Thomas Beard.

Thomas Beard (1807 – 1891) was a journalist and one of the oldest friends of the Victorian author Charles Dickens.

Thomas Beard and Charles Dickens.

Charles Dickens and Thomas Beard met whilst reporters together at The Morning Chronicle newspaper. The two would often be sent on assignments across the country, travelling by stagecoach.

Beard was best man at his wedding in April 1836.

Beard’s younger brother Francis was Dickens’ personal doctor and was with him when he died.

Charles Dickens kept in touch with Beard throughout his life and a number of personal letters survive documenting their correspondence. He wrote to him, for example, after the death of his beloved sister-in-law, Mary Hogarth expressing “Thank God she died in my arms and that the last words she whispered were of me“.