List of Dickensian Characters - B

B

• Bachelor, The, is friend to the parson in the village church where Nell and her grandfather end their journey. He turns out to be the brother of Mr Garland and is instrumental in helping the Single Gentleman find his brother, Nell's grandfather, in The Old Curiosity Shop.
• Badger, Bayham, is a doctor, cousin of Kenge, to whom Richard Carstone is apprenticed. Badger's wife Laura talks incessantly about her two former husbands, Captain Swosser and Professor Dingo, in Bleak House.
• Bagman, The One-eyed, is a middle-aged story-teller in The Pickwick Papers.
• Bagnet Family, is a musical and military family headed by Matthew, an old army friend of George Rouncewell. Bagnet's wife, the old girl, knows Matthew so well that he always calls upon her to supply his opinion. The Bagnet children Quebec, Malta, and Woolwich are named after the military bases where the family has been stationed. Matthew is guarantor to George's loan from Smallweed, when Smallweed calls in the debt George is forced to deliver a document Smallweed needs to help lawyer Tulkinghorn learn Lady Dedlock's secret in Bleak House.
• Bagstock, Major Joseph Neighbour of Miss Tox and friend of Paul Dombey who introduces Paul to Edith Granger and Mrs Skewton. The Major describes himself as "tough, Sir, tough, and de-vilish sly!" in Dombey and Son
• Bamber, Jack is an old man whom Mr Pickwick meets in The Pickwick Papers.
• Bantam, Angelo Cyrus is the Master of Ceremonies at a ball in The Pickwick Papers.
• Barbara Modest and pretty servant of the Garlands. She befriends Kit when he is also employed by the Garlands. Barbara later marries Kit in The Old Curiosity Shop.
• Barbary, Miss 'Godmother' who raises Esther Summerson. Later found to be Esther's aunt, the sister of Lady Dedlock in Bleak House.
• Bardell, Martha is Mr Pickwick's landlady in The Pickwick Papers. After a misunderstanding which leads her to believe that Pickwick has proposed marriage to her, she starts a breach of promise action against him, encouraged by the unscrupulous attorneys Dodson and Fogg.
• Bardell, Thomas is the son of Martha Bardell in The Pickwick Papers.
• Barkis A carrier between Blunderstone and Yarmouth. He marries Clara Peggotty. Quote: "Barkis is willin'" is his reply to her proposal of marriage in David Copperfield
• Barley, Old Bill Clara Barley's bedridden father, a retired ship's purser, who suffers with gout which he treats with an abundance of rum and pepper in Great Expectations.
• Barley, Clara Herbert Pocket's fiancee, she cares for her invalid father, Old Bill Barley, in a waterside house at Mill Pond Bank where Magwitch is hidden. After her father's death she marries Herbert in Great Expectations.
• Barnacle Family, a family that controls the Circumlocution Office, where everything goes round in circles, and nothing ever gets done. Includes Lord Decimus Tite Barnacle, his wife, Lady Jemima Bilberry, nephew Tite Barnacle, and his son Clarence Barnacle (Barnacle Junior) in Little Dorrit.
• Barsad, John (alias Soloman Pross) Barsad testifies against Charles Darnay at the treason trial at the Old Bailey. Later Barsad turns up as a spy in Paris and is found to be the brother of Miss Pross. Threatened with exposure, Barsad helps Sydney Carton exchange places with Charles Darnay in prison in A Tale of Two Cities.
• Bates, Charles Member of Fagin's band of thieves. Often referred to by Dickens as "Master Bates." He mends his ways after Fagin is captured in Oliver Twist.
• Bazzard Clerk to Hiram Grewgious who writes an unproduced tragedy, The Thorn of Anxiety. Grewgious admits that Bazzard has a strange power over him in The Mystery of Edwin Drood.
• Belle Scrooge's former fiancee whom he had forgotten until reminded by the Ghost of Christmas Past in A Christmas Carol.
• Benjamin Member of the 'Prentice Knights with Simon Tappertit in Barnaby Rudge.
• Bertha Plummer blind daughter of the toymaker, Caleb Plummer. From one of Dickens lesser known books, The Cricket on the Hearth.
• Betsy (alias Bet), Prostitute and friend of Nancy. Goes mad after identifying Nancy's body in Oliver Twist.
• Bevan, Mr Boston doctor whom Martin and Mark meet at Pawkins' Boarding House in New York and one of the few positive characters they meet in the America. Bevan later loans them money to return to England in Martin Chuzzlewit.
• Biddy is Wopsle's great aunt's granddaughter in Great Expectations. Earlier in the novel she is Pip's friend, but later in the novel they grow apart as Pip becomes a gentleman. Spurned by Pip, though when he later realises that he loves her too, she has married Joe Gargery.
• Bitzer A student in Gradgrind's school of hard facts. Later a light porter in Bounderby's bank in Hard Times.
• Blackpool, Stephen A worker in Bounderby's mill. His wife is a drunk and he befriends Rachael. He falls out with his employer and leaves to look for work elsewhere. He is accused of robbing the bank and before his name is cleared he falls down a well and dies. Later he is cleared with the discovery that the robbery was committed by young Tom Gradgrind in Hard Times.
