Erasmus Darwin House in

Lichfield Lichfield () is a city status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city and Civil parishes in England, civil parish in Staffordshire, England. Lichfield is situated south-east of the county town of Stafford, north-east of Walsall, north-west of ...

Staffordshire Staffordshire (; postal abbreviation ''Staffs''.) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the West Midlands (region), West Midlands of England. It borders Cheshire to the north-west, Derbyshire and Leicestershire to the east, ...

is the former home of the English poet and physician

Erasmus Darwin Erasmus Robert Darwin (12 December 173118 April 1802) was an English physician. One of the key thinkers of the Midlands Enlightenment, he was also a natural philosophy, natural philosopher, physiology, physiologist, Society for Effecting the ...

, grandfather of naturalist

Charles Darwin Charles Robert Darwin ( ; 12 February 1809 – 19 April 1882) was an English Natural history#Before 1900, naturalist, geologist, and biologist, widely known for his contributions to evolutionary biology. His proposition that all speci ...

. The house is a Grade I

listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building is a structure of particular architectural or historic interest deserving of special protection. Such buildings are placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Hi ...

, and is now a writer's house museum commemorating Erasmus Darwin's life. Erasmus Darwin was a physician, scientist, inventor, poet, and educationalist, and lived on Beacon Street from 1758 until 1781. A founding member of the

Lunar Society The Lunar Society of Birmingham was a British dinner club and informal learned society of prominent figures in the Midlands Enlightenment, including industrialists, natural philosophy, natural philosophers and intellectuals, who met regularly b ...

, it was here that he received many notable 18th-century personalities, including

Josiah Wedgwood Josiah Wedgwood (12 July 1730 – 3 January 1795) was an English potter, entrepreneur and abolitionist. Founding the Wedgwood company in 1759, he developed improved pottery bodies by systematic experimentation, and was the leader in the indu ...

Matthew Boulton Matthew Boulton ( ; 3 September 172817 August 1809) was an English businessman, inventor, mechanical engineer, and silversmith. He was a business partner of the Scottish engineer James Watt. In the final quarter of the 18th century, the par ...

Benjamin Franklin Benjamin Franklin (April 17, 1790) was an American polymath: a writer, scientist, inventor, statesman, diplomat, printer, publisher and Political philosophy, political philosopher.#britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, Wood, 2021 Among the m ...

and

James Watt James Watt (; 30 January 1736 (19 January 1736 OS) – 25 August 1819) was a Scottish inventor, mechanical engineer, and chemist who improved on Thomas Newcomen's 1712 Newcomen steam engine with his Watt steam engine in 1776, which was f ...

History of the house

Darwin purchased a

medieval In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the 5th to the late 15th centuries, similarly to the post-classical period of World history (field), global history. It began with the fall of the West ...

half-timbered building on the west side of the lower courtyard of the Vicars Choral in 1758. From 1758 to 1759 Darwin converted the building into a large Georgian town house of red brick with stucco dressings and Venetian windows. At this time the front of the house was separated from Beacon Street by a narrow deep ditch which once formed the moat of the Cathedral Close. Darwin built a bridge across the ditch descending from his hall door to the street. The ditch was overgrown with tangled bushes, which Darwin cleared and made a terrace on the bank. He planted the ditch with lilacs and rose bushes which screened his terrace from passers by. After Darwin left in 1781 the next owner filled in the ditch to make a driveway from the street to his doorway.

Erasmus Darwin at home in Lichfield

After the Darwins moved into the new front of their house, a wooden bridge was thrown across the ditch and a twin-tier terrace was built, causing alterations to be made to the basement windows. For 20 years this house was the base for Darwin's medical practice, for his scientific experiments, meetings of the

, and such inventive schemes as the construction of the

Trent and Mersey Canal The Trent and Mersey Canal is a canal in Derbyshire, Staffordshire and Cheshire in north-central England. It is a "narrow canal" for the vast majority of its length, but at the extremities to the east of Burton upon Trent and north of Middl ...

. Amid all this, the house was also the centre of family life.

Events and exhibits

Erasmus Darwin House recently relaunched two exhibition rooms, with audio and visual interactives. The house is also involved in the Lichfield festival and the annual medieval market. Heritage weekend has the museum open to the public for free and cellar tours are also available. The

parlour A parlour (or parlor) is a reception room or public space. In medieval Christian Europe, the "outer parlour" was the room where the monks or nuns conducted business with those outside the monastery and the "inner parlour" was used for necessar ...

has been recently restored and now holds an antique

grandfather clock A grandfather clock (also a longcase clock, tall-case clock, grandfather's clock, hall clock or floor clock) is a tall, freestanding, weight-driven pendulum clock, with the pendulum held inside the tower or waist of the case. Clocks of this styl ...

. The room also includes armchairs with headphones where you can listen to

's poetry and ideas of

evolution Evolution is the change in the heritable Phenotypic trait, characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. It occurs when evolutionary processes such as natural selection and genetic drift act on genetic variation, re ...

Erasmus Darwin House -herb garden-9July2007

The Georgian

herb garden The traditional kitchen garden, vegetable garden, also known as a potager (from the French ) or in Scotland a kailyaird, is a space separate from the rest of the residential garden – the ornamental plants and lawn areas. It is used for grow ...

has been restored with plantings of the period and a relief sculpture of Erasmus Darwin and incised text on paving slabs, created by Denis Parsons.

Museum today

Erasmus Darwin House is run by a charitable foundation and relies on public donations. The cellar is usually open to visitors via guided tours on the first and third Saturdays of each month. Erasmus Darwin House is available for events.

References

{{Authority control Buildings and structures in Lichfield Historic house museums in Staffordshire Biographical museums in Staffordshire Science museums in England Literary museums in England Grade I listed houses in Staffordshire Grade I listed museum buildings Museums in Staffordshire Science and technology in Staffordshire

History of the house

Erasmus Darwin at home in Lichfield

Events and exhibits

Museum today

See also

References