Church Street is little more than a car's width's wide along most of its length, although is slightly wider near the parish church. There is a polite notice next to the hedge between the churchyard entrance and Church House, for many years the offices of the solicitors called Barlow Robbins. The notice reads "Please do not park here". This seems a little superfluous as there wasn't a car in sight!

On the left are two timber framed buildings, both of which have first floors that overhang the pavement below (jetties) and are probably 16th century^[2]. The shop closest to the camera sold knitting wools, patterns and, presumably, haberdashery in 1951 as there is a dressmaker's dummy in the far window. The blinds are down on the business premises next door - today no. 31 - and although the name is written on the glass it cannot be read. There are bricks between the timbers, with those above the shop window in a herringbone pattern. In the early 1900s it was a stationers - a "lock up shop" - run by Samuel George Eaton^[2]; he also sold newspapers and picture postcards^[3], some of which were published by Eaton. Both shops have well kept exteriors today.

John Janaway, in "The Story of Godalming", points out that Church Street has kept many of its old buildings and much of it has changed very little since the early 1800s. However, the living conditions then were cramped and without proper sanitation^[4]. A quick look at the street's inhabitants at the time of the 1841 census^[5] shows a wide range of occupations for those then living on Church Street. There were Ag Labs [Agricultural Labourers], bakers, a blacksmith and a butcher, carpenters, a china man, a cooper and a candlemaker, a coppersmith and a currier, cordwainers, a grocer, a hosier, labourers, a miller, a parchment maker, a plumber, several servants, a saddler, a schoolmistress, several tailors, some of independent means and the Vicar (Rev. John Bull^[6]) and his family at the Vicarage. The Mellersh family had a house on Church Street and in their household alone were two attorneys, a farmer, a banker and a surveyor. So households with large and modest incomes lived side by side.

References:

^[1] A "lock up shop" indicated the proprietor did not live on the premises. In this instance this is taken from the 1911 census. Dr. Wyatt was living with his brother on the first floor of no. 29 in 1911.

^[2] No. 31 Church Street is Grade 2 listed today. It is called Rose [2024].

^[3] "Kelly's Directory", 1913 records Samuel George Eaton occupied both 29 and 31 Church Street. His premises were also a depot for the British and Foreign Bible Societies.

^[4] Janaway, John "The Story of Godalming" (1983), Local Heritage Books, Newbury ISBN 1 86368005 4.

^[5] The 1841 census is available on FindMyPast.

^[6] John Garwood Bull, B.A. was Vicar of Godalming from 1838 to 1847. He died at York on 8 July 1847, aged 55 (this from "Brighton Gazette", 27 July 1947). He was the Vicar who oversaw the 1840 enlargement of the church.