Shrewd investments in canals and property made Dr Darwin prosperous, and through private mortgages and loans he kept a tight grip on the financial affairs of several Shrewsbury families. In later life Charles frequently referred to cherished medical and scientific opinions of his father, and he appreciated his father's powers of observation and intuitive understanding of human nature, qualities that enabled him to read ' the characters, and even the thoughts of those whom he saw even for a short time' ( Autobiography, 32). Robert Waring Darwin was a talkative man of strong principles, freethinking, and an enthusiastic gardener. The nature of the relationship between father and son is disputed. She was buried in St Chad's Church, Montford, near Shrewsbury, where Darwin's father also rests.ĭarwin's three older sisters took on maternal responsibility and he remembered his childhood with great affection. Charles's mother died in 1817, when he was eight, and in later life he had no distinct recollection of her beyond the ' black velvet gown' she wore on her deathbed and her ' curiously constructed work-table' ( Autobiography, 22). ![]() His grandfathers, the potter Josiah Wedgwood (1730–1795) and the evolutionist poet and physician Erasmus Darwin (1731–1802), were leading lights of the industrial revolution his grandmothers were respectively Sarah Wedgwood (1734–1815) and Mary Howard (1740–1770). ![]() His sisters were Marianne, Caroline, Susan, and Emily Catherine, his brother Erasmus Alvey. By permission of the Linnean Society of Londonĭarwin, Charles Robert ( 1809–1882), naturalist, geologist, and originator of the theory of natural selection, was born on 12 February 1809 at The Mount, Shrewsbury, the fifth child and second son of Robert Waring Darwin (1766–1848), Shrewsbury's principal physician, and Susannah Wedgwood (1765–1817).
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