Biography | Charles Darwin — The Ugly House Where Origin Was Written

On the Origin of Species was not written on the Beagle.

It was written here, in a former parsonage on Luxted Road in the village then spelled Down.

Emma Darwin moved in on 14 September 1842.

Charles followed three days later.

He had offered about £2,200 for the house and eighteen acres on a chalk plateau southeast of London.

In letters he called the brick block ugly and neither old nor new.

What he wanted was quiet, room for children, and a garden that could be treated as a laboratory.

He lived and worked in this house for forty years.

The Sandwalk, a gravel thinking path on rented ground, was laid out beyond the garden.

John Murray of Albemarle Street published On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection on 24 November 1859.

The first printing was 1,250 copies.

After presentation and copyright deposits, 1,192 were available for sale at fifteen shillings.

Booksellers took the stock at Murray's autumn sale on 22 November.

Darwin died in this house on 19 April 1882.

English Heritage now opens the restored house and garden as the Home of Charles Darwin, postcode BR6 7JT.

The village is Downe, in the London Borough of Bromley.

The pin is the Grade I house, list entry 1038325, not the village centre.

Photo: Anthonyeatworld, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons