipps-Blythburgh." The novel was the second in a trilogy, all of which were adapted for television.
  • James Bond's visit to Shrublands health farm in the ninth James Bond novel Thunderball was inspired by its author Ian Fleming's own 1956 stay at the Enton Hall health farm in Witley near Godalming (the health farm's advertisements had its location as Godalming).[81][82] Ian Fleming's Bond short story Quantum of Solace referred to Godalming as a venue for retired colonial civil servants with memories of postings to places "that no one at the local golf club would have heard about or would care about."[83]
  • In the novel Dracula by Bram Stoker, the character Arthur Holmwood is the only son and heir of Lord Godalming and later succeeds to the title.
  • Much of the action in Bulldog Drummond by Sapper takes place in Godalming.
  • In The Rose of Tibet (1962) by thriller writer, Lionel Davidson, two characters are described as talking "for hours" of a shared link with Godalming. In a somewhat "backhanded compliment", their exotic (and perilous) Tibetan location is held to be "All a long, long way from damp, soft Godalming with its mushy autumnal leaves underfoot and its dark green trains commuting to Waterloo."
  • The 2016 album Refresh! by Euros Childs features a song titled "Godalming".

The town's typically English appearance, attractive shop fronts and streets have led to its use as a shooting location for films and television.[84] In February 2006, High Street and Church Street, which runs from the Pepperpot to the parish church, appeared in the production of The Holiday.[84]

Demography and housing

2011 Census Homes
Output area Detached Semi-detached Terraced Flats and apartments Caravans/temporary/mobile homes shared between households[1]
(Civil Parish) 2,752 2,858 1,663 1,658 1 22

The average level of accommodation in the region composed of detached houses was 28%, the average that was apartments was 22.6%.

2011 Census Key Statistics
Output area Population Households % Owned outright % Owned with a loan hectares[1]
(Civil Parish) 21,804 8,954 32.8% 36.0% 968

The proportion of households in the civil parish who owned their home outright compares to the regional average of 35.1%. The proportion who owned their home with a loan compares to the regional average of 32.5%. The remaining percentage is made up of rented dwellings (plus a negligible percentage of households living rent-free).

Notable people

See also alumni of Godalming Grammar School and List of notable Old Carthusians

Those born here include: James Oglethorpe (born 1696), founder of the colony of Georgia; Julius Caesar (born 1830), cricketer; Aldous Huxley (born 1894), writer; Nick Clarke (born 1948), radio journalist and presenter; Stephen Milligan (born 1948), journalist and politician; and Mick Mills (born 1949), footballer.

The architect Sir Edwin Lutyens began work in 1896 on a house at Munstead Wood, Godalming, for the garden designer Gertrude Jekyll. She died in 1932 and is buried in the churchyard of Busbridge Church, Godalming, next to her brother.

In the 19th century, judge James Wilde, 1st Baron Penzance, lived at Eashing Park, Godalming. Major Cyril Raikes MC lived here. Vere Monckton-Arundell, Viscountess Galway, was born here in 1859.

In the 20th century, George Mallory, who later made a fatal attempt to scale Mount Everest, taught at Charterhouse School, and then lived in the town after marrying Ruth Turner. He died during the 1924 attempt, but Ruth and their three children remained in the area.

W. H. C. Romanis (1889–1972) eminent surgeon and medical author.

Sir William Babtie, recipient of the Victoria Cross, lived at Ockford House, Godalming.

The composer and music critic Peter Warlock (d. 1930) is buried in Godalming.

In the late 20th century, actor Terry-Thomas, comedic actor Terry Scott, actor Christopher Timothy and the singer Alvin Stardust resided in the town.

The band Genesis was formed in 1967 by Peter Gabriel and Tony Banks while they were pupils at Charterhouse School.

Actor Sam Worthington was born in Godalming in 1976, before moving to Australia at a young age.

Billy Dainty a British comedian, dancer, physical comedian and pantomime and television star lived in Godalming. He died on 19 November 1986, aged 59, of prostate cancer at his home, Cobblers, in Godalming.

Significant people currently living in the town include the actress Rachel Hurd-Wood, Great Britain field hockey player Dan Fox, Scottish international footballer John Hansen, mathematics author Matt Parker and his wife, the physics professor Lucie Green, chess grandmaster and author Simon Williams, and sociologist Sara Arber. Architect Elspeth Beard, who lives in the renovated town water tower, was the first English woman to motorcycle around the world. Paul Merrett, a chef who has appeared several times on British TV, was a pupil at Rodborough.[85] Jean-Jacques Burnel, bass player of The Stranglers, grew up in Godalming.

Freedom of Godalming

The following have received the Freedom of the Town of Godalming.

  • John Young: 3 May 2012[86]
  • Zadie Caudle: 15 March 2019[87]

Notes

  1. ^ The prefix gud- as used in place-names.
  2. ^ The word Gùdas - meaning "Polish" or "Belarusian" - transferred to the peoples that replaced the Goths south of their territory. A similar geographic clue can be found in the place-names Sarre and Saaremaa, found on the Isle of Thanet and in Estonia, respectively.
  3. ^ A Germanic cultural group living along the North Sea coast in the areas of Jutland, Holstein, and Frisia in classical antiquity .[8]

Notes and references

Notes
  1. ^ Henry Marshall founded Marshalls Solicitors in 1831.
References
  1. ^ a b c Key Statistics; Quick Statistics: Population Density Archived 6 January 2009 at the Wayback Machine United Kingdom Census 2011 Office for National Statistics Retrieved 21 November 2013
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