Richard Doddridge Blackmore was born at Longworth, Berkshire, England, on June 7, 1825. He was the third son of the Reverend John Blackmore and Anne Basset Knight Blackmore, the daughter of a distinguished vicar. His mother died of typhus a few months after Blackmore's birth, and he and his older brother, Henry, lived with relatives during much of their childhood. The Blackmore family had originated in western Devonshire, and the author spent many of his formative years in the west country, the setting of Lorna Doone. Like his hero, John Ridd, Blackmore attended Blundell's School, Tiverton. He entered Exeter College, Oxford, in 1843 and received his degree four years later. While in college, Blackmore met and fell in love with Lucy Macguire.

Both the Blackmore and the Knight families produced several clergymen, but despite family tradition Blackmore decided against the church as a career and decided to...