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

Then, in October 1865, Hawkshaw's son John Clarke Hawkshaw married Cecily Wedgwood. By 1876, Charles and Emma Darwin were visiting John Hawkshaw at his home, Hollycombe House. So the personal relationship is beyond doubt.

But did Hawkshaw cause Darwin's investment?

We should be cautious here. The evidence establishes that: Darwin invested in Penarth; Hawkshaw was one of the engineers responsible for the dock; Darwin and Hawkshaw knew one another socially; their families became closely connected through the Wedgwood marriages. But the evidence presently available does not establish that Darwin bought his Penarth investment because Hawkshaw was the engineer. That distinction is important. It allows the historical evidence to speak for itself without turning a fascinating possibility into an unsupported fact.

Darwin's two worlds meet at Penarth

Perhaps the most remarkable feature of the story is that Darwin's investment in Penarth brought together two very different aspects of his life. On one side was Darwin the naturalist — the man who had sailed around the world aboard HMS Beagle, studied the diversity of life and published On the Origin of Species.

On the other was Darwin the Victorian investor — a man who put his money into railways, docks and industrial enterprises that were transforming Britain. Penarth belonged firmly to the second world. And yet the people involved brought the two worlds together.

Charles Darwin — investor and naturalist
John Hawkshaw — engineer of Penarth Dock
The Wedgwood family — Darwin's maternal family and an important industrial dynasty Penarth Dock — a major Victorian investment in Britain's maritime infrastructure

The surviving records therefore reveal something easily missed in the traditional story of Darwin. The man who studied the forces that shaped the natural world was also investing in the engineering forces that were reshaping Victorian Britain.