{"id":68672,"date":"2010-12-16T10:00:55","date_gmt":"2010-12-16T15:00:55","guid":{"rendered":"\/gazette\/?p=68672"},"modified":"2019-03-20T17:38:31","modified_gmt":"2019-03-20T21:38:31","slug":"across-160-years-darwin-speaks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/story\/2010\/12\/across-160-years-darwin-speaks\/","title":{"rendered":"Across 160 years, Darwin speaks"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\t
\"\"

\u201cI was a little excited, but a bit skeptical that it would actually be new,\u201d said Myrna Perez, who, alongside lecturer Alistair Sponsel stumbled across a previously unknown letter from Charles Darwin to his colleague and later nemesis, zoologist Richard Owen.<\/p>

Kris Snibbe\/Harvard Staff Photographer<\/p><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\t

\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\tHealth\t\t<\/a>\n\t\t\n\t\t

\n\t\tAcross 160 years, Darwin speaks\t<\/h1>\n\n\t\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\n\t
\n\t\t
\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t

\n\t\tMaya Shwayder \u201911\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t

\n\t\t\tHarvard Correspondent\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/address>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t

\n\t\t\tDiscovery of letter sheds light on murky part of the naturalist\u2019s life\t\t<\/h2>\n\t\t\n<\/header>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\t\t

While in Houghton Library<\/a>, sorting through stacks of old manuscripts and letters from the great naturalist Charles Darwin, history of science graduate student Myrna Perez and lecturer Alistair Sponsel stumbled across something extraordinary: a previously unknown letter from Darwin to his colleague and later nemesis, zoologist Richard Owen.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe initially went [to Houghton] to confirm that a few letters we thought were here at Harvard were actually here,\u201d said Sponsel, who, like Perez, is an affiliate of the Darwin Correspondence Project<\/a>, whose American editorial office is at Harvard.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe were not really looking for a new letter,\u201d Perez said. \u201cOne of the editors \u2026 noticed there were some discrepancies between the letters that the project believed to be at Harvard, and what she could tell from the Harvard catalogs themselves.\u201d<\/p>\n

After cross-checking the British lists and the Harvard catalog, Perez came across a letter that couldn\u2019t be found on any of the lists.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was a little excited, but a bit skeptical that it would actually be new,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd then when I got it, I spent a long time looking through our project databases, had Alistair check what I did, and we finally concluded that it was a letter unknown to the project.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to Sponsel, Darwin wrote the undated letter in April 1848, long before his landmark book \u201cOn the Origin of Species\u201d was published. Darwin would have been 39 years old, but he was already famous as a voyager and author. Owen had previously contributed to Darwin\u2019s book \u201cThe Zoology of the Voyage of the HMS Beagle.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe can tell with fairly good confidence which Sunday in 1848 he wrote this,\u201d Sponsel said. \u201cThe two [Owen and Darwin] were working on a publication for the British Navy, a handbook for people on voyages to teach them how to make scientific observations.\u201d<\/p>\n

Perez added, \u201cThe letter, and the entire exchange, gives a perspective on the collaborative process of their work and the kind of instructions that Darwin felt were appropriate for new naturalists on naval expeditions. He makes some interesting comments in the letter, saying that he would have loved to have had this kind of manual on his own Beagle voyage.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cUnknown letters don\u2019t come up very often, maybe about 10 a year,\u201d said Darwin scholar Janet Browne<\/a>, Aramont Professor of the History of Science and Harvard College Professor. \u201cThis letter is unusual in that it is a letter from early in Darwin\u2019s life, before \u2018On the Origin of Species\u2019 was written, and with a particular individual with whom he became almost sworn enemies.\u201d<\/p>\n

It was \u201cOn the Origin of Species\u201d that changed Darwin and Owen\u2019s relationship. After its publication, Owen wrote a cruel review of the book, and the relationship disintegrated.<\/p>\n

The discovery comes as part of Perez and Sponsel\u2019s work for the Darwin Correspondence Project, an endeavor begun in the mid-1970s by American scholar Frederick Burkhardt and now based at the University of Cambridge.\u00a0 Participants there and at Harvard are dedicated to cataloging, editing, and publishing Darwin\u2019s correspondence from throughout his life. To date, Browne said, the project has cataloged about 15,000 letters from \u201cunexpected people in all sorts of categories, including women scientists and African colonial administrators.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHistorians have found principally through this large publishing project that correspondence is a significant element of what scientists used to do,\u201d Browne said. \u201cIt turns out that someone like Darwin was writing letters as a way of collecting information. It was part of his scientific method.\u201d<\/p>\n\r\n\t\n\n\t

