- Natural History Museum, London: NHM WP1/5/32(1)
- Natural History Museum, London: NHM WP1/5/32(2)
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Showing 21–40 of 69 items
The Alfred Russel Wallace Collection
Alfred Russel Wallace (1823 - 1913) was one of the world's most important scientists. His seminal contributions to biology rival those of his friend and colleague Charles Darwin, though he is far less well known. Together Wallace and Darwin proposed the theory of evolution by natural selection in 1858, and their prolific subsequent work laid the foundations of modern evolutionary biology, and much more besides.
Wallace made enduring scholarly contributions to subjects as diverse as glaciology, land reform, anthropology, ethnography, epidemiology, and astrobiology. His pioneering work on evolutionary biogeography (the science that seeks to explain the geographical distribution of organisms) led to him becoming recognised as that subject’s ‘father’. Beyond this Wallace is regarded as the pre-eminent collector and field biologist of tropical regions of the 19th century, and his book The Malay Archipelago (which was Joseph Conrad’s favourite bedside reading) is one of the most celebrated travel writings of that century and has never been out of print. Wallace was a man with an extraordinary breadth of interests who was actively engaged with many of the big questions and important issues of his day. He was anti-slavery, anti-eugenics, anti-vivisection, anti-militarism, anti-Imperialism, a conservationist and an advocate of woman's rights. He strongly believed in the rights of the ordinary person, was a socialist, an anti-vaccinationist (for rational reasons), and a believer in naturalistic, evolutionary spiritualism. He did not come from a privileged background and was largely self-taught. For a brief biography see https://wallaceletters.myspecies.info/content/mini-biography
The Wallace Correspondence Project (WCP) was founded by George Beccaloni in 2010. Its aims are to locate, digitise, catalogue, transcribe, interpret and publish Wallace's surviving correspondence and other manuscripts. About 5,700 letters to and from Wallace are currently known to survive, and they are held by c. 240 institutions and individuals worldwide. Wallace's letters are a biographical treasure trove, which provides a far better picture of the 'real' Wallace than his heavily edited and censored published writings (e.g. his autobiography My Life (1905) and his letters in Marchant's Letters and Reminiscences (1916)). For example, Wallace never even mentions his wife's name (Annie) in any of his published writings, including his autobiography. The letters are also key to gaining a deeper understanding of his scientific and other work: how and why his ideas arose, and how they evolved over time.
The WCP is unlocking this valuable resource by gathering all the letters together for the first time, and transcribing them so that they can be more easily read and information within them discovered using electronic searches for words and phrases. The vast amount of unpublished information which is coming to light will surely form the basis for numerous articles, scholarly papers, PhD theses and perhaps the first definitive biography.
Epsilon is being used by the WCP's as its online archive of Wallace's correspondence. It replaces our previous archive, Wallace Letters Online, which was last updated in 2015. The process of editing the transcripts and associated metadata is a work in progress which will take many years to complete. Our project’s policy is, however, to make the information we have available to users at the earliest possible opportunity, even if it is incomplete and/or imperfect. For a guide to our data, including the protocols we use for metadata and transcriptions, please see https://wallaceletters.myspecies.info/content/epsilon
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Instructs Annie how to complete ARW's tax return in his absence. ARW also chastises Annie for not dating her previous two letters to him and states that their daughter has picked up this bad habit, but their son Willie, "shows the hereditary business instinct of the male animal by duly dating"! ARW bemoans the US government postal weight restrictions affecting his posting of plants back to England. ARW concludes his letter by stating how miserable California is and that "nowhere in America yet have I seen a place I should like to live in".
Her success in letting the house; visit to Yosemite and Santa Cruz with his brother John to see big trees; swollen and ulcerated lip confining him to the house, plans to visit Lake Tahoe and the Sierra Nevada when well; ferns from Santa Cruz sent to Miss Jekyll; Mr Marshall; problems with posting items from America; ARW's San Francisco lecture on spiritualism well attended and further offer from Chicago, Spiritualism pays better than Natural History; sending ferns from Yosemite; description of Sequoia sempervirens seen in the Redwood forests and exotic plants in California; California as a place to live.
From ARW to his wife describing his week spent in the Rocky Mountains and celebrating the plant variety there. He remarks that the air was too dry for ferns. ARW states that Colorado Springs is the only place in America that it would be pleasant to live. He advises Annie that he will be leaving for home at once via Kingston and Quebec and sailing to Liverpool or Glasgow.
In this letter ARW informs his wife when he is to leave Canada and when he expects to arrive in Liverpool. ARW suggests that they all go to the Lake District for a holiday where they have never been. Wales and Derbyshire are suggested as alternative destinations. ARW signs off saying he is going to the Thousand Islands.
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Declining offer to visit Parkstone while she must remain in London and challenge the "growing materialism of the medical profession".
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Expresses anti-vivisection sentiments.
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Annie's safe arrival at Malvern; lunch with Sir Reginald and Lady Palgrave, the Watkins, Dr Allman and Miss Travers at Mr Dugmore's, ARW left early as all talking "Primrose League"; arrangement of refurbished study; tea at Mrs Barnes's with the Nichols, Mrs Cooper, the Pocock family and Mrs Maitland; Violet doing gymnastics; the Huddlestone's renting a house at Bournemouth; sending a copy of Natural Science containing photos of Coral reefs for Miss Shaen; will send Fortnightly on; London Library; Annie's health regimen; cooking.
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Arrival of her letter from Grindenwald, is preparing for journey (with her father William Mitten), asks her for guide book with maps and to ensure Mitten's boots well nailed, will visit Meiringen and other places on Annie's recommendation; Dr Allman's gardener to care for orchids in ARW's absence; visit from Comerford-Casey and his daughter, visit by George Silk; visit by a student of Spiritualism and his wife who went into a trance and behaved as various characters including ARW's mother, photographs taken, possibly (a spirit) may be seen.
Sending a box of plants, including Gentians, gathered at the Furka Pass, detailed instructions for planting in greenhouse, plans to put out on new rockery; Pa (Annie's father William Mitten) finding lots of curiosities including miniature willows; plans to go on to Grimsel Hospice and Meiringen.
Plans for Annie's father (William Mitten) and ARW to tour in Switzerland after her return; expects many rare plants in the mountains, possibility of visiting Pilatus or Stanzenhorn, asks Annie to enquire about hotel rates there, and about a hotel in Lucerne for day of their arrival; regards to Bessie; asks for news of her tour and fellow-travellers; receipt of letter from Miss Jekyll enclosing an enquiry from another correspondent re effect of sea-air on plants at Lyme Regis; mosquitoes at Rhone glacier.
Arrival and journey with her father (William Mitten) by steamer and train, food, and plans to go on to Stangerbourn; her father's health.
Walk (with William Mitten) over Grimsel Pass, collecting Soldanellas and a Primula; plants boxed and sent off; plans to walk to Handeck to botanise and see a fine waterfall.