Letters Written By Charles Darwin From 1860

In celebration of Charles Darwin’s 207th birthday check out this Popular Science article from March 1908, which featured “hitherto unpublished letters” from the father of evolution himself. Many of the letters are to his close friend and botanist Joseph Dalton Hooker and regard Darwin’s recently published On the Origins of Species. In one 1860 letter written just a couple months after the book was published, Darwin braces himself for reactions to his theory of natural selection, writing, “I have quite made up my mind to a savage onslaught but… I feel confident we are right, and in the long run shall prevail.” Read the full letters below.