Gads Hill Place in Higham,

Kent Kent is a county in South East England and one of the home counties. It borders Greater London to the north-west, Surrey to the west and East Sussex to the south-west, and Essex to the north across the estuary of the River Thames; it faces ...

, sometimes spelt Gadshill Place and Gad's Hill Place, was the country home of

Charles Dickens Charles John Huffam Dickens (; 7 February 1812 – 9 June 1870) was an English writer and social critic. He created some of the world's best-known fictional characters and is regarded by many as the greatest novelist of the Victorian er ...

, the most successful

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies. ** Britishness, the British identity and common culture * British English, ...

author of the

Victorian era In the history of the United Kingdom and the British Empire, the Victorian era was the period of Queen Victoria's reign, from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. The era followed the Georgian period and preceded the Edwa ...

. Today the building is the independent

Gad's Hill School Gad's Hill School in Higham, Kent, England, is an independent school for day pupils, founded in 1924. It is set in the former Gads Hill Place, the country home of Charles Dickens. School history Charles Dickens died in what is now the schoo ...

. The house was built in 1780 for a former Mayor of

Rochester Rochester may refer to: Places Australia * Rochester, Victoria Canada * Rochester, Alberta United Kingdom *Rochester, Kent ** City of Rochester-upon-Medway (1982–1998), district council area ** History of Rochester, Kent ** HM Prison ...

, Thomas Stephens, opposite the present Sir John Falstaff Public House. Gad's Hill is where Falstaff commits the robbery that begins Shakespeare's ''

Henriad In Shakespearean scholarship, Henriad refers to a group of William Shakespeare's history plays. It is sometimes used to refer to a group of four plays (a tetralogy), but some sources and scholars use the term to refer to eight plays. In the ...

'' trilogy (''

Henry IV, Part 1 ''Henry IV, Part 1'' (often written as ''1 Henry IV'') is a history play by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written no later than 1597. The play dramatises part of the reign of King Henry IV of England, beginning with the battle at ...

'', '' Henry IV, Part 2'' and ''Henry V'').

Dickens

Charles Dickens first saw the mansion when he was 9 years old in 1821, when his father

John Dickens John Dickens (21 August 1785 – 31 March 1851) was the father of famous English novelist Charles Dickens and was the model for Mr Micawber in his son's semi-autobiographical novel '' David Copperfield''. Biography The son of William Dickens ...

told Charles that if he worked hard enough, one day he would own it or just such a house. Forster, John ''The Life of Charles Dickens'' Published by Cecil Palmer, London (1872-74) As a boy, Dickens would often walk from Chatham to Gads Hill Place as he wished to see it again and again as an image of his possible future. Ackroyd, Peter ''Dickens'' Published by Sinclair-Stevenson Ltd (1990) p. 32. Dickens was later to write, " I used to look at it as a wonderful Mansion (which God knows it is not) when I was a very odd little child with the first faint shadows of all my books in my head - I suppose." Thirty-five years later, after Dickens had risen to fame and wealth, he discovered that the house was for sale and bought it for £1790 in March 1856 from fellow writer Eliza Lynn (later known as novelist Mrs.

Eliza Lynn Linton Eliza Lynn Linton (10 February 1822 – 14 July 1898) was the first female salaried journalist in Britain and the author of over 20 novels. Despite her path-breaking role as an independent woman, many of her essays took a strong anti-feminist s ...

). Initially Dickens bought the house as an investment, intending to let it, but changed his mind and used it instead as a country retreat, moving into the house in June 1857. Dickens had bookshelves installed in his study at Gads Hill Place, some of which contained dummy books the titles of which he invented to reflect his own prejudices and opinions, including ''Hansard's Guide to Refreshing Sleep'', ''History of a Short Chancery Suit'' in twenty-one volumes, ''Socrates on Wedlock'', ''King Henry the Eighth's Evidences of Christianity'', and the series ''The Wisdom of Our Ancestors: I Ignorance, II Superstition, III The Block, IV The Stake, V The Rack, VI Dirt,'' and ''VII Disease''. Alongside these was placed a very narrow dummy volume entitled ''The Virtues of Our Ancestors''. Dickens was visited at Gad's Hill Place in 1857 by Danish author and poet

Hans Christian Andersen Hans Christian Andersen ( , ; 2 April 1805 – 4 August 1875) was a Danish author. Although a prolific writer of plays, travelogues, novels, and poems, he is best remembered for his literary fairy tales. Andersen's fairy tales, consist ...

, who was invited for two weeks but who stayed for five. Other guests included

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (February 27, 1807 – March 24, 1882) was an American poet and educator. His original works include "Paul Revere's Ride", ''The Song of Hiawatha'', and '' Evangeline''. He was the first American to completely trans ...