\"\"
The transcription of the letter, which is copyright of the Darwin Correspondence Project, will be published in a forthcoming supplement to the \u201cCorrespondence of Charles Darwin\u201d (Cambridge University Press).\t\t\t<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\t\n\t\r\n\n\n\n<\/div>\n\n\t\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The discovery of an unknown 1848 letter by the great naturalist sheds light on a murky part of his life, and on a friendship that eventually went awry. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":105622744,"featured_media":68678,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"gz_ga_pageviews":14,"gz_ga_lastupdated":"2017-02-24 12:43","document_color_palette":"crimson","author":"Maya Shwayder \u201911","affiliation":"Harvard 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class=\"wp-element-caption--caption\">\u201cI was a little excited, but a bit skeptical that it would actually be new,\u201d said Myrna Perez, who, alongside lecturer Alistair Sponsel stumbled across a previously unknown letter from Charles Darwin to his colleague and later nemesis, zoologist Richard Owen.<\/p><p class=\"wp-element-caption--credit\">Kris Snibbe\/Harvard Staff Photographer<\/p><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","innerContent":["<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img alt=\"\" height=\"403\" loading=\"eager\" src=\"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/12\/110210_darwin_432_605.jpg\" width=\"605\"\/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\"><p class=\"wp-element-caption--caption\">\u201cI was a little excited, but a bit skeptical that it would actually be new,\u201d said Myrna Perez, who, alongside lecturer Alistair Sponsel stumbled across a previously unknown letter from Charles Darwin to his colleague and later nemesis, zoologist Richard Owen.<\/p><p class=\"wp-element-caption--credit\">Kris Snibbe\/Harvard Staff Photographer<\/p><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n"],"rendered":"<header\n\tclass=\"wp-block-harvard-gazette-article-header alignfull article-header is-style-full-width-text-below centered-image\"\n\tstyle=\" \"\n>\n\t<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img alt=\"\" height=\"403\" loading=\"eager\" src=\"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/12\/110210_darwin_432_605.jpg\" width=\"605\"\/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\"><p class=\"wp-element-caption--caption\">\u201cI was a little excited, but a bit skeptical that it would actually be new,\u201d said Myrna Perez, who, alongside lecturer Alistair Sponsel stumbled across a previously unknown letter from Charles Darwin to his colleague and later nemesis, zoologist Richard Owen.<\/p><p class=\"wp-element-caption--credit\">Kris Snibbe\/Harvard Staff Photographer<\/p><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\t<div class=\"article-header__content\">\n\t\t\t<a\n\t\t\tclass=\"article-header__category\"\n\t\t\thref=\"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/section\/health\/\"\n\t\t>\n\t\t\tHealth\t\t<\/a>\n\t\t\n\t\t<h1 class=\"article-header__title wp-block-heading \">\n\t\tAcross 160 years, Darwin speaks\t<\/h1>\n\n\t\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\n\t<div class=\"article-header__meta\">\n\t\t<div class=\"wp-block-post-author\">\n\t\t\t<address class=\"wp-block-post-author__content\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<p class=\"author wp-block-post-author__name\">\n\t\tMaya Shwayder \u201911\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t<p class=\"wp-block-post-author__byline\">\n\t\t\tHarvard Correspondent\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/address>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t<time class=\"article-header__date\" datetime=\"2010-12-16\">\n\t\t\tDecember 16, 2010\t\t<\/time>\n\n\t\t<span class=\"article-header__reading-time\">\n\t\t\t4 min read\t\t<\/span>\n\t<\/div>\n\n\t\n\t\t\t<h2 class=\"article-header__subheading wp-block-heading\">\n\t\t\tDiscovery of letter sheds light on murky part of the naturalist\u2019s life\t\t<\/h2>\n\t\t\n<\/header>\n"},"2":{"blockName":"core\/group","attrs":{"templateLock":false,"metadata":{"name":"Article content"},"align":"wide","layout":{"type":"constrained","justifyContent":"center"},"tagName":"div","lock":[],"className":"","style":[],"backgroundColor":"","textColor":"","gradient":"","fontSize":"","fontFamily":"","borderColor":"","ariaLabel":"","anchor":""},"innerBlocks":[{"blockName":"core\/freeform","attrs":{"content":"","lock":[],"metadata":[]},"innerBlocks":[],"innerHTML":"\n\t\t<p>While in <a href=\"https:\/\/library.harvard.edu\/libraries\/houghton\">Houghton Library<\/a>, sorting through stacks of old manuscripts and letters from the great naturalist Charles Darwin, history of science graduate student Myrna Perez and lecturer Alistair Sponsel stumbled across something extraordinary: a previously unknown letter from Darwin to his colleague and later nemesis, zoologist Richard Owen.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe initially went [to Houghton] to confirm that a few letters we thought were here at Harvard were actually here,\u201d said Sponsel, who, like Perez, is an affiliate of the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.darwinproject.ac.uk\">Darwin Correspondence Project<\/a>, whose American editorial office is at Harvard.