Charles Robert Darwin

Darwin

Charles Robert Darwin who is considered the "father of evolutionary theory" was born in Shrewsbury, England on February 12, 1809. He came from a modestly wealthy family of doctors. His grandfather Erasmus Darwin was a respected physician, a well known poet, philosopher, botanist, and naturalist. As a naturalist, he formulated one of the first formal theories on evolution in Zoonomia, or, The Laws of Organic Life.

When Charles was eight his mother died and he went away to boarding school until he was sixteen. His father decided to send him to medical school to continue in the family occupation as a doctor. He went to Edinburgh University, where the barbaric surgery practices appalled him and he couldn't stand the sight of blood. Again not wanting Charles to be without a formal occupation his father sent him to Cambridge University to study to be a clergyman. There he got a Bachelor of Arts degree in theology. While at Cambridge he developed an interest in natural history. It was here that he met John Henslowe a professor of botany.

Henslowe recommended Darwin for the unpaid position of naturalist to Capt. Fitzroy on the HMS Beagle. In December of 1831 Darwin set sail on a two year expedition to chart the South American coastline. Darwin collected and documented vast numbers of specimen, many of them were new to science. It is on this voyage that Darwin contracted Chagas disease which plagued him the rest of his life. When the HMS Beagle returned in October 1836 Darwin return as a celebrity in scientific circles. Henslow helped built up Darwin's reputation by showing fossil samples and copies of his geological writings from the Beagle.

In 1839 Darwin married his cousin Emma Wedgewood together they had ten children. Darwin expressed his concerns of the closeness of his linage to Emma's in his writings on the effects inbreeding and cross breeding. When Darwin beloved Annie got sick it reawakened his fears that her illness might be hereditary. After a long illness Annie died and Darwin lost his faith in a beneficent God. Three of their children died young.

Darwin was convinced of his theory of evolution but was well aware of the fact that transmutation of species was connected with the crime of blasphemy, and radical democratic agitators trying to over throw society in Britain. To publish his theories would run the risk ruining his reputation. In 1856 Lyell urged Darwin to publish his theory of evolution to create precedence. In 1859 Origins of Species was published. "Evolutionism" at his time implied creation without divine intervention so Darwin didn't use the words evolution or evolve. Origins of Species sparked a public controversy that's still going on today. Reviewers of the time were quick to grab the phrase "men from Monkeys", even though Darwin never used those words. The Church of England came out against