The message on the back of this card reads "That
shimmering brook, on the other side of this card, with the foam
crested wavelets (ahem) is where I wash my feet". Perhaps the
writer wouldn't have been quite so keen on washing his feet
in the water if he had known that the horses drank from the
river and during hot weather their carts, which had wooden
wheels with iron bands round the rims, were also taken into
the water. This custom was to ensure the wood of the wheels
swelled up and did not separate from the rims. The sender might
also have found that washing his feet in the river might also
have been rather cold in December, when the card was posted!
It is difficult to tell what is in the cart on the far right
but it doesn't look like sacks of either grain or flour, which
you might expect it to be as Hatch Mill was on the right of
this image, out of shot.
Amongst the residents of Mill Lane in 1911, excluding the
pubs, were: Miss Alice Tucker at No.2; the Elson family;
Mrs Charlton (No. 8); William Voice, a carter (No.10);
William Joslin and his housekeeper (No. 12); Emma Vickery
and her children (No. 14); Thomas Ragless and family; John
Barnes and family; Thomas Lawrence and family (at No.22); George
Edwards and family (No. 30, Tanquary Cottage); George Woods
and family (No.32); William Levi Voller and family (No. 34);
and Frederick Bookham and his wife (no.36)[1].
In 1914 George Edwards and
his wife, who were still living on Mill Lane, celebrated their
golden wedding. George Edwards had worked at Rea's tannery
for 40 years[2].
The tannery would have been just out of shot on the left.
 There
is more about the Mill on
the page about Godalming, Surrey
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