CHARLES DICKENS MUSEUM
The Charles Dickens Museum is located at No. 48 Doughty Street Holborn, situated within the London Borough of Camden. It was while he was living in these premises, that he wrote the whole of Oliver Twist (1838) and Nicholas Nickleby,completed Pickwick Papers (1836), and worked on Barnaby Rudge(1840–41). Comprising four floors of a typical Georgian terraced house, the museum boasts the world's most important collection of paintings, original furniture, rare editions, manuscripts and various other items which relate to the life, work and times of Charles Dickens. The unfinished portrait of Charles Dickens known as Dickens' Dream, by an original illustrator of The Pickwick Papers, R.W.Buss, shows Dickens surrounded in his study at Gads Hill Place in Higham, Kent by many of the characters he had created. This is perhaps the most famous of the many exhibits on show in the Charles Dickens Museum. On March 25th 1837, No. 48 Doughty Street became home to Charles Dickens, his wife Catherine and the three eldest of their ten children, one year after his marriage to Catherine, with both Mary and Kate the two eldest of their daughters actually being born there. Dickens had a three year, £80 a year lease on the house, and lived there until 1839 when, as both his family and his wealth grew apace, he moved on to pastures new, and larger, grander houses. Two other relatives moved in with them while they were in residence in Doughty Street, Dickens' younger brother Frederick and Catherine's sister Mary, a seventeen year old girl, both of whom had lived with them at their previous home at Furnival's Inn. It was certainly not unusual in those days for a woman's unmarried sister to live with and offer support to her newly married sister and brother-in-law. It was to be a very short lived arrangement however, for tragically Mary died the same year they moved into Doughty Street following a very brief illness. Charles Dickens and his wife Catherine never fully got over her death. Dickens himself had become very attached to Mary, she actually died in his arms and later became a character in several of his books. Her death was fictionalized as the death of Little Nell in The Old Curiosity Shop. Charles Dickens spent two extremely successful and productive years in this house, for while he was living here, he completed The Pickwick Papers (1836), wrote the whole of Oliver Twist (1838) and Nicholas Nickleby (1838–39) and worked on Barnaby Rudge (1840–41) In 1923, No. 48 Doughty Street was threatened with demolition but was saved by the Dickens Fellowship, which had been founded in 1902. They managed to raise the mortgage for the property's freehold which they bought. After renovation and under the direction of an independent trust, the Dickens House Museum was opened in 1925 and has since been renamed the Charles Dickens Museum. OPENING HOURS: Monday - Saturday 10:00 - 17:00 Sunday 10:00 - 17:00 Last admission is 30 minutes before closing time.
Admission Adults £7 Concession £5 Children £3 Children Under 10 Free
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