Darwinophiles, such as me, cannot get enough books about the life and times of their hero. Our appetite for all things Darwinian is voracious. The celebration of the bicentennial year of Darwin’s birth in 2009 yielded a plethora of new biographies and works on such topics as the voyages of his friends and correspondents Joseph Dalton Hooker, Thomas Henry Huxley, and Alfred Russel Wallace (McCalman 2009); Darwin’s influence on photography (Prodger 2009); a biography of his wife, Emma (Loy and Loy 2010); an analysis of the illustrations in Darwin’s books (Voss 2010); and even a book on Darwin’s 15 or so dogs (Townshend 2009), to name just a few. In the biographies, his children, with the exception of Annie, are treated more or less as footnotes to his life, and after Charles’s funeral, the accounts of his children’s lives cease. The more I read about Darwin, the more I wanted to know about his family. Who were these people and what did they do with their lives? This book is an attempt to answer those questions succinctly. These sketches are based on secondary sources and are not complete biographies. That remains for others, more patient than I, to do. Nonetheless, this book assembles a considerable quantity of interesting information and illustrations in one place. It is what results when an ichthyologist gets curious about things beyond his pay grade.
The first of the 10 Darwin children, William, became a banker and managed the business affairs of the extended Darwin-Wedgwood family quite successfully. Anne died young, and Charles never quite got over it. Mary only lived a few weeks. Henrietta overcame many illnesses, and considerable hypochondria, to become her father’s editor and her mother’s biographer. George was a mathematician and developed into a world authority on tides. Elizabeth never married and lived with her mother and father until their deaths. She is the least known of the surviving siblings. Francis (with his father) practically invented the field of plant hormones and was a very influential plant physiologist in his own right. He made his father’s autobiography and letters available to the world. Leonard had three careers: a military man, an economist/politician, and a eugenics advocate. He was a member of Parliament. Horace founded the Cambridge Scientific Instrument Company and served as Mayor of Cambridge. The last, Charles Waring, was a “special needs” child and only lived for 18 months. George, Francis, and Horace were knighted and elected Fellows of the Royal Society. The lives and accomplishments of Francis and Horace have been chronicled in detail by Ayres (2008) and Cattermole and Wolfe (1987), respectively. George and Leonard also deserve full-blown biographies of their own, and I hope this book can help stimulate that urge in a biographer looking for a subject.
What follows is a brief sketch of Darwin’s life and his significance to Western culture, a chapter on his marriage to and later life with Emma, and then one chapter for each child. The biographical sketches begin with the birth of the child and end with his or her death. The time frame then starts anew with the next child. Some events in the narrative, such as Darwin’s death, occur in several children’s chapters. The chapters can be perused independently and in any order. My wish is that the reader comes away from this book with admiration for the accomplishments of the children of this extraordinary man, appreciation for the mutual love and devotion shown by the two parents and their children, and an understanding of the humanity of Charles Darwin.