Original Letters of Charles Robert Darwin (1809-1882)

Note: the photocopied letters, photographs and other non-holograph items in the volume are not listed.

Folio: 1 Addressee: S P Woodward Date: 1860 Calendar reference: 2630

Folio: 3 Addressee: G R Waterhouse Date: [Dec 1843] Calendar reference: 718

Folio: 4 Addressee: Emma [Darwin] Date: 5 July 1844 Calendar reference: 761

Folio: 6 Addressee: *G C Wallich Date: 12 December 1860 Calendar reference: 3020

Addressee: *from Wallich Date: 25 March 1882 Calendar reference: 13739

Addressee: *G C Wallich Date: 28 March 1882 Calendar reference: 13747

Folio: 7 Addressee: G R Waterhouse Date: 1 April [1860] Calendar reference: 2740

Folio: 8 Addressee: [T M Hughes] Date: 26 August 1880 Calendar reference: 12701

Folio: 9 Addressee: Sir H[enry] Edwards Date: 15 July [1873] Calendar reference: 8979

Folio: 15-27 Addressee: H T Stainton Date: 1855-1881 Calendar reference: 1767, 1853, 2829, 2839, 5890, 5903, 5907, 5949, 5960, 5967, 5994, 9243, 10385, 13359

Folio: 29 Addressee: Frank [Darwin] Date: 6 Jan 1872 Calendar reference: 8147

Folio: 30-34 Addressee: Wiliam [E Darwin] Date: [1872] Calendar reference: 8140, 8174, 8208, 8396, 8529

Folio: 36 Addressee: H Weyenbergh Date: 18 March 1879 Calendar reference: 11943

Folio: 43 Addressee: Prof [T McK] Hughes Date: 23 August [1880] Calendar reference: 12695

Folio: 44 Addressee: George [H Darwin] Date: 30 May

Folio: 45 Addressee: H Anton de Barry Date: 11 February 1879 Calendar reference: 11869

Folio: 45a Addressee: H Anton de Barry Date: 5 August 1879 Calendar reference: 12182

Folio: 62 Addressee: [W Thistleton-] Dyer Date: 22 April 1879 Calendar reference: 12009

Folio: 67 Addressee: [A G Butler] Date: 9 May 1877 Calendar reference: 10957

Folio: 68 Addressee: [A G Butler] Date: 1 July [1871] Calendar reference: 7845

Folio: 69 Addressee: [J E] Gray Date: 1 July [1856] Calendar reference: 1915

Folio: 71 Addressee: [A G Butler] Date: 20 February [1879] Calendar reference: 11889

The letters have been acquired at various times and in various ways.

The most important event in Charles Darwin's life was his five-year voyage around the world aboard the Admiralty surveying ship Beagle, under the command of Robert Fitzroy. The observations and collections made on this voyage led Darwin to important publications on geology and botany. They also led to his interest in adaptation and the origin of species, from which he developed his theory of evolution by natural selection, published in On the origin of species (1859).