Charles Dickens

[number1owlal]

does anyone have any actual proof that brooks of sheffield which is mentioned in david copperfield is fact or fiction as or family have been told for generations that this is fact and we know that charles dickens actual signed a copy of this book for a ancestor can any one in lighten this .we know dickens was in sheffield in 1855.

[Greybeard]

A writer in the Sheffield Weekly Independent for November 19th, 1887, having heard that 'Brookes of Sheffield' was living at 'Woodbourne,' says that he went there to call upon him. "I found that it was a large, handsomely-built house but with its former glories sadly dimmed by the soot and grime from the neighbouring colliery . . , After ringing twice, I was admitted by Mrs. Brookes, a kind-looking lady of fifty or sixty years of age, and in the comfortable dining room, seated in a large easy chair by the side of a brightly blazing fire, was Mr. Brookes, to whom I was introduced. Courteously he motioned me to be seated, and I then explained the nature of my errand. I said I had been informed that he was the original Brookes of Sheffield, to whom reference was made by Charles Dickens in 'David Copperfield.' 'That is so,' he replied, and at once asked Mrs. Brookes to bring him the author's copy which the great-novelist sent to him in 1851, with a statement on the fly leaf in Dickens' handwriting to the effect that it was presented to Brookes of Sheffield by Charles Dickens." He was also shown a copy of "The Ambassadors of Commerce," published in 1885, where his host was mentioned as giving some autobiographical details three years before. "I am eighty years of age : I have travelled for fifty-eight years : I married my second wife six years ago : I always go home on Friday nights . . ." Then they went upstairs, where "one seemed to have gone back half-a-century. There were old oak cabinets dark with age, curious chests of drawers, and a remarkable little table with sixteen legs" which used to belong (so he was told) to Mr. Maurice Rodgers, cousin to his wife's mother. Then the veteran commercial traveller got out his old, almost-forgotten, coaching coat (a journey to London a century ago took two-and-a-half days), and put it on: it reached down to the ground and the up-turned collar-came up to his ears ... " Whenever I think of him now I see him encased therein, the very picture of a jolly old Pickwickian, whom Dickens, had he lived a few years longer, would surely have made one of his immortal characters."

 

From - Viine G R, The story of Old Attercliffe Ward Bros. 1932.

 

The 'Woodbourne' mentioned in the text was Woodbourne Hall which stood opposite the board school on Woodbourne road.

[locket]

i share the same surname

[Greybeard]

i share the same surname

 

I notice in Vine's book all references are to 'Brookes' with an 'e'.

[number1owlal]

we are brookes and we have always wondered if my husbands great grand father was telling us the truth about an ancestor being met by dickens ,as if you go on the dickens website it says he used towns and characters from people he had met.

[Greybeard]

we are brookes and we have always wondered if my husbands great grand father was telling us the truth about an ancestor being met by dickens ,as if you go on the dickens website it says he used towns and characters from people he had met.

 

The William Brookes of Dickens fame had a son also called William. This is the William Brookes who founded the Wesleyan Reform Church in Woodbourn road.

 

The descendents of this William should be fairly easy to trace. It's possible he died around 1924 for in that year a portrait of him was hung in the church. The records of the church may well be available at the Local Studies Library or Sheffield Archives.

 

Edit - Vine quotes from Sheffield Daily Telegraph for January 22nd, 1924, it may have been an obituary he's quoting but he doesn't specifically say so. You will be able to see a copy of this edition of the paper in Local Studies.

[number1owlal]

does anyone have info on william brookes