I see a lot of innocent misinformation from people selling dolls on ebay. Innocent because people just do not realize.

    Frozen Charlotte/Charlie type dolls are just that. A type of doll. A frozen Charlotte/Charlie doll can have been made at any time, and can be of any subject ie an animal/ person ect. The only requirement is that it be in one peice. immobile (no movable parts ie arms. legs, tails).

    When we think of a frozen charlotte dolls, an older, crudely painted miniature female nude doll comes to mind. These frozen charlotte dolls are the most  collectable and in some cases very valuable. The older ones  were made from 1860 thru 1900ish. they were made in the era before the penny doll.  Arms can be up, down, or in a hugging myself state. No matter how the arms are, they are always stationary (frozen)  most are dark headed, some blond, some red headed. This doll is made of porcelain, generally glazed only on one side. The word Charlotte represents feminine or female where as Charlie represent masculine/ male. 

Where did the name for this type of doll originate?

  Many countries claim fame to making the first frozen Charlotte/ Charlie. From my in depth research, I conclude that America is the true answer.

The following is a copy of what I wrote from my research a few years ago.

Seba Smith a newspaperman wrote a poem  between 1840 and 1843. His poem "a corpse going to a ball" became a victorian cautionary story first appearing in print  December 28th 1843 in a newspaper called "the Rover",  just 3 days before new years eve. I am sure that Seba timed the publishing of his poem, to warn young girls to keep warmly dressed on their way to New Years eve parties in that year. Seba had, in 1831 read of a girl named Charlotte J who had died in her bower all dressed up for a ball. Nine years later, "in the New York observer" newspaper dated February 8, 1840 Seba read of an unnamed girl who had again frozen to death on her way to a party. Seba used his writting skills to create  the poem from these 2 very real incidents, The poem probably would have been long forgotten, except that William Lorenzo Carter, a partially blind man with musical talents, put Seba's poem to music and sang it in his travels across America. I do not who first coined the dolls type name "frozen Charlotte", but i do know that the dolls first were made in the 1860's  early frozen charlotte were used to cool hot tea down at ladies tea parties. Once used,  the little doll was given to a well behaved young girl who may have come to the tea party with her Mother. later. the smaller versions were baked into cakes, and used as cup cake toppers.  In Australia they were places in christmas puddings, to be found by lucky children. They are crudely painted, but have a charm about them.

I have many documents to substantiate my findings. no part of this guide may be reproduced without my written permission. Please contact me Ebay seller ID Normanjwellman regarding usage of this guide.