Charles Babbage is an almost legendary figure of the Victorian era, yet relatively little is known about him. No authoritative account of his life and work has yet been published. In the absence of accurate knowledge, he is misrepresented as the eccentric genius, inventing computers which he never completed and quarrelling with almost everyone, especially the organgrinders. Certainly Babbage was a man of highly individual talent, applying his ability with great success to a variety of subjects from economics to ballet, from deciphering to life insurance, from tool-making to astronomy. Indeed it is hard to think of any field of knowledge in which he did not excel, excepting possibly classics, for which he admitted a dislike. As far as his personal life is concerned, there is abundant, scarcely touched material available for studies of his exceptional personality, and when this is thoroughly examined it will almost certainly be discovered that he was a far different person from the one represented by popular misconception.

Primarily, Charles Babbage was a mathematician. In spite of the great variety of interests in other spheres, together with a considerable amount of family and social commitment, there is no doubt that he devoted himself essentially to a study of pure mathematics during the early years of his working life. In these years, as will be shown, his productive work was most original in content, exerting a strong influence on the course of British mathematics. It was recognised and esteemed by some of the greatest contemporary Continental mathematicians and contained many ideas, the value of which was not acknowledged till many years later.