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe were not really looking for a new letter,\u201d Perez said. \u201cOne of the editors \u2026 noticed there were some discrepancies between the letters that the project believed to be at Harvard, and what she could tell from the Harvard catalogs themselves.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>After cross-checking the British lists and the Harvard catalog, Perez came across a letter that couldn\u2019t be found on any of the lists.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI was a little excited, but a bit skeptical that it would actually be new,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd then when I got it, I spent a long time looking through our project databases, had Alistair check what I did, and we finally concluded that it was a letter unknown to the project.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>According to Sponsel, Darwin wrote the undated letter in April 1848, long before his landmark book \u201cOn the Origin of Species\u201d was published. Darwin would have been 39 years old, but he was already famous as a voyager and author. Owen had previously contributed to Darwin\u2019s book \u201cThe Zoology of the Voyage of the HMS Beagle.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe can tell with fairly good confidence which Sunday in 1848 he wrote this,\u201d Sponsel said. \u201cThe two [Owen and Darwin] were working on a publication for the British Navy, a handbook for people on voyages to teach them how to make scientific observations.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Perez added, \u201cThe letter, and the entire exchange, gives a perspective on the collaborative process of their work and the kind of instructions that Darwin felt were appropriate for new naturalists on naval expeditions. He makes some interesting comments in the letter, saying that he would have loved to have had this kind of manual on his own Beagle voyage.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cUnknown letters don\u2019t come up very often, maybe about 10 a year,\u201d said Darwin scholar <a href=\"http:\/\/www.fas.harvard.edu\/~hsdept\/bios\/browne.html\">Janet Browne<\/a>, Aramont Professor of the History of Science and Harvard College Professor. \u201cThis letter is unusual in that it is a letter from early in Darwin\u2019s life, before \u2018On the Origin of Species\u2019 was written, and with a particular individual with whom he became almost sworn enemies.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>It was \u201cOn the Origin of Species\u201d that changed Darwin and Owen\u2019s relationship. After its publication, Owen wrote a cruel review of the book, and the relationship disintegrated.<\/p>\n<p>The discovery comes as part of Perez and Sponsel\u2019s work for the Darwin Correspondence Project, an endeavor begun in the mid-1970s by American scholar Frederick Burkhardt and now based at the University of Cambridge.\u00a0 Participants there and at Harvard are dedicated to cataloging, editing, and publishing Darwin\u2019s correspondence from throughout his life. To date, Browne said, the project has cataloged about 15,000 letters from \u201cunexpected people in all sorts of categories, including women scientists and African colonial administrators.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHistorians have found principally through this large publishing project that correspondence is a significant element of what scientists used to do,\u201d Browne said. \u201cIt turns out that someone like Darwin was writing letters as a way of collecting information. It was part of his scientific method.\u201d<\/p>\n","innerContent":["\n\t\t<p>While in <a href=\"https:\/\/library.harvard.edu\/libraries\/houghton\">Houghton Library<\/a>, sorting through stacks of old manuscripts and letters from the great naturalist Charles Darwin, history of science graduate student Myrna Perez and lecturer Alistair Sponsel stumbled across something extraordinary: a previously unknown letter from Darwin to his colleague and later nemesis, zoologist Richard Owen.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe initially went [to Houghton] to confirm that a few letters we thought were here at Harvard were actually here,\u201d said Sponsel, who, like Perez, is an affiliate of the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.darwinproject.ac.uk\">Darwin Correspondence Project<\/a>, whose American editorial office is at Harvard.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe were not really looking for a new letter,\u201d Perez said. \u201cOne of the editors \u2026 noticed there were some discrepancies between the letters that the project believed to be at Harvard, and what she could tell from the Harvard catalogs themselves.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>After cross-checking the British lists and the Harvard catalog, Perez came across a letter that couldn\u2019t be found on any of the lists.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI was a little excited, but a bit skeptical that it would actually be new,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd then when I got it, I spent a long time looking through our project databases, had Alistair check what I did, and we finally concluded that it was a letter unknown to the project.