William Darwin Fox - Early Life

Early Life

Fox was born in 1805 and initially raised at Thurleston Grange near Elvaston, Derbyshire and from 1814 at Osmaston Hall, Osmaston about 2.5 miles (4 km) south of Derby. Fox was the son of Samuel Fox (1765-1851) and his second wife, Ann Darwin (1777-1859). Ann was the daughter of William Alvey Darwin (1726-1783) and Jane Brown (1746-1835), and niece of Erasmus Darwin (1731-1802). He attended Repton School.

Fox attended Repton School from 1816 to 1823, when the headmaster was William Boultbee Sleath. Like his second cousin Charles Darwin, Fox prepared for the church at Christ's College, Cambridge. He was also a naturalist and entomologist, particularly collecting beetles. At Cambridge, Fox and Darwin became friends, and Fox tutored his younger cousin on natural history. Darwin noted in his autobiography:

I was introduced to entomology by my second cousin W. Darwin Fox, a clever and most pleasant man, who was then at Christ's College, and with whom I became extremely intimate.

It was also Fox who introduced Darwin to John Stevens Henslow who held a weekly open house which undergraduates and some older members of the University, who were attached to science attended in the evenings.

Darwin spent three weeks with Fox at Osmaston Hall in the summer of 1829. The Hall and its associated 4,000 acre (16 km²) estate was owned by the Wilmot-Horten family and leased to the Fox family from 1814 to 1887 and sold subsequently in 1888 to the Midland Railway. In 1938 the Hall was demolished and the area is now industrial, more noted for the manufacture of Rolls Royce turbo-fan engines.

Throughout his life, Fox remained in regular contact with Charles Darwin, and many of the letters exchanged contained comments relating to Darwin's work as well as family matters (Larkum, 2009).