Religious Views of Charles Darwin - Darwin's Religious Background

Darwin's Religious Background

Charles Darwin was born during the Napoleonic Wars and grew up in their aftermath, a conservative time when Tory dominated government closely associated with the established Anglican Church of England repressed Radicalism, but when family memories recalled the 18th century Enlightenment and a multitude of Non-conformist churches held differing interpretations of Christianity. His Whig supporting extended family of Darwins and Wedgwoods was strongly Unitarian, though one of his grandfathers, Erasmus Darwin, was a freethinker, and his father was quietly a freethinker but as a physician avoided any social conflict with his wealthy Anglican patrons. While Darwin's parents were open enough to changing social pressures to have Charles baptised in the Church of England, his pious mother took the children to the Unitarian chapel. After her death when he was only eight he became a boarder at the Shrewsbury School, an Anglican public school.