DARWIN, Charles (1809-1882) - photo 1
DARWIN, Charles (1809-1882) - photo 2

DARWIN, Charles (1809-1882)

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£ 5 670
Auction dateClassic
13.07.2022 10:30UTC +01:00
Auctioneer
CHRISTIE'S
Event location
United Kingdom, London
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ID 794465
Lot 59 | DARWIN, Charles (1809-1882)
DARWIN, Charles (1809-1882)

Letter signed (‘Charles Darwin’) to [Charles] Wyville Thomson, Down House, 10 October 1870.

Two pages, 201 x 125mm, bifolium, printed heading ‘Down, Bromley [cancelled and revised to ‘Beckenham’ in autograph], Kent, S.E.’. In the hand of Emma Darwin, signed and with autograph subscription. Provenance: by descent.



Darwin offers his support to a future opponent of evolution, backing the candidacy of Charles Wyville Thomson for the chair of natural history at Edinburgh in 1870 some six years before the younger man joined the ranks of his critics. Darwin professes himself glad to hear of the candidacy, continuing ‘You have my sincere good wishes for your success, for to the best of my judgement you have proved yourself well fitted for the post by what you have done in science & by the course of your recent investigations. Should you succeed, you will have an admirable opportunity for bringing forward and encouraging new recruits in science’.



The Scottish naturalist Charles Wyville Thomson (1830-1882) served as scientific director of the Challenger expedition of 1872-6, a mission which saw the discovery and cataloguing of over 4,000 previously-unknown species and laid the foundations for the discipline of oceanography. Two years before HMS Challenger left Portsmouth, Wyville Thomson acceded to the chair of Natural History at the University of Edinburgh with the support of prominent scientists including Darwin and Richard Owen. However, in an introductory lecture to the natural history class at Edinburgh in 1876, Thomson claimed that natural selection did not provide sufficient support for the hypothesis of evolution, prompting a rift between the two that would culminate in the riposte by Darwin published in the 11 November 1880 edition of Nature: ‘I am sorry to find that Sir Wyville Thomson does not understand the principle of natural selection, as explained by Mr. Wallace and myself’.



Published DCP-LETT-7337.

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