The Charles Dickens Letters Project

To RAIKES CURRIE,1 10 AUGUST 1855

MS John Cave.

Folkestone, Friday Evening

Tenth August 1855

My Dear Sir

I was very sorry to have missed you and Gowran Vernon2 (to whom I beg my kind regards) to day. After a morning’s work, I was ravaging the Downs at a great pedestrian rate when you called. I am anxious to say in explanation of the enclosed note,3 that we have friends with us (as we almost always have when we are out of town), and therefore are unable to consult our own inclinations as to invitations. 

Raikes Currie Esquire

Very Faithfully Yours

 CHARLES DICKENS

• 1. Raikes Currie (1801-81), banker and politician; Liberal MP for Northampton 1837-57. His country home was Sandling Park, Hythe, some four miles from Folkestone.
• 2. The Hon Gowran Charles Vernon (1825-72), barrister, second son of Robert Vernon Smith, of Farming Woods, Thrapston, Northants, MP for Northampton from 1831 until 1859, when he was raised to the peerage as Baron Lyveden; Vernon's father was the son of "Bobus" Smith and nephew of Sydney, took the name of Vernon only, already authorized by Royal Licence for his issue in 1845. Gowran Vernon played Tom Saville in Used Up, and Lord Rivers in A Day after the Wedding. Gowan in Little Dorrit was first called "Gowran".
• 3. Presumably from Mrs CD, declining Currie’s invitation.