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Overview
If you were to pose a question to a friend along the lines of “Who discovered the theory of evolution?”, it is almost guaranteed that their answer will be related to Charles Darwin. However, he was not the only man to contribute great findings to the theory and without his lesser-known counterpart, we may never have heard his great Theory of Evolution.
Early Life
Alfred Russel Wallace was born on January 8th in the year 1823 in the region of Usk, in South Wales. Wallace completed 6 years of formal education at the Hale’s Grammar School, a single classroom school in Hertfordshire, England. He continued his career after school by joining his older brother William at his surveying firm in Bedfordshire where he would learn the trade. In 1839 Alfred was temporarily placed as watchmaker’s apprentice but by the end of the year was back with William who’s firm had moved to Hereford. Over the course of the next few years, young Wallace would develop skills in map-making, both geometry and trigonometry, as well as agricultural chemistry and construction building skills which triggered the realization that he enjoyed both working outdoors as well as using his surveying skills. Between 1841 and 1845 Wallace put forth his first effort in writing, producing an essay covering the disposition of mechanical institutions. William let Alfred go from his firm in 1843, and Alfred then went on to acquire a masters position at the Collegiate School in Leicester to teach surveying, drafting, English, and arithmetics. Shortly thereafter, Wallace met Henry Walter Bates, an amateur naturalist and accomplished entomologist who was 2 years younger than himself. After his brother William's death in 1845, Alfred quit his job at Leicester and returned to the surveying firm where he quickly realized that running the business involved doing things that he did not care for.
"A.R. Wallace (age 24), 1848" is in the Public Domain
The Amazonian Excursion
Alfred Wallace continued his natural-history related business and furthered it by becoming a curator for the Neath Philosophical and Literary Institute’s museum. Bates and Wallace remained in touch and became inspired by a new William H. Edwards book titled, A Voyage up the River Amazon, to find a way out. After becoming professional and launching a self-sustaining expedition for natural history data collection, the two ambitious young men set off for the mouth of the Amazon on April 25, 1848. For the first 2 years or so of the Amazonian excursion, Wallace and Bates worked together but ended up splitting up and Wallace focused his studies in the central Amazon and Rio Negro regions while Bates remained in Southern regions of the Amazon for 11 years. Bates therein secured his position as the central naturalist and entomologist of Southern Amazonia, where his findings contributed largely to the early development of the theory of natural selection.
First Published Work
Wallace accomplished the furthest navigation up the Rio Negro and developed a map draft that was standardized until more advanced mapping was certified. Wallace’s two main points of study were one, how the extension of species range was limited or facilitated by geography, and two, how the shaping of adaptations were influenced more by ecological station (protected area of land) than by the closeness of affinity between species. His studies still left him seeking the answers to actual processes of evolutionary change. Wallace left the Amazon in 1852 but was struck with tragedy as the vessel returning to England caught fire and with it, much of Wallace's research. After being rescued by a cargo ship, Wallace returned to English soil 80 days later with enough data to publish 2 books, Palm Trees of the Amazon and Their Uses and A Narrative of Travels on the Amazon and Rio Negro. The published work was nothing immensely profound, but nonetheless a positive first impression for Alfred’s career.
"Who Was Alfred Russel Wallace?" by James McNish is in the Public Domain
The Malay Archipelago
Two Years later in 1854, Wallace was ready to adventure again in order to bring home more conclusive data on an Indonesian excursion, otherwise known as “The Malay Archipelago ''. He arrived in Singapore on April 20th, where the following eight years would be spent researching and observing specimens on over seventy different expeditions around the islands of the archipelago. Over 14,000 miles were traveled while documenting an astonishing 125,660 different specimens of life, roughly a thousand or more of those were entirely new species to science. From this Wallace spawned his next book, The Malay Archipelago, known as the most celebrated account of Indonesia, as well as one of the best works of 19th-century scientific travel books. However, the book wouldn’t be published until 1869. In it though, he focused on his studies of birds-of-paradise, orangutans, and encounters with natives.
"Charles Lyell, 1st Bt" by John & Charles Watkins is in the Public Domain
Survival of the Fittest
In 1855 amidst his travels, Wallace had been thinking deeply about how organic evolution occurs, which inspired a published research essay titled, “On the Law Which Has Regulated the Introduction of New Species”, that firmly stated Wallace’s beliefs on evolution. The article was passed to a familiar name, Charles Darwin, through Alfred Wallace’s accomplice Charles Lyell. In February of 1858, soon after publishing two more works in 1856 and 1857, while battling Malaria, Wallace conspired the idea of “survival of the fittest” after connecting a mechanism of long-term organic change to Thomas Malthus’ ideas on the limits of population growth. The theory was roughly that individual specimens that are the most adapted to their environment have been observed to have better chances of surviving, in turn passing the traits that proved better survivability to their offspring. His excitement over this conclusion sprouted an essay that he sent to his accomplice, Charles Darwin. Wallace and Darwin had actually already been communicating about their findings for approximately two years prior. Wallace hoped his Charles Darwin would share his essay, “On the Tendency of Varieties to Depart Indefinitely From the Original Type”, with Charles Lyell. Lyell was one of the finest geologists of his day, his most famous published work is known as Principles of Geology. Darwin did actually pass the publication on, but evidently for nothing more than his personal gain.
" Title page of Charles Darwin's ''On the Origin of Species'' (1859)" by John Murray is in the Public Domain
The Birth of Darwin's Legacy
Darwin had been working on a similar idea to Wallace’s for nearly two decades, so when faced with a threat to his work, Darwin looked to Lyell who worked with Joseph Hooker, a botanist and good friend of Darwin’s, to resolve the issue. Wallace’s essay and some unpublished fragments of Darwin’s work were presented at the next meeting of the Linnean Society, without asking Wallace’s permission beforehand. Eighteen months later in November of 1859, Darwin’s On the Origin of Species was published publicly. This sealed the fate of Alfred Wallace in being overshadowed in the public eye by Charles Darwin for the rest of history. Wallace did however reign in scientific history as the greatest living authority on the Indonesian region. Wallace passed away on November 7, 1913 in Broadstone, UK.
Smith, Charles H. “Alfred Russel Wallace: The Origins of an Evolutionist (1823-1848).” Alfred Russel Wallace: The Origins of an Evolutionist (1823-1848), 27 Feb. 2002, victorianweb.org/science/wallace/wallace1.htm.
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