Second voyage of HMS Beagle

Common card · No. 296304

The second survey expedition of HMS Beagle took place from 27 December 1831 to 2 October 1836. Robert FitzRoy, the newest commander of Beagle, had thought of the advantages of having someone onboard who could investigate geology, and sought a naturalist to accompany them as a supernumerary. At the age of 22, the graduate Charles Darwin hoped to see the tropics before becoming a parson, and accepted the opportunity. He was greatly influenced by reading Charles Lyell's Principles of Geology during the voyage. By the end of the expedition, Darwin had made his name as a geologist, and fossil collector, and the publication of his journal (later known as The Voyage of the Beagle) gave him wide renown as a writer. Beagle sailed across the Atlantic Ocean, and then carried out detailed hydrographic surveys around the coasts of southern South America, returning via Tahiti and Australia, after having circumnavigated the Earth. The initial offer to Darwin told him the voyage would last two years; it...

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