Ɛpsilon

To E. A. Darwin   7 September [1871]1

Down, | Beckenham, Kent.

Sept 7th

My dear Eras,

Langton has advised me to sell Carlisle Pref. Stock, but to do this it must first be converted into N.E. Consols. Will you, therefore, be so kind as to sign enclosed & forward (with this note) to Jos;2 “Post-Office Penzance”. Will you get certificate out of your bank, & when Jos. returns the enclosed signed, please send it, as soon as you can, with certificates to “C. N. Wilkinson Ge Secy. N.E. Railway York”.—3 Also please to ask him to send the new certificates to you as soon as he can, & be so kind as to inform me, that I may sell new shares, which Langton says ought now to fetch, at least 10,000£. They shall be invested again half in Debentures, & half in S.W. Railway ordinary shares. Langton says you & Jos. will have to give an order addressed to my Bankers for the sale, , & for the new purchase.—4 All this is a horrid amount of trouble, which I did not foresee. When I hear that you have the new certificate, I will write about the order for sale & exchange.—

Yours affect | C. Darwin

1
The year is established by the form of the address and its location in the upper right-hand corner of the page; CD used this paper between May 1871 and January 1872.
2
CD refers to Charles Langton. This transaction is referred to in CD’s Investment book (Down House MS), pp. 106–7. CD, Erasmus, and Josiah Wedgwood III were trustees of Emma Darwin’s trust. Erasmus probably enclosed this letter with a letter to Josiah Wedgwood; ‘Please to return this | ED’ is written in Erasmus’s hand at the bottom of the letter. The Newcastle & Carlisle Railway was amalgamated with the North Eastern Railway on 17 July 1862 (Bradshaw’s railway guide 16 (1864): 221).
3
Christopher Newman Wilkinson was general secretary of the North Eastern Railway (Tomlinson 1987, p. 772).
4
CD banked with the Union Bank of London (see Correspondence vol. 5, letter to John Higgins, 11 April [1853]). CD refers to the London and South Western Railway.

Manuscript Alterations and Comments

1.3 certificate 1.4] after del ‘out’
1.6 to you] interl
1.7 now] interl
1.8 again half] ‘half’ interl
1.9 S.] after del ‘some’
1.9 have to] interl

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-13789,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-13789