Charles Robert Darwin

1809-1882

English Naturalist

Charles Robert Darwin is best known for his hypothesis that natural selection is the driving force behind evolution. Although the ideathat species evolve over time was not a new one, Darwin's famous work, On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection (1859), brought public attention to the hypothesis and presented a field of evidence for natural selection. Simultaneously and independently, fellow scientist Alfred Russel Wallace (1823-1913) presented similar findings.

Charles Darwin. (The Library of Congress. Reproduced by permission.)

Darwin grew up in Shrewsbury, England, the fifth of eight children to Robert and Susannah Darwin. His grandfathers were quite famous—Erasmus Darwin (1731-1802) was a noted physician and poet, and Josiah Wedgewood was known for his porcelain—although both died before his birth. Although he initially enrolled for his higher education at Edinburgh University in medicine, his interests as a naturalist won out when he joined Cambridge and became involved in entomology, geology, and botany.

With a bachelor's degree from Cambridge newly in hand, Darwin accepted the position of unpaid naturalist on the HMS Beagle, a small cruiser that embarked on a five-year voyage to South America at the end of December 1831. During the trip, Darwin took meticulous notes on the geology, flora, and fauna of the coastal locations they visited. He collected many animal specimens, and supplemented them with descriptions of their location, range, and habits. During the long voyage, he also began to notice slight differences between animals living on various islands, including the Galapagos, and also between living animals and fossils, raising initial questions that would later become the subject of his landmark research concerning evolution.

After Darwin returned to England, he published Journal of Researches (1939) and The Structure and Distribution of Coral Reefs (1842). He also edited the four-volume Zoology of the Voyage of the Beagle (1839-1843), which included material from systematists who studied the collections made during the voyage. The well-received books gave Darwin status as a top scientist. He married first cousin Emma Wedgewood in 1839, and four of their children became distinguished scientists in their own right.

Over the next two decades, Darwin began to formulate ideas about evolution and natural selection by combining the data he gathered on the Beagle voyage, his work with specimens he harvested on the trip, studies of selective breeding in domesticated animals, and previously proposed ideas from scientists like Thomas Malthus (1766-1834) and Charles Lyell (1797-1875). Most of this work Darwin did at his home, called Down House, in the village of Downe. Chronic fatigue and intestinal ailments forced him to work in seclusion. Although it was undiagnosed at the time, Darwin was likely suffering from the insect-borne Chagas' disease, which he had probably contracted during the Beagle voyage.

Darwin began to compose his thoughts about a method for evolution in the early 1840s, but withheld his notes after somewhat similar views by Robert Chambers (1802-1871) in 1844 drew fierce criticism. In the 1850s he worked out additional details, and in 1858 learned that Wallace was developing basically the same hypothesis of evolution by natural selection. Wallace and Darwin wrote a joint paper and presented it to the Linnaean Society in 1858.

It wasn't until 1859, however, and Darwin's publication of On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life that the ideas drew widespread interest. With that interest came a good deal of misinterpretation and even condemnation. Darwin remained secluded at Down House, fielding criticisms and releasing additional editions of Origin of Species.

For the rest of his life, Darwin continued to develop his hypothesis, and in 1871 publishedThe Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex, which presents the topic of sexual selection and the place of humans along the evolutionary path. In addition, Darwin began to place an increasing focus on domesticated plants and animals in his later years. From 1860-80 he published works on orchids, climbing plants, and insectivorous plants.