Volume Thirteen - Pre-Victorian to the Present Day - Remarkable Connections - Darwin, FitzRoy, Hawkshaw & Wedgwood . . . .

The directors acknowledged that the shareholders had already waited nine years for the project to reach completion. This is significant when we consider Darwin as an investor. He was putting money into a major Victorian infrastructure project whose success depended upon enormous expenditure on docks, railway connections, machinery and harbour works — and whose investors had to wait for the completed enterprise to begin producing a return.

The financial risks

The mid-1860s were also an uncertain period for investors. The collapse of the banking house Overend, Gurney & Company in 1866 caused widespread financial anxiety. The Penarth Dock research records that Darwin's investment book showed no dividend from the Penarth Company in 1867.

By January 1869, however, a letter from Darwin's son William Erasmus Darwin refers to a return of £213 1s. 1d., apparently connected with the Penarth investment. The surviving evidence does not yet allow every aspect of Darwin's later financial return from Penarth to be reconstructed with certainty, but it does demonstrate that the investment was producing financial transactions. This makes the story considerably more interesting than simply saying that Darwin 'owned shares in Penarth Dock'. He had invested capital, followed its value and experienced the uncertainties as well as the potential rewards of Victorian infrastructure investment.

Why Penarth?

It is tempting to assume that Darwin invested in Penarth because John Hawkshaw was the engineer. There was certainly a close personal connection between the two families. Hawkshaw moved to London in 1851, and following the death of his son Oliver, the Hawkshaw family's governess was recommended to the Darwin household. Hawkshaw's sons Clarke and Harry also spent time at Down House. The connection became much closer through marriage.

During 1862, Hawkshaw's eldest daughter Mary married Godfrey Wedgwood, a great-grandson of Josiah Wedgwood. Godfrey's sister Cecily was also part of this family network, and Charles Darwin was himself a grandson of Josiah Wedgwood through his mother, Susannah Darwin, née Wedgwood.