Bernard Richard Meirion Darwin CBE JP (7 September 1876 − 18 October 1961) was a golf writer and high-standard amateur golfer. A grandson of the British naturalist Charles Darwin, he was inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame.
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Early life
Born in Downe, Kent, Darwin was the son of Francis Darwin and Amy Ruck, his mother dying from a fever on 11 September, four days after his birth. He was the first grandson of Charles and Emma Darwin (see Darwin–Wedgwood family), and was brought up by them at their home, Down House. His younger half-sister from his father's second marriage to Ellen Wordswotth Crofts was the poet Frances Cornford.
Education
Darwin was educated at Eton College, and graduated in law from Trinity College, Cambridge, where he was a Cambridge Blue in golf 1895–1897, and team captain in his final year.
Career
After Cambridge, Darwin became a court lawyer, but did not particularly enjoy that career, and gradually moved into journalism, despite having no formal training. He covered golf for The Times from 1907 to 1953 and for Country Life from 1907 to 1961, the first writer ever to cover golf on a daily basis, instead of as an occasional feature.
Darwin's journalism career spanned the Atlantic, most notably including on-scene coverage of the famed 1913 U.S. Open won by American amateur Francis Ouimet over British greats Ted Ray and Harry Vardon. Darwin served as the official marker/scorekeeper for Ouimet in the playoff round. Darwin famously wrote of Ouimet before the playoff round: "He was one David against two Goliaths."
Darwin played the game at an excellent level himself well into middle age, and competed in The Amateur Championship on 26 occasions across five decades between 1898 and 1935, with his best results being semi-final appearances in 1909 and 1921. In 1922, while in the United States to report on the first Walker Cup amateur team match between Britain and Ireland and the U.S., and also appointed as non-playing captain, Darwin was pressed into service at the last minute as a player, when one of the British team members, Robert Harris, was unable to play. He lost his team match, but won his singles match.
He was Captain of The Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St Andrews in 1934, and was President of the Golf Club Managers' Association (then the Association of Golf Club Secretaries) from 1933 to 1934 and then again from 1955 to 1958. Though mainly a golf writer, he also occasionally wrote on cricket, and prefaced the first edition of The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations. He was awarded CBE in the 1937 Coronation Honours.
Bernard Darwin was an authority on Charles Dickens. He frequently contributed the fourth leading article in The Times. The fourth Leader was devoted to flippant themes, and Darwin was known to insert quotes from or about Dickens in them. When Oxford Press issued all classics by Dickens around 1940, each with a foreword by a Dickensian scholar, Darwin was chosen to contribute the foreword to The Pickwick Papers. He was also asked by The Times to pen the main tribute to cricketer W.G. Grace when Grace's birth centenary was celebrated in 1948. The article has been included since in a few anthologies.
Personal life
Darwin married the engraver Elinor Monsell in 1906. They had one son, Sir Robert Vere Darwin, and two daughters; the potter Ursula Mommens, and Nicola Mary Elizabeth Darwin, later Hughes (1916–1976). During the First World War he served with the Royal Army Ordnance Corps in Macedonia as a lieutenant.
Death
Darwin is buried in St Mary the Virgin Churchyard, Downe, Kent.
Award and honors
In 2005, Darwin was elected to the World Golf Hall of Fame, in the Lifetime Achievement category.
Amateur wins
1896 Linskill Cup
1919 Golf Illustrated Gold Vase
Results in major championships
Note: Darwin played in only The Amateur Championship.
NT = No tournament
DNP = Did not play
R512, R256, R128, R64, R32, R16, QF, SF = Round in which player lost in match play
Yellow background for top-10
Sources:
Team appearances
Walker Cup (representing Great Britain): 1922
England–Scotland Amateur Match (representing England): 1902, 1904, 1905, 1908, 1909, 1910 (winners), 1923, 1924 (winners)
List of works
The Golf Courses of the British Isles (Duckworth, 1910) illustrated by Harry Rountree
Tee Shots and Others (Kegan Paul, 1911) illustrated by E. W. Mitchell
Golf from The Times (The Times, 1912)
Erasmus Darwin: Born 7 December 1881, killed in action 24 April 1915
Golf: Some Hints and Suggestions (Country Life, 1920)
A Friendly Round (Mills & Boon, 1922)
A Round of Golf on the London & North Eastern Railway (Ben Johnson & Co., 1924)
The Tale of Mr. Tootleoo (Nonesuch Press, 1925) with Elinor Darwin, for children
The Games's Afoot! An Anthology of Sports, Games and the Open Air (Sidgwick & Jackson, 1926) editor
Eton v. Harrow at Lord's (Williams & Norgate, 1926) see Eton v Harrow
Tootleoo Two (Nonesuch Press, 1927) with Elinor Darwin, for children
Six Golfing Shots by Six Famous Players (Dormeuil Freres, 1927)
Green Memories (Hodder & Stoughton, 1928)
Second Shots: Casual Talks About Golf (Newnes, 1930)
The Dickens Advertiser: A Collection of the Advertisements in the Original Parts of Novels by Charles Dickens (Elkin Mathews & Marrot, 1930)
Other publications
A Round with Darwin: A Collection of the Golf Writings (Souvenir Press, 1984)
Darwin on the Green (Souvenir Press, 1986)
Historic Golf Courses of the British Isles (Duckworth, 1987)
The Darwin Sketchbook: Portraits of Golf's Greatest Players and Other Selections (Classics of Golf, 1991) from his writings, 1910–1955
The Happy Golfer (Classics of Golf, 1997) his best articles from The American Golfer magazine, 1922–1936
Bernard Darwin on Golf (Rowman & Littlefield, 2003) edited by Jeff Silverman ISBN 1-58574-768-8