Footnotes

Although destined for greater achievements, H.M.S. 'Beagle' was routinely completed as one of the huge class of ‘Cherokee’ 10-gun brigs constructed for the Royal Navy between 1807 and 1830. In all, one hundred and fifteen identical vessels of 236 tons were ordered from Sir Henry Peake’s original design and 'Beagle' was built at Woolwich from where she was launched on 11th May 1820. After a brief naval career, mostly employed on anti-slavery patrols, she was selected for surveying duties in 1825 and, in consequence, given a more suitable barque-rig by the addition of a third (mizzen) mast. On her first major voyage (1826-30), when she accompanied H.M.S. 'Adventure' on a survey of the treacherous waters off Cape Horn and the southern tip of South America, she was commanded by Captain Pringle Stokes but he committed suicide in August 1828 and was succeeded by Lieutenant Robert Fitzroy.

Having brought his ship home safely, Fitzroy’s temporary command was confirmed and he was chosen to take 'Beagle' on her subsequent circumnavigation (1831-36) during which she completed the survey of Tierra del Fuego – left unfinished by the premature death of Captain Stokes on the earlier expedition – surveyed the coast of Chile and also visited numerous Pacific islands. Amongst 'Beagle’s' passengers on this remarkable journey was a young botany student named Charles Darwin and even though he did not publish his revolutionary On the Origin of Species until 1859, he freely acknowledged that his voyage in the 'Beagle' had been the catalyst for his theories of evolution and natural selection which so profoundly altered the course of modern scientific thought. Most significant of all to Darwin were his observations in the Galapagos Islands, 600 miles west of Ecuador, where his study of the thirteen different species of finches proved an especially seminal moment.

'Beagle' stayed a month in the Galapagos (17th September – 20th October 1835) before sailing on westwards to Tahiti, and eventually arrived back at Falmouth in October 1836 after what was soon being hailed as one of the greatest surveying expeditions ever undertaken.