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>According to Sponsel, Darwin wrote the undated letter in April 1848, long before his landmark book \u201cOn the Origin of Species\u201d was published. Darwin would have been 39 years old, but he was already famous as a voyager and author. Owen had previously contributed to Darwin\u2019s book \u201cThe Zoology of the Voyage of the HMS Beagle.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe can tell with fairly good confidence which Sunday in 1848 he wrote this,\u201d Sponsel said. \u201cThe two [Owen and Darwin] were working on a publication for the British Navy, a handbook for people on voyages to teach them how to make scientific observations.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Perez added, \u201cThe letter, and the entire exchange, gives a perspective on the collaborative process of their work and the kind of instructions that Darwin felt were appropriate for new naturalists on naval expeditions. He makes some interesting comments in the letter, saying that he would have loved to have had this kind of manual on his own Beagle voyage.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cUnknown letters don\u2019t come up very often, maybe about 10 a year,\u201d said Darwin scholar <a href=\"http:\/\/www.fas.harvard.edu\/~hsdept\/bios\/browne.html\">Janet Browne<\/a>, Aramont Professor of the History of Science and Harvard College Professor. \u201cThis letter is unusual in that it is a letter from early in Darwin\u2019s life, before \u2018On the Origin of Species\u2019 was written, and with a particular individual with whom he became almost sworn enemies.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>It was \u201cOn the Origin of Species\u201d that changed Darwin and Owen\u2019s relationship. After its publication, Owen wrote a cruel review of the book, and the relationship disintegrated.<\/p>\n<p>The discovery comes as part of Perez and Sponsel\u2019s work for the Darwin Correspondence Project, an endeavor begun in the mid-1970s by American scholar Frederick Burkhardt and now based at the University of Cambridge.\u00a0 Participants there and at Harvard are dedicated to cataloging, editing, and publishing Darwin\u2019s correspondence from throughout his life. To date, Browne said, the project has cataloged about 15,000 letters from \u201cunexpected people in all sorts of categories, including women scientists and African colonial administrators.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHistorians have found principally through this large publishing project that correspondence is a significant element of what scientists used to do,\u201d Browne said. \u201cIt turns out that someone like Darwin was writing letters as a way of collecting information. It was part of his scientific method.\u201d<\/p>\n"],"rendered":"\n\t\t<p>While in <a href=\"https:\/\/library.harvard.edu\/libraries\/houghton\">Houghton Library<\/a>, sorting through stacks of old manuscripts and letters from the great naturalist Charles Darwin, history of science graduate student Myrna Perez and lecturer Alistair Sponsel stumbled across something extraordinary: a previously unknown letter from Darwin to his colleague and later nemesis, zoologist Richard Owen.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe initially went [to Houghton] to confirm that a few letters we thought were here at Harvard were actually here,\u201d said Sponsel, who, like Perez, is an affiliate of the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.darwinproject.ac.uk\">Darwin Correspondence Project<\/a>, whose American editorial office is at Harvard.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe were not really looking for a new letter,\u201d Perez said. \u201cOne of the editors \u2026 noticed there were some discrepancies between the letters that the project believed to be at Harvard, and what she could tell from the Harvard catalogs themselves.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>After cross-checking the British lists and the Harvard catalog, Perez came across a letter that couldn\u2019t be found on any of the lists.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI was a little excited, but a bit skeptical that it would actually be new,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd then when I got it, I spent a long time looking through our project databases, had Alistair check what I did, and we finally concluded that it was a letter unknown to the project.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>According to Sponsel, Darwin wrote the undated letter in April 1848, long before his landmark book \u201cOn the Origin of Species\u201d was published. Darwin would have been 39 years old, but he was already famous as a voyager and author. Owen had previously contributed to Darwin\u2019s book \u201cThe Zoology of the Voyage of the HMS Beagle.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe can tell with fairly good confidence which Sunday in 1848 he wrote this,\u201d Sponsel said. \u201cThe two [Owen and Darwin] were working on a publication for the British Navy, a handbook for people on voyages to teach them how to make scientific observations.