Walter Landor Dickens

Walter Landor Dickens, the fourth child of Charles Dickens and Catherine Hogarth Dickens, was born on 8th February, 1841, at the family home of 48 Doughty Street to 1 Devonshire Terrace, York Gate, close to Regent's Park.

Walter was not a very successful student and when he was sixteen his father arranged for him to be sent to India to join the 42nd Highlanders (the Black Watch). He wept as he said goodbye to his mother, sisters and younger brothers. Dickens and his eldest son, Charles Culliford Dickens , went to Southampton to see him board the Indus . Dickens wrote to Angela Burdett Coutts that he was "cut up for a minute or so when I bade him good bye, but recovered directly, and conducted himself like a man."

While in India Walter got in debt. Charles Dickens was very angry with him when he heard the news and refused to send him money to solve the problem. Walter wrote to Mamie Dickens that he was very ill. Arrangements were made to send him home. The family were later informed that on 31st December, 1863: "He was talking with other patients ill the hospital and became rather excited about the arrangements he proposed for his homeward passage, when a violent fit of coughing came on and the Aneurism burst into the left bronchial tube and life became extinct in a few seconds by the rush of blood which poured from his mouth." He was buried in the Bhowanipore Cemetery, Calcutta . Dickens wrote to Angela Burdett Coutts : "I could have wished it had pleased God to let him see his home again, but I think he would have died at the door."

Arthur A. Adrian, the author of Georgina Hogarth and the Dickens Circle (1957) has pointed out: "A few months later arrived the all too familiar evidence of reckless spending - Walter's unpaid accounts... Among his possessions Walter had left nothing of value: only a small trunk, changes of linen, some prayer books, and a coloured photograph of a woman believed to be a member of the family. (It may have been his Aunt Georgy's recently taken portrait. There would have been time for it to reach him before his death.) According to his captain, everything else had been turned into cash in preparation for the return to England. What could Walter have done with his money! The officers' mess, the regimental store, the billiard table, the native servants, a merchant or two - all remained to be paid. The claims against him, not including the servants' wages for £39, were in excess of £100."

William Hardman, editor of The Morning Post: "Poor Mrs. Charles Dickens is in great grief at the loss of her second son, Walter Landor Dickens, who has died with his regiment in India... Her grief is much enhanced by the fact that her husband has not taken any notice of the event to her, either by letter or otherwise. If anything were wanting to sink Charles Dickens to the lowest depths in my esteem, this fills up the measure of his iniquity. As a writer, I admire him: as a man, I despise him."

Primary Sources

(1) Arthur A. Adrian, Georgina Hogarth and the Dickens Circle (1957)

A few months later arrived the all too familiar evidence of reckless spending - Walter's unpaid accounts. Georgina, still somewhat under the strain of illness, saw Dickens harried by conflicting demands, but could do nothing. He had been unable to finish the tenth number of Our Mutual Friend, he complained to her, because he had spent his time settling "the regimental part of poor Walter's wretched affairs-utterly incomprehensible, as they always have been". As long as possible he had postponed facing this miserable business. From Walter's commanding officer had come a humiliating assortment of bills. "I feel I could not do my duty if I withheld these from you," the officer had written, adding for Dickens's consolation: "Let me take this opportunity of saying that the death of your son caused us all sincere sorrow; for lie was a favourite with us all; and not all his difficulties in pecuniary matters, which appear to have begun immediately after he came to India, affected or in any way diminished our regard for him. And this perhaps is another reason why I now trouble you with these affairs.

Among his possessions Walter had left nothing of value: only a small trunk, changes of linen, some prayer books, and a coloured photograph of a woman believed to be a member of the family. (It may have been his Aunt Georgy's recently taken portrait. There would have been time for it to reach him before his death.) According to his captain, everything else had been turned into cash in preparation for the return to England. What could Walter have done with his money! The officers' mess, the regimental store, the billiard table, the native servants, a merchant or two - all remained to be paid. The claims against him, not including the servants' wages for £39, were in excess of £100.

(2) Henry Fielding Dickens , The Recollections of Sir Henry Dickens (1934)

Walter went to India, gazetted to a native regiment which had been disbanded at the time of the Mutiny, and which had consequently been attached to the 42nd Highlanders (the Black Watch). He died when in Calcutta on his way home on sick leave in December, 1863.

(3) William Hardman, editor of The Morning Post on the death of Walter Dickens (January, 1864)

Poor Mrs. Charles Dickens is in great grief at the loss of her second son, Walter Landor Dickens, who has died with his regiment in India... Her grief is much enhanced by the fact that her husband has not taken any notice of the event to her, either by letter or otherwise. If anything were wanting to sink Charles Dickens to the lowest depths in my esteem, this fills up the measure of his iniquity. As a writer, I admire him: as a man, I despise him.