Bleak House (originally known as Fort House) is a prominent house on the cliff overlooking the

North Foreland North Foreland is a chalk headland on the Kent coast of southeast England, specifically in Broadstairs. With the rest of Broadstairs and part of Ramsgate it is the eastern side of Kent's largest peninsula, the Isle of Thanet. It presents a ...

and Viking Bay in

Broadstairs Broadstairs is a coastal town on the Isle of Thanet in the Thanet district of east Kent, England, about east of London. It is part of the civil parish of Broadstairs and St Peter's, which includes St Peter's, and had a population in 2011 o ...

Kent Kent is a county in South East England and one of the home counties. It borders Greater London to the north-west, Surrey to the west and East Sussex to the south-west, and Essex to the north across the estuary of the River Thames; it faces ...

. It was built around 1801 and then substantially extended, doubling in size, in 1901. The house was the site of the North Cliff Battery and was used as a coastal station for observing maritime activity.Smuggling in Kent, Bridget Ley, Jerold Publishing House and Bleak House, 1990, , p. 14

Charles Dickens Charles John Huffam Dickens (; 7 February 1812 – 9 June 1870) was an English writer and social critic. He created some of the world's best-known fictional characters and is regarded by many as the greatest novelist of the Victorian er ...

holidayed at Fort House in the 1850s and 1860s, and wrote ''

David Copperfield ''David Copperfield'' Dickens invented over 14 variations of the title for this work, see is a novel in the bildungsroman genre by Charles Dickens, narrated by the eponymous David Copperfield, detailing his adventures in his journey from inf ...

'' during his time there. He is also said to have penned out ''

Bleak House ''Bleak House'' is a novel by Charles Dickens, first published as a 20-episode serial between March 1852 and September 1853. The novel has many characters and several sub-plots, and is told partly by the novel's heroine, Esther Summerson, and ...

'' whilst in residence, hence the change of name in the early 1900s. The house is

Grade II listed In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern I ...

on the

National Heritage List for England The National Heritage List for England (NHLE) is England's official database of protected heritage assets. It includes details of all English listed buildings, scheduled monuments, register of historic parks and gardens, protected shipwrecks, a ...

History

Bleak House was originally called Fort House and was the residence of a captain of one of the two coastal forts guarding Broadstairs, the town in which it is situated.

Association with Charles Dickens

leased Fort House from the 1840s till 1852. It was there in that "airy nest" above the harbour that he wrote ''

''. Fort House was dubbed Bleak House in the early part of the 20th century. Somebody asserted that it was the Bleak House referred to in Dickens' 1853 novel, and the name stuck. There has been much dispute over the truth of the claim. Some people believe that the house from which Dickens took his inspiration is far distant from Broadstairs. What can be certain is that the house held a special attraction for Dickens, and was the residence he "most desired" in his most favourite of watering places, Broadstairs. The famous Danish author Hans Christian Andersen was a regular guest during this time. In the novel ''Sophy Laurie'', published in 1865,

William Carew Hazlitt William Carew Hazlitt (22 August 18348 September 1913), known professionally as W. Carew Hazlitt, was an English lawyer, bibliographer, editor and writer. He was the son of the barrister and registrar William Hazlitt, a grandson of the essayist ...

writes: ''It is at Broadstairs they are staying; in the big, bleak house that stands alone on a peak of the chalk cliff, as if it were some sentinel set over the rovers up and down the sea.'' For much of the 20th century, Bleak House was in two quite distinct parts, serving as both a private residence and a Dickens memorial museum. In 2012 the previous owners opened the house as a wedding venue and guest house. It is now under new ownership and is a private residence once again, as of January 2021. It is being restored back to its former glory.

Smuggling

Broadstairs, like many coastal places around England, had something of a reputation for smuggling in the 18th and early 19th centuries. The current establishment has a Smugglers Museum below deck.

References

External links

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Blaze at Bleak House
Broadstairs Charles Dickens Houses completed in the 19th century Grade II listed buildings in Kent Grade II listed houses Houses in Kent Literary museums in England {{Kent-geo-stub