Colvin's childhood was spent at The Grove, Little Bealings, Suffolk,[1] as Bazett David inherited the estate in 1847 from his father James.

[5] In 1878, 114 Old Master engravings, which Colvin had purchased for the museum from London art dealer A. W. Thibaudeau, were stolen by a hansom cab driver.

Colvin paid the £1,537 10s to Thibaudeau from his own salary in instalments for many years, having initially to borrow £400 from Robert Louis Stevenson; a debt which he was still repaying to his friend in 1884.

In the field both of art and of literature, Colvin's fine taste, wide knowledge and high ideals made his authority and influence extend far beyond his published work.

In late summer 1873, Colvin became friends with Robert Louis Stevenson, then a young man and an unpublished author.

), and was to have written an authoritative Life, intended for publication simultaneously with the Letters, but was obliged to relinquish the task to Graham Balfour.

[12] According to the literary critic R. L. Calder, the Colvins were models for Mr and Mrs Barton Trafford in W. Somerset Maugham's 1930 Cakes and Ale.