This book is a biography of Frederick Nicholas Charrington. He was an English social reformer who renounced succession to a fortune of over £1 million in order to devote his life to temperance work. His father was a partner in the Charrington Brewery, one of London's biggest brewing companies. At the age of 19, Charrington had a conversion experience and became an Evangelical Christian. About a year later, while walking through Whitechapel, he saw a poorly dressed woman with her children begging her husband to leave a public house and give her money for food. The furious husband came out and knocked her into the gutter. Charrington went to help and was also knocked to the ground. Looking up, he saw his name on the sign above the pub.