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Perez added, \u201cThe letter, and the entire exchange, gives a perspective on the collaborative process of their work and the kind of instructions that Darwin felt were appropriate for new naturalists on naval expeditions. He makes some interesting comments in the letter, saying that he would have loved to have had this kind of manual on his own Beagle voyage.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cUnknown letters don\u2019t come up very often, maybe about 10 a year,\u201d said Darwin scholar <a href=\"http:\/\/www.fas.harvard.edu\/~hsdept\/bios\/browne.html\">Janet Browne<\/a>, Aramont Professor of the History of Science and Harvard College Professor. \u201cThis letter is unusual in that it is a letter from early in Darwin\u2019s life, before \u2018On the Origin of Species\u2019 was written, and with a particular individual with whom he became almost sworn enemies.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>It was \u201cOn the Origin of Species\u201d that changed Darwin and Owen\u2019s relationship. After its publication, Owen wrote a cruel review of the book, and the relationship disintegrated.<\/p>\n<p>The discovery comes as part of Perez and Sponsel\u2019s work for the Darwin Correspondence Project, an endeavor begun in the mid-1970s by American scholar Frederick Burkhardt and now based at the University of Cambridge.\u00a0 Participants there and at Harvard are dedicated to cataloging, editing, and publishing Darwin\u2019s correspondence from throughout his life. To date, Browne said, the project has cataloged about 15,000 letters from \u201cunexpected people in all sorts of categories, including women scientists and African colonial administrators.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHistorians have found principally through this large publishing project that correspondence is a significant element of what scientists used to do,\u201d Browne said. \u201cIt turns out that someone like Darwin was writing letters as a way of collecting information. It was part of his scientific method.\u201d<\/p>\n"},{"blockName":"core\/image","attrs":{"sizeSlug":"full","align":"none","id":69356,"caption":"The transcription of the letter, which is copyright of the Darwin Correspondence Project, will be published in a forthcoming supplement to the \u201cCorrespondence of Charles Darwin\u201d (Cambridge University Press).","blob":"","url":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/12\/darwin_letter2.gif","alt":"","lightbox":[],"title":"","href":"","rel":"","linkClass":"","width":"","height":"","aspectRatio":"","scale":"","linkDestination":"","linkTarget":"","lock":[],"metadata":[],"className":"","style":[],"borderColor":"","anchor":""},"innerBlocks":[],"innerHTML":"\n\n\t<figure class=\"wp-block-image alignnone size-full is-resized\"><img src=\"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/12\/darwin_letter2.gif\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-69356\"><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">The transcription of the letter, which is copyright of the Darwin Correspondence Project, will be published in a forthcoming supplement to the \u201cCorrespondence of Charles Darwin\u201d (Cambridge University Press).\t\t\t<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\t","innerContent":["\n\n\t<figure class=\"wp-block-image alignnone size-full is-resized\"><img src=\"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/12\/darwin_letter2.gif\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-69356\"><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">The transcription of the letter, which is copyright of the Darwin Correspondence Project, will be published in a forthcoming supplement to the \u201cCorrespondence of Charles Darwin\u201d (Cambridge University Press).\t\t\t<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\t"],"rendered":"\n\n\t<figure class=\"wp-block-image alignnone size-full is-resized\"><img src=\"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/12\/darwin_letter2.gif\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-69356\"><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">The transcription of the letter, which is copyright of the Darwin Correspondence Project, will be published in a forthcoming supplement to the \u201cCorrespondence of Charles Darwin\u201d (Cambridge University Press).\t\t\t<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\t"},{"blockName":"core\/freeform","attrs":{"content":"","lock":[],"metadata":[]},"innerBlocks":[],"innerHTML":"\n","innerContent":["\n"],"rendered":"\n"}],"innerHTML":"\n<div class=\"wp-block-group alignwide\">\n\n\r\n\t\n\t\r\n\n\n<\/div>\n","innerContent":["\n<div class=\"wp-block-group alignwide\">\n\n","\r\n\t","\n\t\r\n","\n\n<\/div>\n"],"rendered":"\n<div class=\"wp-block-group alignwide has-global-padding is-content-justification-center is-layout-constrained wp-block-group-is-layout-constrained\">\n\n\n\t\t<p>While in <a href=\"https:\/\/library.harvard.edu\/libraries\/houghton\">Houghton Library<\/a>, sorting through stacks of old manuscripts and letters from the great naturalist Charles Darwin, history of science graduate student Myrna Perez and lecturer Alistair Sponsel stumbled across something extraordinary: a previously unknown letter from Darwin to his colleague and later nemesis, zoologist Richard Owen.