Charles Dickens living at Devonshire Terrace, Marylebone, to care for the young family they had left behind. She remained with them as housekeeper, organiser, adviser, and friend until Dickens's death in 1870. Dickens modeled the character of Agnes Wickfield after Georgina and Mary. He described his impressions in a travelogue, "American Notes for General Circulation". Dickens includes in "Notes" a powerful condemnation of slavery, which he had attacked as early as "The Pickwick Papers", correlating the emancipation of the poor in England with the abolition of slavery abroad citing newspaper accounts of runaway slaves disfigured by their masters. In spite of the
Frederick Dickens couple applied for a judicial separation on the grounds of adultery. Anna was granted alimony, which Fred Dickens refused to pay, leaving the country. On his return in 1862, he was arrested and imprisoned for debt. Like his father before him, who had also been imprisoned for debt, Fred had gained credit from various sources by trading on his brother's fame, "...rasping my very heart," Charles Dickens stated. Fred became the inspiration for the dissolute brother of Little Nell, also named Fred, in "The Old Curiosity Shop". During the period Charles was writing the novel, Fred Dickens had been obtaining