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Rating: 
Summary: A fascinating historical portrait
Review: Charting a path through the Americas, Captain Robert FitzRoy crosses paths with a young Charles Darwin, an event that affects the direction of scientific study. In 1829, Capt. FitzRoy, of the HMS Beagle, sails with Capt. Phillip Parker, of the HMS Adventure, on a survey that will enable Great Britain's complete dominance of world trade. FitzRoy has his first sighting of natives in Tierra del Fuego; he finds their primitive appearance repulsive. On their return home, FitzRoy carries four natives back to England, his specimens. It is his intention to "save" the savages, baptize them as Christians and expose them to the advantages a civilization defined by its Godliness.By 1831, the savages are the source of constant embarrassment and it is necessary to return them to Tierra de Fuego. Finagling a commission, ostensibly to finish the survey of the Americas, FitzRoy releases the natives to their homeland. This new commission involves an extended voyage navigating the globe and FitzRoy is concerned about the years of isolation, not one to mix with those of lesser rank. The prospect of such solitude is daunting to the young captain, haunted by the history of insanity in his family. Charles Darwin is a naturalist, the perfect choice as FitzRoy's companion. Both possess astute minds and spend hours discoursing on scientific principles. While FitzRoy surveys the rugged coastline of Tierra del Fuego, Darwin roams the countryside, gathering specimens. The trip almost flounders when the overstressed FitzRoy loses his focus, but he rallies, able to continue. By the time they reach the Falklands, Darwin is writing voluminous notes on the aberrations observed on various islands, particularly the Galapagos Islands. Returning home, the two scientists prepare for publication. Their work is published in three volumes: King's, FitzRoy's and Darwin's. Darwin's most important work is published twenty-two years later, but in 1837, he avoids an argument with accepted theology. At this point the two friends drift apart philosophically, Darwin committed to a scientific definition of the world and FitzRoy ever more avidly Creationist. As Nichols chronicles the men's lives, the once friendly scientists finally become adversarial. FitzRoy has noble aspirations, albeit fettered by his English prejudices. He never imagined his name written on the pages of history as "the man who took Darwin around the world" on his momentous adventure. FitzRoy makes important contributions as a weather forecaster, but is never appreciated in his time; his fate is sealed when he chooses the traveling companion for this fated voyage. Nichols offers a fascinating view of a remarkable voyage; he brings the seafaring world to life, the dangers, curiosities and courage of an undertaking that will dramatically alter the scientific world. Luan Gaines/2004.
Rating: 
Summary: Evolution's captain
Review: Fitzroy and Darwin. How these brave men were marked by adventure and discovery. A fascinating story of the unknown territories and the isolation they suffered on their travels. Nichols describes their solitude and madness, tangled with beautiful narrative. Very entretaining.
Rating:
Summary: Simply Fabulous
Review: I can hardly imagine a more enjoyable book, some how miraculously delving the reader into the annals of Victorian English society. The book is a much a testament to the epic voyage which ultimatly brought Darwin his fame, as a tale of the culture which bred such a remarkable theory.
Rating:
Summary: good, not great
Review: Nichols does a good job of providing historical detail without descending into excessive academic drudgery. It is readable and entertaining most of the time. The author occasionally delves too deeply into a tangential detail, but just when I began to get bored, Nichols got back on track. If you like reading about sailing and exploration of the "new world", or are interested in Victorian era academic thought, or of course the origin of the "origin of species", check it out.
Rating:
Summary: "The only thing that bothered Fitzroy was Darwin's face."
Review: Poor Robert Fitzroy has been relegated to the footnotes section of history....oh yes, wasn't he the captain of "The Beagle"? Yes he was, but he was much more. He was also a member of Parliament, a governor of New Zealand, and he founded the British government's Meteorological Office. The downside of Peter Nichols' book is he gives rather short shrift to these generally unknown aspects of Fitzroy's career. But, when Mr. Nichols is on his home turf (the ocean, if that isn't a non sequitur!), he sparkles. He is clearly most happy when discussing Fitzroy the "boy wonder" captain and surveyor. (Fitzroy was in his mid-twenties when he squired young Mr. Darwin around the world.) We can feel the ocean spray and smell the salt air. Not only that, but we really feel that we get to know Fitzroy. He was an excellent and brave captain. He cared about his men. He was also intelligent and charming. On the less pleasant side, he had a very thin skin, a bad temper, and was subject to bouts of depression. During five long years at sea Darwin got to see every facet of Fitzroy. Mr. Nichols is also fascinating when he writes about the four Fuegians that Fitzroy brought back to England...hoping to "civilize" them and bring them back to further spread British culture along the southern tip of South America. The second voyage of "The Beagle" with Fitzroy as captain was the voyage where Fitzroy brought the natives back home, and it was also the voyage with Darwin on board as naturalist. Fitzroy was a strong believer in phrenology, and initially had doubts about Darwin because of Darwin's "hooded brow and large, spatulate nose." Fortunately for science, Fitzroy was won over by Darwin's intelligence and genial personality. Both men started the journey with a great deal of scientific curiosity and with orthodox religious beliefs. Darwin's theories led him to atheism. Fitzroy remained very religious all his life. If it hadn't been for Fitzroy, Darwin likely never would have come up with his theory of evolution by natural selection. The irony of this wasn't lost on Fitzroy. Again, all this is well, even brilliantly, told by Mr. Nichols. The book loses steam when we read about the later developments in Fitzroy's life, but the rest of this book is so good that we can forgive Mr. Nichols for not being able to maintain the high level of writing throughout. The definitive biography of Robert Fitzroy remains to be written, but this book goes a long way in bringing him off the bottom of the page.
Rating:
Summary: "The only thing that bothered Fitzroy was Darwin's face."
