Charles Darwin in Love with Emma
August 30, 2026
by William P. Meyers

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Darwin in Love

If you hate a historical figure, it is hard to imagine them in love. It humanizes them.

A lot of people hate Charles Darwin, the scientist who introduced the Theory of Evolution by Natural Selection. The theory upsets those who believe the Christian Bible is history, not myth. At the time of its introduction it upset many scientists, though that community came around over the next few decades. Because a small group of racists, led by U.S. southern segregationists, later misused the theory to espouse the idea that Negroes and Asians were separate species from white Europeans, Darwin is even hated by some people with leftist political views.

Although much of the Charles Darwin story is easily found, the American education system tends to hide it. It, like evolution, upsets a key constituency. The story is simplified to: Charles Darwin signed on as the naturalist on the British exploration ship H.M.S. Beagle. He saw some turtles and birds on Pacific Islands and then came up with Evolution. He is an atheist buried somewhere in England.

Somewhere in there, in real life, Charles Darwin fell in love. He married the woman he loved. They stayed married until he died.

There was no reason to think the boy Charles was a weirdo. His father and grandfather were doctors. His mother was Susannah Wedgwood. Her father began life as a humble potter, invented many modern pottery techniques, and so became one of the richer non-aristocrats in England. Charles was born in 1809. His mother Susannah died in 1817. He was largely raised by his older sisters. He attended the local private school in his hometown of Shrewsbury. Then his father sent him to Edinburgh for medical school, which he failed at. Then he was sent to Cambridge where he studied to enter the Anglican ministry, with a side of natural science (then usually called natural philosophy).

All through this period he knew his cousin Emma Wedgwood. In fact in many ways the Darwin and Wedgwood families acted as a single clan. The founding potter of the famous branch of the Wedgwood family was close friends with, and a patient of, Doctor Erasmus Darwin. That was Charles's grandfather. Charles's mother was the older sister of Josiah (son of the founder Josiah) Wedgwood. Who was Charles's uncle. And Emma, Josiah's youngest daughter, was Susannah's niece. [hard to keep straight, I am reading from a genealogy chart.]

Emma was a few months older that Charles. We know she had a sweet disposition. We know they saw each other at least once a year at family gatherings and visits. We know that Charles had at least one flirtation, in Shrewsbury, with another girl. We do not know what they thought of each other when Charles left on the Beagle in 1831 at the age of 22.

We do not know why Emma was still unmarried at 26 when Charles returned from his famous voyage. We know she had suitors and women married much younger in that era. We know that marrying within the extended family was a somewhat common practice. We know that Charles became hopeful about Emma, seeing her at the Wedgwood estate.

It was the summer of 1838. Charles wrote to the prominent geologist Charles Lyell, on November 12th, "I write because I cannot avoid wishing to be the first person to tell Mrs Lyell and yourself that I have the very good, and shortly since very unexpected fortune, of going to be married. The lady is my cousin, Miss Emma Wedgwood, the sister of Hensleigh Wedgwood, and of the elder brother who married my sister, so we are connected by manifold ties, besides on my part by the most sincere love and hearty gratitude to her for accepting such a one as myself."

Unfortunately Emma's letters to Charles have been lost, though she sometimes comments about their relationship in letters to other relatives. In contrast, Emma kept Charles' letters. They are included in A Century of Family Letters by Emma Darwin, edited by their daughter Henrietta and published in 1915.

On November 14, 1838 Charles wrote Emma "the one conclusion I exult in is that there was never anyone so lucky as I have been, or so good as you. . . I vow to try to make myself good enough somewhat to deserve you. . . My own dear Emma, I kiss the hands with all humbleness and gratitude, which have so filled up for me the cup of happiness."

Writing to her Aunt Jessie on November 15, Emma said "Though I knew how much I liked him, I was not the least sure of his feelings, as he is so affectionate, and so fond of Maer [the Wedgwood estate] and all of us, and demonstrative in his manners that I did not think it meant anything . . . He came down again last Thursday with aunt Fanny, and on Sunday he spoke to me, which was quite a surprise, as I thought we might go on in the sort of friendship were in for years. . . It is a match that every soul has been making for us, so we could not have helped it if we had not liked it ourselves."

If Charles had not been recruited to the Beagle, and had instead become a country parson, as his family had intended, would he have married Emma? As an amateur naturalist, as so many of the clergy were in England in that era, might he have discovered evolution?

Before the wedding Charles looked for a house to rent in London. He wrote to Emma [November 30, 1838] "I told you I should write to your as if you really were my own dear, dear wife, and have not I kept my word most stoutly? ... and what can a man have to say, who works all morning in describing hawks and owls, then rushes out and walks in a bewildered manner up one street and down another, looking for the words to let."

They were married in a simple ceremony at Maer on January 29th, 1839. In a letter on the 20th Charles had written her "I do hope you may be as happy as I know I shall be . . . Excuse this much egotism, I give it to you because I think you will humanize me, and soon teach me there is greater happiness than building theories and accumulating facts in silence and solitude. My own dearest Emma, I earnestly pray you may never regret the great, and I will add very good deed, you are to perform on the Tuesday. My own dear future wide, God bless you."

The rest is history. Charles Darwin remains, in my mind, the greatest scientist of all time. He shed light upon the world like no one else in human history. We should celebrate the theory of evolution in our schools and the character of the man who uncovered this great truth.