![DICKENS, Charles (1812-1870). Autograph letter signed (‘Charles Dickens’) to [Susanna] Milner Gibson, Devonshire Terrace, 11 November 1847, accepting an invitation and discussing a candidate she has put forward for employment: ‘I will make a note of the twenty fourth – and come if I can (of which I have a little doubt) ... Your pretty little protegée has played the Devil with us by her delay; but it was quite natural, and I can’t blame her’, one page, 8vo.](https://www.christies.com/img/LotImages/2014/CSK/2014_CSK_05388_0008_000(dickens_charles_autograph_letter_signed_to_susanna_milner_gibson_devon012541).jpg?w=1)
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DICKENS, Charles (1812-1870). Autograph letter signed (‘Charles Dickens’) to [Susanna] Milner Gibson, Devonshire Terrace, 11 November 1847, accepting an invitation and discussing a candidate she has put forward for employment: ‘I will make a note of the twenty fourth – and come if I can (of which I have a little doubt) ... Your pretty little protegée has played the Devil with us by her delay; but it was quite natural, and I can’t blame her’, one page, 8vo.
Susanna Milner Gibson, the wife of the MP and free-trade proponent Thomas Milner Gibson, had put forward the girl in question for the post of matron at Urania Cottage, the home for ‘fallen women’ that Dickens was in the process of setting up -- though she would later be passed over for being 'so young and (necessarily) inexperienced'. Dickens was close to the Milner Gibsons; it was at their London home that he wrote his last novel, The Mystery of Edwin Drood.
Susanna Milner Gibson, the wife of the MP and free-trade proponent Thomas Milner Gibson, had put forward the girl in question for the post of matron at Urania Cottage, the home for ‘fallen women’ that Dickens was in the process of setting up -- though she would later be passed over for being 'so young and (necessarily) inexperienced'. Dickens was close to the Milner Gibsons; it was at their London home that he wrote his last novel, The Mystery of Edwin Drood.