Aided by a love of literature, an eye that could recognize a rare book, and much hard work, Bertram Dobell rose from humble beginnings to become proprietor of two bookshops in London's Charing Cross Road and to be held in high esteem by most of the collectors of the day, many of whom visited his shops regularly or bought from him through the mail. As the eldest son of Elizabeth (Eldridge) Dobell and Edward Dobell, a journeyman tailor whose forebears had been among the persecuted Huguenots who fled from France to seek religious freedom after King Louis XIV had revoked the Edict of Nantes in 1685, Bertram Dobell was born in Battle on 9 January 1842. Little is known of his early life, and he was reticent in providing details of it. When he was still young, the Dobell family moved to London, where his father was soon stricken and severely...