Charles Darwin (1809–1882)
Letter to Joseph Hooker
Down, Kent, 11 January 1844

In 1844 Darwin sent a letter to his friend and admirer, the botanist Joseph Dalton Hooker (1817–1911). This is Darwin’s first known communication of his conclusion that species might change and evolve, and saying it was, he told Hooker, ‘like confessing a murder’.

MS DAR 114: 3