Review: Poor Robert Fitzroy has been relegated to the footnotes section of history....oh yes, wasn't he the captain of "The Beagle"? Yes he was, but he was much more. He was also a member of Parliament, a governor of New Zealand, and he founded the British government's Meteorological Office. The downside of Peter Nichols' book is he gives rather short shrift to these generally unknown aspects of Fitzroy's career. But, when Mr. Nichols is on his home turf (the ocean, if that isn't a non sequitur!), he sparkles. He is clearly most happy when discussing Fitzroy the "boy wonder" captain and surveyor. (Fitzroy was in his mid-twenties when he squired young Mr. Darwin around the world.) We can feel the ocean spray and smell the salt air. Not only that, but we really feel that we get to know Fitzroy. He was an excellent and brave captain. He cared about his men. He was also intelligent and charming. On the less pleasant side, he had a very thin skin, a bad temper, and was subject to bouts of depression. During five long years at sea Darwin got to see every facet of Fitzroy. Mr. Nichols is also fascinating when he writes about the four Fuegians that Fitzroy brought back to England...hoping to "civilize" them and bring them back to further spread British culture along the southern tip of South America. The second voyage of "The Beagle" with Fitzroy as captain was the voyage where Fitzroy brought the natives back home, and it was also the voyage with Darwin on board as naturalist. Fitzroy was a strong believer in phrenology, and initially had doubts about Darwin because of Darwin's "hooded brow and large, spatulate nose." Fortunately for science, Fitzroy was won over by Darwin's intelligence and genial personality. Both men started the journey with a great deal of scientific curiosity and with orthodox religious beliefs. Darwin's theories led him to atheism. Fitzroy remained very religious all his life. If it hadn't been for Fitzroy, Darwin likely never would have come up with his theory of evolution by natural selection. The irony of this wasn't lost on Fitzroy. Again, all this is well, even brilliantly, told by Mr. Nichols. The book loses steam when we read about the later developments in Fitzroy's life, but the rest of this book is so good that we can forgive Mr. Nichols for not being able to maintain the high level of writing throughout. The definitive biography of Robert Fitzroy remains to be written, but this book goes a long way in bringing him off the bottom of the page.
Rating: 
Summary: Evolution's Captain with a Dark Fate that was not so Dark
Review: The last thing that Robert Fitzroy, late captain of the H.M.S Beagle, late inspired leader and motivator of men, late brilliant navigator and cartographer, late natural scientist at odds with history's greatest naturalist Charles Darwin, late member of the British Parliament, late British Governor to New Zealand soon after the founding of that colony, late Admiral in the Royal Navy, and most lately, the man most responsible for the creation of modern day weather forecasting, was to climb up out of the bed he shared with his wife and alone in front of a mirror slit his own throat. Perhaps a "dark fate", but the path to that dark end was anything but dark. Fitzroy, born in 1805, started his career in the British Royal Navy at the age of twelve. And to prove he was no ordinary man, at a mere 23 years of age, he was given command of the Beagle after the man who started out as the expedition's commander, a Captain Stokes, slit his own throat after endless months under the pressures of command and peering out into the drizzle and freezing rain of Tierra del Fuego. Darwin commented on the presence and leadership qualities of Fitzroy while he was on the Beagle, describing how extraordinary he was, like one of the, "great men of history". But what makes Fitzroy interesting is that, if he was an inspired leader, even Napoleon-like, he was also flawed. And it his flaws when placed in contrast to his obvious qualities that make him interesting. After all, many thought - and even gave him the opportunity to become -another Horatio Nelson, a great scientist, or a wise and careful Governor; but he did none of those things. He did, ultimately, make a name for himself as the inventor of the "Fitzroy Barometer" and his weather forecasts (which like today were notoriously inaccurate). But that paled beside what could have been. It's said that because he was passed up for being chosen as Chief Naval Office in the Marine Department at 60 years of age, he slit his throat; but I doubt it. It was just the straw that broke his back.
Of course, Fitzroy was a man of his time, and in his time the church and the teachings of the church predominated the social fabric, morality, philosophy, and even the science of the day. (Ironically, even today in the United States, many might more readily accept Fitzroy's view of the world than Darwin's.) It was also the beginning of the Victorian Era in England with all the implicit social arrogance and condescension to other "inferior" peoples that was not present even 50 years earlier during Cook's voyages throughout the pacific. And so one of the most interesting sub-plots of this book was the story of the three natives Fitzroy took (some say kidnapped) from their homes in Tierra del Fuego and brought them to England for "proper" instruction in civilization, meaning Christianity as then taught. The ostensible purpose of Fitzroy's plan was to, `transfer to their relatives some rudiments of civilization'. It was a fact that two of the natives (a grown man and a twelve year old girl) after being caught having sex in the garden of the Rectory, prompted the second voyage of the Beagle for which Darwin was invited to come along: (They had to be taken out of England, and fast!) It is easy for us today - and perhaps a little too smugly as well - to criticize such gross arrogance; but given the context of his time, it's not so difficult to understand. Interestingly, Jemmy Buttons, one of the natives taken by Fitzroy, was, many years later, said to be responsible for the murder of the captain and crew of a Missionary Ship sent to give the natives further instruction. Fitzroy knew and read about this in the London Times; Nichols doesn't express what he might have thought; but we can imagine.
Nichols seems to spend more text on Darwin than Fitzroy, possibly because there is simply a paucity of primary source material. For those already familiar with Darwin's Journal or his, "Voyage of the Beagle", much of this book is a re-hash of that. But Nichols seems to be sea-going man and he spends most of his description of Fitzroy under that context. And it is wonderful, and it is enlightening. It just doesn't go far enough.
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