Mill Lane 1910, Godalming
Mill Lane 1910, Godalming Ref: 62239x
Memories of Mill Lane 1910, Godalming
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Godalming & local memories
Read and share memories of Godalming and Surrey inspired by Frith photos.
The Licenced Victualler
My great-grandfather Walter Alfred BEARMAN was the 'pub manager' in 1908. He was married to Helen Mary Bearman and had been resident in Godalming for some time, the earliest I am aware of was 1899 when my grandfather's sister was born. Walter was originally the blacksmith in Godalming. There is a picture in the Frith gallery of two children standing on the streetside under the blacksmith sign. The two children are my grandfather Cyril Wallace George Bearman, and his elder sister Irene May. When Walter took a change of career I am not sure, sometime between 1903 and 1908. My great-grandmother divorced him in 1908, virtually unheard-of for a woman to do, and she cited violence, drunken ways, and the fact that he committed adultery 'frequently' with a local woman called Annie Simmonds, who bore him a child on 22 September 1908!
Re Great Grandfather
A deleted memory from Philip Le Houx of this site (formerly?), says he remembers John Dean, the swimming instructor of Charterhouse. I am John Dean, my Great Grandfather was Edward Dean Snr. When he retired in about 1930 his son, also Edward Dean (my Great Uncle) took over as swimming instructor. I guess this is who he means. He also mentions the sweet / grocery shop in Peperharrow Road. Edward Dean Snr's wife worked in a shop in this road but i'm not sure which shop it was or when. Her name was Elizabeth but she could have been known by any number of variations of this name. She died in 1933, her husband died a fortnight later. They are buried together in Eashing Cemetary.
Peperharrow Rd
I was born in Peperharrow Road in 1935 and still have two sisters living in the house where I was born. I went to Meadrow Central School. I swam in the Ginny, 'played' and grew up in the Charterhouse grounds and Milton's woods. I was a Junior member of Godalming Angling Society and spent many happy hours, fishing the Wey and Broadwater lake. I met my wife at Puttenham, we were married for 47 years. I have a 'soft spot' for Godalming. Boyhood names that I remember are: Peter Morton, Sheila Milligan, Benny Scavolo, June Dix, Mariane Brockwell, Valerie Jackson (I am still in contact with). Norman & Ivan Marshall, Brian Dunce, Ann Hook, Jean McCue, Dawn Elliot and others. I am philip.123456@tiscali.co.uk
Flying Bomb
It was a warm sunny morning and I was lying in bed in Minster Road. I heard a 'doodlebug' putter overhead, I heard the motor stop, silence... and then the explosion. I swear the blast lifted me off the bed - half a mile away! What I did not know was that my father, walking to work, had just reached the area where the trees are in the picture when the bomb exploded. A tree fell on him and he was trapped under it until some Canadian soldiers came and lifted it off him. They took him in their jeep to St Thomas's Hospital at Hyde Style. He had blast injury of the lungs and split eardrums. After a long slow recovery he was finally able to resume work but he suffered from high blood pressure for the rest of his life.
My Grandfather Lived at Ivy Cottage
My Grandfather, Hubert Blackwell, lived in Ivy Cottage with his mother and father, Mr Henry Alfted Blackwell, he was born in 1897. I have just looked up his First World War war records and he states his address as Ivy Cottage, Peperharrow Road. I knew he lived in Godalming, but that was it. It is lovely to see a picture of the road as he would have certainly seen it as it is shown in 1907. Did anyone know him?
Great-Grandfather
My great-grandfather was a swimming instructor at Charterhouse. He lived in the last (?) house on the right, just before the lane leading to Charterhouse. The swimming pool was directly behind the back garden. Before this was built they used to swim in the River Wey which was accessed by a path opposite the lane. The remains of the wooden platform on the river bank still remain. His son took over the job when he retired due to having a stroke after saving someone from the river. If you remember him, I would love to hear from you: john@broadwaycars.com
My Grandmother
My grandmother lived in Godalming at 20 Pound Lane, her name Annie Winter. She used to work in the Milk Bar in the High Street with a lady named Mrs Margaret Barnes. She did not die until 1977 and is buried alongside her husband Thomas Winter in Eashing Lane cemetery. She was a member of the deaf club. She had friends all over the place near to Godalming. Does anyone remember her?
Margaret Finch
My Godalming
I lived my early years in Godalming, in a small house opposite the Salvation Army Hall in Mint Street. In the 1930s we moved to Peperharow Road. My father Ernest Covey was the Steward of Brookhall, Charterhouse for a number of years. I went into the Royal Engineers in 1937, as a Boy Soldier. I learned to swim in the Ginny and went to the Bell School. I found since, that Covey folks have lived in Godalming since the 1600s, and around Surrey generations before that. I now live far away in Oregon, USA, but a part of me will always be Godalming. Old friends were 'Champ' Brown, the Kingshots, my Haskell cousins, 'Ticky' Wheeler, Peggy Smith, ('Chunky'), my Uncles Percy, Albert, and Harry. I remember Dr Boyd (who mounted his bicycle from the rear step) and Eddy Leroy and the 'Kings Own' canoe trips up the Wey to Somerset Farm and strawberries and cream. and our meetings in the hall next door to my grandmother's house. I also sang... Read more
Last Public Hanging
I think it took place in 1818 opposite the church and what is now the Phillips Memorial, on the other side of the river . ( Llamas Lands?) The depression made in a horse shoe shape was where the crowd stood to watch the event! Each year, the Horseshoe, as we called it, flooded and froze and we all gathered to scate and slide on it. Was the Boarden bridge the only one there at that time? Still a ford, I think.
Boyhood Memories of Peperharrow Road.
It was the summer of 1946 and we used to go swimming in the river at a spot called "The Ginny" which was up the road a little (towards the camera) on the opposite side of the road to these houses. This part of the river was used as a swimming pool by Charterhouse school. We, that is children from Busbridge School aged 10 to 11 years, were about to start at Meadrow Secondary School at the end of the holiday.
Sadly , my friend Billy Ranger drowned whilst swimming here, we had planned to start the new school together (for mutual support). Billy was a lovely character and lived
in one of Tuesley Cottages between Quarter Mile Road and Minster road. He had two older brothers , one a plumber and the other, a well known blacksmith.
The dental technician I was with , as an apprentice , lived in one of those tall houses pictured on the left of the photo.
Doodlebug 1944 Ish.
Hidden by or almost visible in the trees beyond the large house on the left is a small cottage or lodge, opposite the beginning of Busbridge Lane just visible behind and to the right of the people in the road. One morning during the war (WW2) a stray
Doodlebug (Flying bomb) landed and exploded opposite this cottage and destroyed it. Minutes before, the occupants, adults and several children had left and gone down to school in Godalming. I lived in Duncombe Road and we had broken windows and a cracked wall in our house.
