I am indebted to Mr Crafton Smith for the series of letters addressed to Alexander Spencer, and for other letters and documents; to Mr T. W. Spencer for his permission to use certain letters in his possession addressed to Dr Burbidge; to Mr James Holt for letters written by Charles Lever’s father; and to Mrs Blackwood Porter and Mr William Blackwood for the letters written to Mr John Blackwood. Also I have to thank Messrs T. and A. Constable for their permission to avail myself of the autobiographical prefaces which Lever wrote during the last year of his life.
With that heroic heedlessness which distinguished him throughout his career, Charles Lever allowed ‘Men of the Time’ to state that he was born in 1809. The late W. J. Fitzpatrick, when he was engaged (thirty years ago) upon his biography of Lever, found it difficult to obtain accurate information concerning the birth-date of the Irish novelist. The records of his parish church--St Thomas’s, Dublin--were searched unavailingly. Finally Dr Fitzpatrick decided to pin his faith to a mortgage-deed (preserved in the Registry Office, Dublin), in which it is set forth that certain “premises”--a dwelling-house, outhouses, yard, and garden--situated at North Strand* are leased of 1802 to James Lever for the term of his life and the lives of his sons, John, aged thirteen years, and Charles James, aged three years.
* Dr Fitzpatrick, in his ‘Life of Lever,’ declares that the name “North Strand” was changed to “Amiens Street” after the treaty.
A correspondent points out to me that, according to maps of Dublin published in 1800, the street was then called Amiens Street, and that it derived its name from Viscount Amiens, minor title of the Earl of Aldborough, who built Aldborough House in the neighbourhood.--E. D.
This is dated 1809. Apart from this deed, however, there are in existence letters written by James Lever which fix the year 1806 as being the birth-date of his younger son. The day and the month are of comparatively little importance, but it is interesting to note that here also is there cloudiness. Dr Fitzpatrick was satisfied that the 31st of August was the day. For this he had the authority of Charles Lever himself: in one of his moments of depression he expressed a wish that August had only thirty days; he would then have been saved from the wear and tear of an anxious life. But James Lever speaks of September as being the month in which his famous son was born; and in 1864 the novelist, writing on the 2nd of September, says that his birthday--presumably the previous day--“passed over without any fresh disaster.” Possibly there may have been a dispute in the family circle as to the exact hour,--the birth may have occurred “upon the midnight.”