Dickens, Charles John Huffham
Dickens, Charles John Huffham ( 1812 – 70 ),born in Portsmouth, the son of a clerk in the navy pay office. He spent the happiest period of his boyhood in Chatham; this was followed by a period of intense misery which deeply affected him, during which his father was imprisoned for debt in the Marshalsea and he himself (aged 12) worked in a blacking warehouse. Memories of this painful period inspired much of his fiction, notably the early chapters of David Copperfield . He then worked as an office boy; studied shorthand; and became reporter of debates in the Commons for the Morning Chronicle . He contributed to the Monthly Magazine ( 1833 – 5 ), to the Evening Chronicle ( 1835 ), and to other periodicals the articles subsequently republished as Sketches by ‘Boz’ , Illustrative of Every-Day Life and Every-Day People ( 1836 – 7 ); these attracted much attention and...
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