Charles Allston Collins ''Convent Thoughts'' (1850–51; Ashmolean Museum, Oxford) Charles Allston Collins (London 25 January 1828 – 9 April 1873) was a British painter, writer, and illustrator associated with the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. Life and work ...

Wilkie Collins William Wilkie Collins (8 January 1824 – 23 September 1889) was an English novelist and playwright known especially for '' The Woman in White'' (1859), a mystery novel and early "sensation novel", and for '' The Moonstone'' (1868), which has b ...

Marcus Stone Marcus Stone (4 July 1840 – 24 March 1921) was an English painter. Stone was born in London, and was educated at the Royal Academy. Life Marcus Clayton Stone was the son of Frank Stone ARA. Marcus was trained by his father and began to ...

, H.F. Chorley, Percy Fitzgerald, John Leech,

Alexander William Kinglake Alexander William Kinglake (5 August 1809 – 2 January 1891) was an English travel writer and historian. He was born near Taunton, Somerset, and educated at Eton College and Trinity College, Cambridge. He was called to the Bar in 1837, ...

William Powell Frith William Powell Frith (9 January 1819 – 2 November 1909) was an English painter specialising in genre subjects and panoramic narrative works of life in the Victorian era. He was elected to the Royal Academy in 1853, presenting ''The Sleep ...

and

Charles Fechter Charles Albert Fechter (23 October 1824 – 5 August 1879) was an Anglo-French actor. Biography Fechter was born, probably in London, of French parents, although his mother was of Piedmontese and his father of German extraction. As a boy he h ...

. In 1864 Fechter gave Dickens a prefabricated two-storey Swiss chalet as a Christmas present. Dickens had it assembled on land he owned on the opposite side of the Rochester High Road. Later, he had a brick-lined tunnel dug between the house's front lawn and the chalet. During the spring and summer months, Dickens worked on many of his later works in his study on the top floor of this Swiss chalet, including ''

A Tale of Two Cities ''A Tale of Two Cities'' is a historical novel published in 1859 by Charles Dickens, set in London and Paris before and during the French Revolution. The novel tells the story of the French Doctor Manette, his 18-year-long imprisonment in ...

'', ''

Great Expectations ''Great Expectations'' is the thirteenth novel by Charles Dickens and his penultimate completed novel. It depicts the education of an orphan nicknamed Pip (Great Expectations), Pip (the book is a ''bildungsroman''; a coming-of-age story). It ...

'', ''

Our Mutual Friend ''Our Mutual Friend'', written in 1864–1865, is the last novel completed by Charles Dickens and is one of his most sophisticated works, combining savage satire with social analysis. It centres on, in the words of critic J. Hillis Miller, quo ...

'' and the unfinished ''

The Mystery of Edwin Drood ''The Mystery of Edwin Drood'' is the final novel by Charles Dickens, originally published in 1870. Though the novel is named after the character Edwin Drood, it focuses more on Drood's uncle, John Jasper, a precentor, choirmaster and opium ...

''. The chalet has been preserved and was moved to Eastgate House in Rochester High Street,

, as a memorial to the writer. The house remained Dickens's country home until his death in 1870, dying as he did of a stroke on a couch in the dining room there. Much of the contents of the house were auctioned after his death.

Later history

Gads Hill Place was bought by Charles Dickens, Jr. after his father's death, but he was forced to give it up in 1879 because of his own ill-health and financial difficulties. The house was bought in 1890 by the Hon. Francis Law Latham, the then Advocate-General of Bombay. In 1924 the house became

, which it remains today. As of 2013, the school was moving into purpose-built buildings in the grounds of the house, and there was a plan to open the house as a museum. In June 2008 the house was shown in the

Channel 4 Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network operated by the state-owned Channel Four Television Corporation. It began its transmission on 2 November 1982 and was established to provide a fourth television service ...

TV docudrama ''Dickens' Secret Lover'', presented by actor

Charles Dance Walter Charles Dance (born 10 October 1946) is an English actor. He is known for playing strict, authoritarian characters and villains. His most notable film roles include Sardo Numspa in '' The Golden Child'' (1986), Dr. Jonathan Clemens in '' ...

, on Dickens's affair with the actress

Ellen Ternan Ellen Lawless Ternan (3 March 1839 – 25 April 1914), also known as Nelly Ternan or Nelly Wharton-Robinson, was an English actress known for association with the author Charles Dickens. Birth and family life Ellen Ternan was born in Roches ...

during the last 13 years of his life. Gads Hill Place is a Grade I listed building.

References

External links

The Gads Hill AppealGads Hill Visitors Centre
'' BBC'' News 2008
Gads Hill Place on Discover GraveshamDescription of Gads Hill Place from c. 1900
{{Charles Dickens, state=collapsed Country houses in Kent Charles Dickens Gravesham Grade I listed houses in Kent