The name Bramley is of Old English (Anglo-Saxon) origin; like "Bromley", one of its earlier forms, it means a clearing or lea in the broom).

[4] The area comprised most of the western half of the Hundred of Blackheath, extending to the Sussex border and including Shalford, Wonersh, Hascombe and west Cranleigh.

[2] The Anglo-Saxon settlers of neighbouring Wonersh – the name means a crooked field – and any Celts not displaced by them may have been the people who developed the Linish, Bramley.

This name means a flax-stubble field and in 1843, when the Tithe Assessment map was drawn, it covered the area now occupied by the Library, Blunden Court and Old Rectory Close.

Flax was used to make linen but before spinning and weaving the stems were "retted"; soaking in running water, a procedure which could have used the stream which also powered the mills.

[2] At some time during the Middle Ages the village's arterial A281 road through the village leading to Birtley Green around the east slope of Hurst Hill was established as an alternative Horsham and main Loxwood and Billingshurst (all West Sussex) route from Guildford,[citation needed] as was the road from Thorncombe Street to Bramley (Snowdenham Lane) and Wonersh, the village centred immediately east of the street and Cranleigh Waters.

[7] The village was growing in the 17th century; many of the houses on the west side of the High Street date from this period.

The Napoleonic Wars brought concerns for shipping in the English Channel and plans to create an inland waterway between London and Portsmouth led to the building of a canal to connect Guildford to West Sussex and the now traditional port of Littlehampton.

In 1825 the Earl of Egremont, a great supporter of the canal, had purchased a property in Bramley on the site of the present Park Drive which was soon demolished.

The Earl redirected the lane to the mill, roughly to the present Park Drive, and his nephew built Bramley House, now almost completely demolished.

It is a notable example of the work of Charles Eamer Kempe, who was responsible for much of the interior decoration, especially the stained glass windows.

This met, as it still does, in the Village Hall whose Victorian exterior and modern additions conceal a barn with timbers dating back to c.1400.

This has coursed and part snecked Bargate sandstone/red brick quoins and dressings and is Grade II listed.

World War I brought deaths and wounded men from the front were also seen in the village as Thorncombe Park was used as a hospital.

'[2] As one of the Beeching closures the Cranleigh Line to Horsham, including Bramley & Wonersh railway station, closed in 1965 after serving the village for almost a century.

Four named localities cover the south of Bramley: Birtley Green, Thorncombe Street, Grafham and Smithbrook.

This hamlet is 1.5 miles (2.4 km) SSW of Bramley village centre and has 29 houses and four listed buildings.

[13] Grafham, like Bramley, is a settlement by the A281 Guildford-Horsham road and includes three roadside buildings that form part of Palmers Cross hamlet and Goose Green to the southwest.

The Grade II*-listed church, St Andrew's, is the burial place of its stone-specialist Gothic Revival architect Henry Woodyer.

[14] The church was built between 1861 and 1864 at his own expense; it has a statue of Saint Andrew and carvings of Woodyer himself, his wife and daughter.