A town has existed since Saxon times (see too Godalming (hundred)), and probably earliest. These are mentioned in the may of King Alfred the Great, & a title itself hwhen Saxon origins, about translated as “a personal of Godhelm�, and probably on to one of the 1st lords of the manor.

Per instance of the 1086 Domesday survey, Godalming had leash watermills & the humans of about 400 people. At a instance, its manor belonged to the King, however two or three century years late, ownership transferred to the Bishop of Salisbury, under a charter granted by King Edward I of England.

In the season 1300, the town was granted the right to hang on to the each week market & an annual fair. Its major industry at the period was woolen material, which contributed to Godalming’s prosperity all over a next couple centuries, until a sudden decline in the 17th century. Instead, its population applied their skills to the latest knitting & weaving technology & began producing stockings around the kind of materials, & late to leatherwork.

The willingness to adapt, & move from either of these industry to an additional intended that Godalming continued to thrive. For instance, paper making was adopted in the 17th century, and was however made there in the 20th century. A quarrying of Bargate stone also provided an important source of income, when did pass trade - Godalming was the popular stopping point for stage coaches between Portsmouth and London.

Around 1764, trade received an additional boost after canalisation of a river took place, linking the town to Guildford, & from either there to the River Thames and London.

Therefore successful was Godalming, that in the early 19th century it was considerably big than today’s shire town of Guildford, and by 1851 the population experienced passed 6,500. Already, it was becoming the popular home for commuters, for it was attached to London by railway 2 years earliest, inside 1849, and to Portsmouth inside 1859. Now a town is served by Godalming railway station on the Portsmouth Direct Line.

Godalming come to globe attention around 1881, when it became the number one town in the United Kingdom to set up a public supply of electricity, and the 1st in the globe to boast electrical street lighting, caused by a dynamo at Westbrook watermill.

A hanker history of Godalming is however evident around its architecture, from either its parish church, with its Saxon chancel and Norman tower, to its 19th century town hall, nicknamed the Pepperpot. A town has as much as 230 enrolled buildings, featuring all about from either Tudor timbers to 17th century brickwork.

More important buildings include Edwin Lutyens's Red House, & one of a better known English public schools, Charterhouse stands about a mile from either the town, on the top of Charterhouse Hill. Charterhouse won a FA Cup as the Old Carthusians inside 1880 & 1881.

Winkworth Arboretum, with its collection of uncommon trees & bush, is placed two or three miles south.

Godalming is on the mainline railway between London (Waterloo) and Portsmouth.

A comical novel The Return of Reginald Perrin, by David Nobbs, contains the below footer: "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 2nd inside a trilogy, adapted to get a hit TV series: The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin.

Famous Godhelmians

Julius Caesar (Cricketer) [http://www.balchin-family.org.uk/family_history/people/admiral/index.html Admiral Sir John Balchen] James Oglethorpe James Plaisted Wilde, Baron Penzance