Why it’s important to remember Charles Darwin in Simon’s Town
Professor Mike Bruton
The City’s naming committee has recently approved an application made by the Simon’s Town Historical Society to display a bronze bust of a young Charles Darwin, as he looked when he visited Simon’s Town in May/June 1836, on Simon’s Town Jetty.
The project will soon enter the public participation phase during which the public is invited to comment on it.
Through the generosity of Simon’s Town residents, the Simon’s Town Historical Society and donors further afield, notably the Cape Town Heritage Foundation and the Darwin200 project, funds have been raised to cast the clay maquette of Darwin in bronze and mount it on Simon’s Town Jetty near the navy diver statue.
There are many reasons why Darwin should be commemorated in Simon’s Town. His Theory of Evolution by Natural Selection is regarded as one of the most important ideas in the history of science.
During his 19-day visit to the Cape aboard HMS Beagle he had important discussions on the “mystery of mysteries” (evolution) with the scientist, John Herschel, in Claremont.
Such were the importance of these discussions that Darwin mentions them in the first paragraph of his famous book, The Origin of Species (1859).
Herschel also spoke to Darwin about the scientific method and urged him to go beyond being a descriptive naturalist and use the vast amount of data that he had collected to formulate, and then test, a “big idea”.
Darwin followed his advice, which defined the rest of his career. Darwin also met the first curator of the South African Museum, Dr Andrew Smith, and the Astronomer Royal, Thomas Maclear, and continued to correspond with scientists in the Cape Colony long after the departure of Beagle from Simon’s Town.
The visit of Beagle to Simon’s Town was also important nautically as this Royal Navy 10-gun brig/sloop, under Captain Robert FitzRoy, carried out important hydrographic surveys around the coasts of South America and along the southern sea route.
The voyage of HMS Beagle is currently being retraced by a Dutch tall ship, Oosterschelde, the flagship of the Darwin200 project that is celebrating Darwin’s legacy and promoting biodiversity conservation worldwide.
Oosterschelde will visit Cape Town, including Simon’s Town, in April 2025 and a range of activities will coincide with her visit, including the unveiling of the Darwin bust on Simon’s Town Jetty by the great, great granddaughter of Charles Darwin, Dr Sarah Darwin, on Sunday April 27.
These events will add further lustre to Simon’s Town’s international reputation as an important maritime port, and the Darwin bust will become a permanent educational tool for schools and another tourist attraction in Simon’s Town.
Charles Darwin was a sensitive, deep-thinking man who took religion seriously. He graduated with a degree in theology from Cambridge University and did not regard his theory as anti-God.
He saw it merely as a scientific explanation for the mechanism whereby plants and animals have evolved over time in response to changing environments. Millions of Christians worldwide are comfortable with Darwin’s views.
Darwin was not an empire-building colonialist but a humble, inquisitive scientist who visited the Cape Colony to hold discussions with local scientists and explore the natural history of the Cape.
He was also not a racist and stated that one of the reasons why he spent so much time studying evolution was to prove that all humans belong to one species and were therefore equal, as opposed to the prevailing view that there were seven species of humans and that some were inferior to others.
Darwin was an abolitionist who published a paper with FitzRoy on the role that missionaries had played in the abolition of slavery in the Cape.
His maternal grandfather, Josiah Wedgwood, was an avid abolitionist who created a porcelain brooch, inscribed with the slogan, “Am I not a man and a brother”, with a slave imprinted on it that became the international symbol of the anti-slavery movement.
There are memorials to Darwin in many places where Beagle dropped anchor.
In Australia, where he spent less time than in the Cape, a city is named after him and, in that city, is the Charles Darwin University. There is no adequate public commemoration of Darwin’s historic visit to Simon’s Town.
The display on Darwin in the Iziko South African Museum is important but makes no mention of his important discussions with Herschel.
Hopefully, the display of the Darwin bust will stimulate a campaign to create and display busts of other famous people who have been associated with Simon’s Town.
I would be the first to donate to a fund to create and display a bust of, for instance, Mary Kingsley.
• Professor Mike Bruton has led the Darwin Bust Project, including the fund-raising campaign, from the outset. He has been assisted in this task by ward councillor Simon Liell-Cock, Andrew Jones of the Cape Town Heritage Foundation, Roger Bagshaw of the Simon’s Town Historical Society, retired Rear-Admiral Arné Soderland, and Dennis Lihou of Simon's Town Amenities Development Company (Stadco).
