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Darwin Correspondence Project

From John and Emma Pender   [before 23 June 1870]1

His Royal Highness

The Prince of Wales.

Mr. & Mrs. Pender

request the honor of

Mr. Charles Darwin’s

Company on the Evening of

Thursday the 23rd. June at 10 o’c⁠⟨⁠lock⁠⟩⁠2

CD annotations

Recto: ‘Keep’ blue crayon circled blue crayon
Verso: ‘Keep’ blue crayon circled blue crayon; ‘Size of *page, Heading & type [above del ‘Wood-Blocks’] | Descent of Man3 | for Photographs & folding Plates’ pencil

Footnotes

The date is established by the day and month mentioned in the invitation and by the year of the Penders’ party to celebrate the opening of the telegraph link with India, 1870 (see ODNB s.v. Pender, John).
CD had met the prince of Wales (Albert Edward, later Edward VII) at a Royal Society of London soirée on 28 April 1866 (Emma Darwin (1915), 2: 184–5; Emma Darwin’s diary (DAR 242)). The party at the Penders’ London house was to celebrate the opening of a telegraphic link with India, which had been achieved under John Pender’s supervision. About 700 people attended, including the prince of Wales. The Darwins did not arrive in London until 24 June.
CD’s notes are evidently to do with the publication of Descent.

Bibliography

Emma Darwin (1915): Emma Darwin: a century of family letters, 1792–1896. Edited by Henrietta Litchfield. 2 vols. London: John Murray. 1915.

ODNB: Oxford dictionary of national biography: from the earliest times to the year 2000. (Revised edition.) Edited by H. C. G. Matthew and Brian Harrison. 60 vols. and index. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 2004.

Letter details

Letter no.
DCP-LETT-7240F
From
John Pender; Emma Denison/Emma Pender
To
Charles Robert Darwin
Source of text
DAR 53.2: 168v

Please cite as

Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 7240F,” accessed on 19 March 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-7240F.xml

Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 18

letter