The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete

How it begins

Charles Dickens, the most popular novelist of the century, and one of the greatest humorists that England has produced, was born at Landport in Portsea on Friday, the 7th of February, 1812. His father, John Dickens, a clerk in the Navy-pay office, was at this time stationed in the Portsmouth dockyard. He had made acquaintance with the lady, Elizabeth Barrow, who became afterwards his wife, through her elder brother, Thomas Barrow, also engaged on the establishment at Somerset House; and she bore him in all a family of eight children, of whom two died in infancy.