Trip to Down House

Westminster Archives joined forces with English Heritage and Action for Children to put together a special visit to Down House, Charles Darwin’s home, where he lived with his family for over forty years.  Darwin worked on his revolutionary theories at Down House and it was here where he wrote ‘On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection’, published 24 November, 1859.

The visit offered children and young people from Brunel Family Centre in Westminster and children from Kent the opportunity to enter into Darwin’s world.  The trip included a tour of Down House and the extensive gardens – Darwin’s ‘outdoor laboratory’, where Darwin would experiment with ideas, often involving his family in his work; his wife, Emma, took on the role as gardener and his children would help their father with practical experiments. Darwin was a creature of habit; he enjoyed long solitary walks along the Sand Walk, a narrow strip of land that runs the boundary of Down House, overlooking a valley.  His children would play near by; he liked to hear them as he formulated his thoughts.  He would often walk it several times, recording the number of laps by kicking a flint from a pile as he passed by.

Sadly, Charles Darwin spent much of his adult life in sickness; this was one of the reasons why he escaped “smoky, dirty London” and moved to Kent.  He had an uncommon combination of symptoms, leaving him very ill for long periods, sometimes staying in bed for months at a time.  Down House provided Darwin with a space where he could work, be near his children and be looked after by his wife when he was ill.

Darwin cleared a couple of patches in the garden to observe how many weeds grew up. In a patch of 2 x 3 feet, he found 357 seedlings grew up and 295 were destroyed by slugs and insects. This showed that many more seedlings are produced than can survive, as so many will be destroyed in the struggle for existence. Holly from Dartford, stands outside Down House Children and young people from Brunel Family Centre enjoy a walk along the famous ‘Sand Walk’ where Darwin would walk daily, gathering his ideas for his theory on evolution. Holly and Tom work on the ‘death bed’ scene in the Charles Darwin animation. Holly and Tom work on the characters for the ‘death bed’ scene in the Charles Darwin animation
Young people from Brunel Family centre work start to animate the ‘death bed’ scene using ‘icananimate’. This is a slow process and requires a great deal of patience as there are 25 frames per second that need to be animated! Young people from Brunel Family Centre study the ‘death bed’ scene closely, ensuring that the characters in the scene move as realistically as possible  Down House. English Heritage Photo Library  Darwin's wife, Emma. English Heritage Photo Library  Charles Darwin's green house at Down House. English Heritage Photo Library

Charles Darwin died at Down House on April 19, 1882 and as part of the Down House visit the participants from Action for Children worked with Tom Hillenbrand creating the final deathbed scene for the animation. You can view the animation by visiting the homepage. 

The Geological Society
To find out more about Down House visit the
English Heritage website at www.english-heritage.org.uk