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe initially went [to Houghton] to confirm that a few letters we thought were here at Harvard were actually here,\u201d said Sponsel, who, like Perez, is an affiliate of the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.darwinproject.ac.uk\">Darwin Correspondence Project<\/a>, whose American editorial office is at Harvard.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe were not really looking for a new letter,\u201d Perez said. \u201cOne of the editors \u2026 noticed there were some discrepancies between the letters that the project believed to be at Harvard, and what she could tell from the Harvard catalogs themselves.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>After cross-checking the British lists and the Harvard catalog, Perez came across a letter that couldn\u2019t be found on any of the lists.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI was a little excited, but a bit skeptical that it would actually be new,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd then when I got it, I spent a long time looking through our project databases, had Alistair check what I did, and we finally concluded that it was a letter unknown to the project.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>According to Sponsel, Darwin wrote the undated letter in April 1848, long before his landmark book \u201cOn the Origin of Species\u201d was published. Darwin would have been 39 years old, but he was already famous as a voyager and author. Owen had previously contributed to Darwin\u2019s book \u201cThe Zoology of the Voyage of the HMS Beagle.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe can tell with fairly good confidence which Sunday in 1848 he wrote this,\u201d Sponsel said. \u201cThe two [Owen and Darwin] were working on a publication for the British Navy, a handbook for people on voyages to teach them how to make scientific observations.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Perez added, \u201cThe letter, and the entire exchange, gives a perspective on the collaborative process of their work and the kind of instructions that Darwin felt were appropriate for new naturalists on naval expeditions. He makes some interesting comments in the letter, saying that he would have loved to have had this kind of manual on his own Beagle voyage.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cUnknown letters don\u2019t come up very often, maybe about 10 a year,\u201d said Darwin scholar <a href=\"http:\/\/www.fas.harvard.edu\/~hsdept\/bios\/browne.html\">Janet Browne<\/a>, Aramont Professor of the History of Science and Harvard College Professor. \u201cThis letter is unusual in that it is a letter from early in Darwin\u2019s life, before \u2018On the Origin of Species\u2019 was written, and with a particular individual with whom he became almost sworn enemies.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>It was \u201cOn the Origin of Species\u201d that changed Darwin and Owen\u2019s relationship. After its publication, Owen wrote a cruel review of the book, and the relationship disintegrated.<\/p>\n<p>The discovery comes as part of Perez and Sponsel\u2019s work for the Darwin Correspondence Project, an endeavor begun in the mid-1970s by American scholar Frederick Burkhardt and now based at the University of Cambridge.\u00a0 Participants there and at Harvard are dedicated to cataloging, editing, and publishing Darwin\u2019s correspondence from throughout his life. To date, Browne said, the project has cataloged about 15,000 letters from \u201cunexpected people in all sorts of categories, including women scientists and African colonial administrators.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHistorians have found principally through this large publishing project that correspondence is a significant element of what scientists used to do,\u201d Browne said. \u201cIt turns out that someone like Darwin was writing letters as a way of collecting information. It was part of his scientific method.\u201d<\/p>\n\r\n\t\n\n\t<figure class=\"wp-block-image alignnone size-full is-resized\"><img src=\"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/12\/darwin_letter2.gif\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-69356\"><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">The transcription of the letter, which is copyright of the Darwin Correspondence Project, will be published in a forthcoming supplement to the \u201cCorrespondence of Charles Darwin\u201d (Cambridge University Press).\t\t\t<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\t\n\t\r\n\n\n\n<\/div>\n"}},"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":86136,"url":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/story\/2011\/07\/on-darwin-and-gender\/","url_meta":{"origin":68672,"position":0},"title":"On Darwin and gender","author":"harvardgazette","date":"July 7, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"New website opens a window onto naturalist Charles Darwin\u2019s struggle with the complexities of gender, and illustrates how culture affects science\u2019s vaunted neutrality.","rel":"","context":"In "Science & Tech"","block_context":{"text":"Science & Tech","link":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/section\/science-technology\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/07\/darwinscreen605a.