• Blimber, Cornelia is a prim school-matron in Dombey & Son.
• Boffin, Henrietta Noddy Boffin's wife in Our Mutual Friend.
• Boffin, Noddy John Harmon's servant. When John's son is supposed drowned, Boffin and his wife inherit the Harmon fortune, in Our Mutual Friend.
• Bounderby, Josiah Coketown Banker, mill owner, and 'self-made man' proud that he raised himself in the streets after being abandoned as a child. His story is exposed as a sham when Mrs Pegler, his loving mother whom he has discarded, is found. Bounderby marries his friend Gradgrind's daughter, Louisa, and later discards her in Hard Times.
• Boythorn, Lawrence A former soldier and an old friend of John Jarndyce in Bleak House. He is very loud and harsh, but goodhearted, and always speaks in superlatives. He is a neighbour of Sir Leicester Dedlock, with whom he is engaged in an epic tangle of lawsuits over a right-of-way across Boythorn's property that Sir Leicester asserts the legal right to close. The character is based on Walter Savage Landor.
• Brass, Sally Sister and partner of Quilp's unscrupulous attorney, Sampson Brass. She is the mother of the Marchioness, the below-stairs maid in The Old Curiosity Shop.
• Brass, Sampson "An attorney of no good repute" and "One of the greatest scoundrels unhung". Brass served as Daniel Quilp's lawyer. He helps Quilp get the Curiosity Shop from Nell's grandfather and when he tries to help Quilp frame Kit Nubbles he is undone with the help of his clerk Dick Swiveler and the Marchioness, his below-stairs maid in The Old Curiosity Shop.
• Bray, Madeline Girl with whom Nicholas falls in love when he first sees her at an employment office. She cares for her selfish, invalid father who tries to sell her in marriage to Arthur Gride, assisted by Ralph Nickleby. Her father dies and the scheme is exposed. She marries Nicholas at the end of the story in Nicholas Nickleby.
• Bray, Walter Tyrannical father of Madeline. Heavily in debt, and living in the Rules of the King's Bench debtor's prison, he promises his daughter's hand in marriage to Arthur Gride in return for the forgiveness of his debt to Gride and Ralph Nickleby. He dies on the morning of the wedding thus saving Madeline from the unwanted marriage Nicholas Nickleby.
• Brick, Jefferson War correspondent for the New York Rowdy Journal, edited by Colonel Diver in Martin Chuzzlewit.
• Bates, Charley is one of Fagin's boy pickpockets in Oliver Twist.
• Browdie, John Son of a small corn-factor. He gives money to Nicholas Nickleby on his escape from Dotheboys Hall. John marries Matilda Price. Later assists in Smike's escape from Squeers in London in Nicholas Nickleby.
• Brown, Good Mrs An ugly old rag and bone vendor and mother of Alice Marwood (Brown). She kidnaps Florence Dombey and steals her clothes. Later she helps Dombey find Carker and Edith after their elopement. Dickens describes Good Mrs Brown as a "very ugly old woman, with red rims round her eyes, and a mouth that mumbled and chattered of itself when she was not speaking" in Dombey and Son.
• Brown, Alice (alias Marwood) Daughter of Good Mrs Brown and cousin of Edith Granger in Dombey and Son.
• Brownlow, Mr Befriends Oliver after he is charged with pickpocketing. He later establishes Oliver's true identity and adopts him in Oliver Twist.
• Bucket, Inspector is a policeman in Bleak House. He undertakes several investigations in the course of the novel, most notably the investigation of Mr Tulkinghorn's murder, which he brings to a successful conclusion.
• Bud, Rosa Betrothed to Edwin Drood in childhood, they later agree that they cannot marry. Edwin disappears and John Jasper declares his love for Rosa. In terror she flees to London to her guardian, Grewgious. "The pet pupil of the Nuns' House is Miss Rosa Bud, of course called Rosebud; wonderfully pretty, wonderfully childish, wonderfully whimsical. An awkward interest (awkward because romantic) attaches to Miss Bud in the minds of the young ladies, on account of its being known to them that a husband has been chosen for her by will and bequest, and that her guardian is bound down to bestow her on that husband when he comes of age" in The Mystery of Edwin Drood.
• Bumble is the beadle of the parish that operates the workhouse depicted in Oliver Twist.
• Bunsby, Jack Seafaring friend of Captain Cuttle who is always called in times of crisis for advise. The advise given confounds everyone listening except his friend Cuttle, who values it immensely. Bunsby is later trapped into marriage by Mrs MacStinger. Bunsby's ship is the Cautious Clara. Bunsby is described by Dickens as having "one stationary eye in the mahogany face, and one revolving one, on the principle of some lighthouses" in Dombey and Son.
• Buzfuz, Serjeant a Barrister who represents Mrs Bardell in her suit against Samuel Pickwick. He bullies the witnesses into giving incriminating testimony and Pickwick is falsely convicted in The Pickwick Papers.