Godalming is a market town and civil parish in southwest Surrey, England, around 30 miles (49 km) southwest of central London. It is in the Borough of Waverley, at the confluence of the Rivers Wey and Ock. The civil parish covers 3.74 sq mi (9.7 km2) and includes the settlements of Farncombe, Binscombe and Aaron's Hill. Much of the area lies on the strata of the Lower Greensand Group and Bargate stone was quarried locally until the Second World War.
The Borough of Waverley is a local government district with borough status in Surrey, England. The council is based in the town of Godalming. The borough also contains the towns of Farnham and Haslemere and numerous villages, including the large village of Cranleigh, and surrounding rural areas. At the 2021 Census, the population of the borough was 128,200. The borough is named after Waverley Abbey, near Farnham. Large parts of the borough are within the Surrey Hills Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty.
Shalford is a village and civil parish in the Guildford district, in Surrey, England on the A281 Horsham road immediately south of Guildford. It has a railway station which is between Guildford and Dorking on the Reading to Gatwick Airport line. In 2011 the parish had a population of 4142.
Farncombe, historically Fernecome, is a village and peripheral settlement of Godalming in Waverley, Surrey, England and is approximately 0.8 miles (1.3 km) north-east of the Godalming centre, separated by common land known as the Lammas Lands. The village of Compton lies 1.8 miles (3 km) to the northwest and Bramley 2 miles (3 km) to the east; whilst Charterhouse School is to the west. Loseley Park, in the hamlet of Littleton, lies 1 mile (1.6 km) to the north of the village.
Shackleford is a village and civil parish in the Borough of Guildford, Surrey, England centred to the west of the A3 between Guildford and Petersfield 32 miles (51 km) southwest of London and 5.2 miles (8.4 km) southwest of Guildford. Shackleford includes the localities of Eashing, Hurtmore, Norney and Gatwick.
Tilford is a village and civil parish centred at the point where the two branches of the River Wey merge in Surrey, England, 3 miles (4.8 km) south-east of Farnham. It has half of Charleshill, Elstead in its east, a steep northern outcrop of the Greensand Ridge at Crooksbury Hill on Crooksbury Common in the north and Farnham Common (woodland) Nature Reserve in the west, which has the Rural Life Living Museum. As the Greensand Ridge in its western section is in two parts, the Greensand Way has a connecting spur here to its main route running east–west to the south.
Frensham is a village in Surrey, England, next to the A287 road, 13 miles (20.9 km) WSW of Guildford, the county town. Frensham lies on the right bank of the River Wey, only navigable to canoes, shortly before its convergence with the north branch. Farnham is the nearest town, 3.5 miles (5.6 km) to the north.
Churt is a village and civil parish in the borough of Waverley in Surrey, England, about 5.5 miles (8.9 km) south of the town of Farnham on the A287 road towards Hindhead. A clustered settlement is set in areas acting as its green buffers, which include the Devil's Jumps. The west of the village slopes down to the steep edge of Whitmore Vale, which is mostly in Headley, Hampshire; at the foot of this bank is a steeply cut brook which defines the Hampshire border. There are forests and heathland by and atop the Greensand Ridge, and the hamlet of Crosswater is in the north of the parish.
Frensham Common is a large Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) heathland of 373 hectares which includes two lakes; it is owned and operated by the National Trust.
For the school in the UK see More House School, Frensham
Compton is a former village and today a semi-rural suburb centred 1 mile (1.6 km) ESE of Farnham in the Waverley district of Surrey, England and connected to Farnham by two direct urban single carriageways and green space footpaths along the Wey which in part marks the northern boundary of the area together with the A31. The area relies on Farnham for most of its modern amenities and its eastern part is rural whereas its western part is urban, with a divide where the Wey flows between the two south-eastwards.
The River Wey is a main tributary of the River Thames in south east England. Its two branches, one of which rises near Alton in Hampshire and the other in West Sussex to the south of Haslemere, join at Tilford in Surrey. Once combined, the flow is eastwards then northwards via Godalming and Guildford to meet the Thames at Weybridge. Downstream the river forms the backdrop to Newark Priory and Brooklands. The Wey and Godalming Navigations were built in the 17th and 18th centuries, to create a navigable route from Godalming to the Thames.
Bourne Wood is an area of predominantly coniferous woodland just south of Farnham, Surrey, England; the area is often used as a film location. Near to another area also used as a film location, locally it was known as The Clumps, and was called this until Forestry England changed the name in the 1950s when fire breaks were introduced. Charles Darwin may have written about the area in Appendices of Natural Selection, describing the trees in clumps. A promontory (rise) above a large heathland clearing provides views over the surrounding woodland. Much of the wood was formerly heathland at the western end of the Greensand Ridge that was developed privately during the 20th century as commercial conifer plantations. This part of the wood has been purchased by the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds and is being restored mainly to heath, with retention of some woodland of wildlife significance, as Farnham Heath nature reserve. Their aim is to benefit scarce heathland species such as nightjar, woodlark, Dartford warbler and tree pipit as well as species such as sand lizard.
Oxenford Farm is a former abbey farm, a dependency of Waverley Abbey in the civil parish of Witley, Surrey, England, with several listed buildings around a courtyard, including three by Augustus Pugin.
St Edmund's Church is the Roman Catholic parish church of Godalming, a town in the English county of Surrey. It was built in 1906 to the design of Frederick Walters and is a Grade II listed building. The church stands on a "dramatic hillside site" on the corner of Croft Road just off Flambard Way close to the centre of the town.
Meadrow Unitarian Chapel is a Unitarian chapel in the Farncombe area of Godalming, Surrey, England. It is part of the London District and South Eastern Provincial Assembly of Unitarian and Free Christian Churches, one of 16 districts within the General Assembly of Unitarian and Free Christian Churches, the umbrella organisation for British Unitarians.
Godalming Friends Meeting House is a Friends meeting house in the ancient town of Godalming in the English county of Surrey. One of many Nonconformist places of worship in the town, it dates from 1748 but houses a congregation whose roots go back nearly a century earlier. Decline set in during the 19th century and the meeting house passed out of Quaker use for nearly 60 years, but in 1926 the cause was reactivated and since then an unbroken history of Quaker worship has been maintained. Many improvements were carried out in the 20th century to the simple brick-built meeting house, which is Grade II-listed in view of its architectural and historical importance.
The former Salvation Army Hall in Godalming, Surrey, England, now an office building known as Aurum House, has been used by three religious groups since its construction c. 1830. The ancient town in the English county of Surrey has a long and diverse history of Protestant Nonconformity, and three Nonconformst denominations are represented: at first it served Congregationalists, but when they built a larger chapel in the town it passed to the Methodist Church. In the 20th century it was occupied by The Salvation Army, but it closed in 2012 and was redeveloped for commercial use. The building has been listed at Grade II for its architectural and historical importance.
The building formerly known as Godalming Congregational Church was the Congregational chapel serving the ancient town of Godalming, in the English county of Surrey, between 1868 and 1977. It superseded an earlier chapel, which became Godalming's Salvation Army hall, and served a congregation which could trace its origins to the early 18th century. The "imposing suite of buildings", on a major corner site next to the Town Bridge over the River Wey, included a schoolroom and a manse, and the chapel had a landmark spire until just before its closure in 1977. At that time the congregation transferred to the nearby Methodist chapel, which became a joint Methodist and United Reformed church with the name Godalming United Church. The former chapel then became an auction gallery before being converted into a restaurant; then in 2018 the premises were let to the Cotswold Company to be converted into a furniture and home accessories showroom. In 1991 the former chapel was listed at Grade II for its architectural and historical importance.