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/07\/darwinscreen605a.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/07\/darwinscreen605a.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":3352,"url":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/story\/2009\/02\/two-reasons-to-fete-darwin\/","url_meta":{"origin":68672,"position":1},"title":"Two reasons to fete Darwin","author":"harvardgazette","date":"February 5, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Small is beautiful. Small may also be powerful. Judging from a copy on display at Harvard\u2019s Houghton Library, the book that changed the world is only 8 inches high and 5 1\/2 inches wide.","rel":"","context":"In "Health"","block_context":{"text":"Health","link":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/section\/health\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":70602,"url":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/story\/2011\/01\/what-made-darwin-first\/","url_meta":{"origin":68672,"position":2},"title":"What made Darwin first","author":"harvardgazette","date":"January 11, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Evolution icon Charles Darwin rushed \u201cOn the Origin of Species\u201d into print to beat the competition, but neglected to credit early thinkers on the subject, who let him know it after the book\u2019s 1859 publication, leading to his appended \u201cHistorical Sketch\u201d in later editions.","rel":"","context":"In "Health"","block_context":{"text":"Health","link":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/section\/health\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/01\/011011_friedman_012_605.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/01\/011011_friedman_012_605.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/01\/011011_friedman_012_605.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":299037,"url":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/story\/2020\/03\/was-charles-darwin-first-kind-of-depends\/","url_meta":{"origin":68672,"position":3},"title":"Was Darwin first? Kind of depends","author":"Lian Parsons","date":"March 5, 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"Charles Darwin\u2019s work arose in an era where many were thinking about the source of nature\u2019s variety.","rel":"","context":"In "Science & Tech"","block_context":{"text":"Science & Tech","link":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/section\/science-technology\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Photograph of Charles Darwin taken around 1874 by Leonard Darwin.","src":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/1878_Darwin_photo_by_Leonard_from_Woodall_1884.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/1878_Darwin_photo_by_Leonard_from_Woodall_1884.jpg?resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/1878_Darwin_photo_by_Leonard_from_Woodall_1884.jpg?resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/1878_Darwin_photo_by_Leonard_from_Woodall_1884.jpg?resize=700%2C400 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":4808,"url":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/story\/2009\/02\/darwins-empathy-imagination-highlighted\/","url_meta":{"origin":68672,"position":4},"title":"Darwin\u2019s empathy, imagination highlighted","author":"harvardgazette","date":"February 26, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"On Feb. 12, the world celebrated the 200th anniversary of Charles Darwin\u2019s birth. Much was made of his key idea, natural selection, and how it still resonates and informs science in the 21st century.","rel":"","context":"In "Health"","block_context":{"text":"Health","link":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/section\/health\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":61263,"url":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/story\/2009\/02\/the-evolution-of-darwin\/","url_meta":{"origin":68672,"position":5},"title":"The evolution of Darwin","author":"harvardgazette","date":"February 13, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"In a fitting celebration of a man whose ideas revolutionized science, Harvard marked Charles Darwin\u2019s 200th birthday in style.","rel":"","context":"In "Science & Tech"","block_context":{"text":"Science & Tech","link":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/section\/science-technology\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68672","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/105622744"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=68672"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68672\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":268930,"href":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68672\/revisions\/268930"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/68678"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=68672"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=68672"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=68672"},{"taxonomy":"format","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/gazette-formats?post=68672"},{"taxonomy":"series","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/series?post=68672"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}