It is difficult to obtain more than a very general estimate of the population of Guildford before censuses began in 1801. The Domesday Survey of 1086 records that there were 175 men in 75 separate households. A multiplication of 4 or 5 per household would give some 300-400 inhabitants. This is roughly the same figure that would result in 1333 if the number of households taxed – 101 – were multiplied by 3 or 4. The Hearth Ta of 1664 notes 371 houses, and a multiplication of 4 ½ would suggest a population of 1,670. (These multiplications are in general accepted by historians as average approximations of household size in these contexts, but there can be wide variations.) Researches into roughly comparable towns in England confirm that there were unlikely to be more than 500 people in the town throughout the Middle Ages and fewer than 1,000 during the Elizabethan period. The first actual census of population was Richardson’s, which accompanied his Ichnography or map of the borough in 1739. He gives a figure of 2,574 this is probably an over-estimate as he included many that lived outside the borough boundaries. Parish rate books indicate that a figure below 2,000 is more probable until the late 18th century.

Official censuses began in 1801 and give a total population for the three borough parishes of Holy Trinity, St Mary’s and St Nicholas of 2,634, with an average of 4 ½ per household. This increased gradually until in 1835 the boundaries of the new borough were extended to include part of Stoke parish to the north, where new development was beginning. This caused an apparent jump in the population, as did subsequent borough extensions, especially those of 1904 and 1933. The original three parishes more than tripled their population during the 19th century (see graph) but this steady growth-rate was small compared with that of Stoke, which had 15 times more inhabitants. The difference between them is clear – the old borough was already almost completely built up, while the obvious area for expansion was to the north – the Downs limited building to the south, and to a lesser extent to the east and west.

The principle cause of the growth in population was immigration, for the birth rate remained below the national average, and the principle means of immigration was the railway. Arriving in 1845, by the mid-1860’s the railway had made Guildford a more accessible town that ever before in its history, accessible in particular to London. It became possible to live in Guildford and work in London and many of the new Guildfordians did so, being specifically catered for by the New Guildford Line in 1885. However, this effect was slow in gathering momentum: as the railway arrived the Corn Laws were repealed and Guildford’s once-prosperous grain trade languished. Physical expansion of the town was limited because much of the land on its outskirts could not be sold for development because of legal restraints.

Among the earliest developments were the rather cramped houses along the path through Stoke Fields, but the first large-scale enterprise was Charlotteville. This area, south-east of the town, was owned by Dr T. Jenner Sells and was laid out for residential development by Henry Peak, who was to design many of Guildford’s buildings subsequently. Sells named the estate Charlotteville after his wife, and the streets after famous doctors. There was an unusual arrangement in that both villas for the middle classes and smaller houses for workers were intermingled – later developments separated the classes rigidly. Typically, houses were erected by building societies for specific customers or as speculations by local tradesmen with money to invest. The price of a rich man’s villa on the hillside above the town could cost twenty or thirty times that of an artisan’s terrace house north of it. The new streets advanced steadily outwards from the old centre, and by 1900 almost all the borough at that time was built upon. The boundaries were further extended in 1904, taking in most of Stoke and St. Catherine’s. There was the beginning of a housing shortage and in 1906 the first council houses were put up in Cline Road. Later council estates were somewhat less stark in design and grew to be a large proportion of the town’s total housing. The influx of soldiers returning from the First World War exacerbated the accommodation problem and the result was the beginning of Onslow Village, an estate on the hillside west of the town, on land sold at a quarter of its market value by Lord Onslow in 1920.

By the 1930s it was estimated that retired people made up a third of the town’s population: a reputation for healthy air and water made it popular with ex-officers and colonials. At the same time workers were beginning to migrate to Guildford from the areas of high unemployment in the north and west, seeking work on such projects as the By-pass, completed in 1934. Another large addition to the borough’s area was made in 1933 taking in Merrow and Warwick’s Bench, amongst other locations. The Town and Country Planning Act gave the Council powers to restrain development from 1932 and the Mount Field was purchased to preserve forever the splash of green at the end of the High Street.

The Second World War saw a temporary jump in the population as evacuees and servicemen moved in. This fell afterwards, but then climbed again until now it is almost eight times what it was a hundred years ago, many living in the large post-war estates such as Bellfields and Park Barn. In 1974 the Municipal Borough was amalgamated with the Guildford Rural District, resulting in the modern Borough which runs from Ash to Effingham. At the beginning of the third millennium the population stood at nearly 130,000, about half living in the rural parishes.

Guildford Museum, Castle Arch, Guildford, Surrey

(01483) 444750

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