Twenty amateur photographs of locations related to Dickens' life and works. With pencil notes in an unknown hand on the verso of each, indicating subject. c. 1901-1904. Including: Dickens' home in Chatham; The Great White Horse, Ipswich (The Pickwick Papers); Cobtree Hall, Sandling (Dingley Dell, The Pickwick Papers); pubs on North Street, Dorking (The Marquis of Granby, The Pickwick Papers); Paper Buildings, Inner Temple (Barnaby Rudge); St Dunstan's Fleet Street (David Copperfield; Barnaby Rudge; The Chimes is dedicated to it); various views of Cooling (the inspiration for the village Pip lived in in Great Expectations), including the graves of the Comports, and the Horseshoe and Castle pub (the model for the Three Jolly Bargemen, Joe Gargery's haunt); Dickens' favourite watering hole, The Leather Bottle, among others. One of the photos is of the pond at Cobtree Hall, which inspired Dickens to create one of his most genial characters, and early festive scenes.
Full list of subjects: - Paper Buildings, Inner Temple – Barnaby Rudge (2) - The pond at Cobtree Hall, Sandling (in which Dickens once fell in whilst ice-skating). Present as Manor Farm at Dingley Dell in The Pickwick Papers. Cobtree Hall's owner, William Spong, was Mr Wardle in Pickwick. - St Dunstan's Fleet Street – Mentioned in David Copperfield when DC and Betsy Trotwood visit especially to see Gog and Magog strike the bells; also mentioned in Barnaby Rudge and A Christmas Carol. Dickens dedicated The Chimes to St. Dunstan's. - 'Where Dickens lived in Chatham' (2) - The Great White Horse, Ipswich (4) – The Pickwick Papers - "The Priory Gate" – Priory Gate (15th Century), leading to and with a view of Rochester Cathedral's main tower. Interestingly this is the Tower prior to the addition of the Scott Spire, which was finished in 1904. - The Leather Bottle – One of Dickens' favourite pubs. - Canterbury – St Peter Street with Tudor buildings and three maids. A possible inspiration for the description in David Copperfield: "bulging out over the road; a house with long, low lattice windows bulging out still farther, and beams with carved heads on the ends bulging out too, so that I fancied the whole house was leaning forward, trying to see who was passing on the narrow pavement below…" - The Swan Inn, Town Malling – possibly the Blue Lion of Muggleton in The Pickwick Papers. Agreement has not been reached whether the inspiration for corporate Muggleton is Town Malling or Maidstone (the distances given in the book between Rochester and Dingley Dell and "Muggleton" cannot be made to agree with either Town Malling or Maidstone). At the former the "Swan" is pointed to as the real "Blue Lion," and at Maidstone it is the "White Lion" which is suggested. - Photo of both The King's Head and The Gun in North Street, Dorking - The Marquis of Granby (King's Head) from The Pickwick Papers. - Cobtree Hall, Sandling – Dingley Dell in The Pickwick Papers. - Horseshoe and Castle, Cooling – Three Jolly Bargemen, Joe Gargery's haunt, Great Expectations. - The graves of the Comports in the Churchyard of Cooling Church – the inspiration for the Church and Churchyard in Great Expectations, and the graves that inspired the idea of Pip's many and diseased siblings: "....five little stone lozenges each about a foot and a half long which were arranged in a neat row ... and were sacred to the memory of five little brothers of mine...." - Cooling Marshes – Great Expectations. "Ours was the marsh country, down by the river, within, as the river wound, twenty miles of the sea…" - Cooling Church (2) – Great Expectations - Cooling Castle – the locality of Great Expectations.
Also "The Dickens Exhibition" catalogue, compiled and edited by F.G. Kitton, London, The Dickens Fellowship, 1903. The Dickens Exhibition Organized by The Dickens Fellowship - Held at Memorial Hall, Farringdon Street, London - March 25th, 26th & 27th, 1903. 66 pages detailing exhibited items and their owners. Cover detached.