Author: Henry Fitzherbert Buckland
Author: Henry Fitzherbert Buckland (1842–1897)
Alternate Name(s): Charlie Charlton (pseudonym)
Biography: Henry Fitzherbert Buckland was born on 17 February 1842 in Hampstead, the son of master brewer Thomas Buckland and his wife Katherine Dorothy Jones. He came from an old west country family. By 1861, he was articled as a clerk at law before entering a law partnership in Bristol. He had some success as a solicitor eventually owning his own office with several employees. In 1868, he married Blanche Bamfield Jenkyns, the sister of Buckland's sister's husband. The marriage was childless and shortlived as Blanche died in April 1873. Seven months later, Buckland remarried to Margaret Thomas and the couple would have eight children. In 1882, the family moved to Yates where Buckland turned his hand to fiction under the pseudonym "Charlie Charlton": the shorter The Chronicles of Yate Court (1885) was followed by the more substantial The Fair Maid of Codrington (1885) and The Brown Ringlet of the Hawkesbury Widow (1886). All three draw on Buckland's knowledge of Gloucestershire and Wiltshire life and history as well as his own family genealogy. Disappointed by his father's will and the failure of his business (probably through neglect), Buckland quietly booked passage for himself and his family to Australia and absconded, leaving his debtors behind. His flight caused a minor sensation in the newspapers. Settling in Melbourne, Buckland worked as a market gardner. He died after a long and painful illness on 31 October 1897 in Melbourne. Note: authorship established by Barrie Hope.
Author Tags:
References: Age (1 November 1897); British Census (1851, 1861, 1871, 1881); Barrie Hope, ed., The Complete Works of 'Charlie Charlton' (2017)
Fiction Titles:
- The Fair Maid of Codrington. 1 vol. London: Wyman and Sons, 1885.
- The Brown Ringlet of the Hawkesbury Widow. 1 vol. London: Wyman and Sons, 1886.