Brief description: Hairbrush and leather cover owned by Dickens, c.1850
Label: Dickens is remembered with a bushy beard and thinning hair on top, but in his youth he was clean-shaven with carefully parted brown locks. Later, in America, he sported oiled, corkscrew curls and grew "glorious" moustaches, trimmed by himself, writing "without them, life would be a blank". Others disagreed. Hoping the moustache would disappear, William Powell Frith delayed painting him. This did not work as Dickens then grew a beard as well.
Collection: Object
Object number: DH1134
Object type: toiletries
Production date: 1850s

Hairbrush and leather cover