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Saint Catherines Press "It May Be Truth, but It Is Not Evidence": Paul du Chaillu and the Legitimation of Evidence in the Field Sciences Author(s): Stuart McCook Source: Osiris, Vol. 11, Science in the Field (1996), pp. 177-197 Published by: University of Chicago Press on behalf of History of Science Society Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/301931 Accessed: 12-02-2016 16:08 UTC REFERENCES Linked references are available on JSTOR for this article: http://www.jstor.org/stable/301931?seq=1&cid=pdf-reference#references_tab_contents You may need to log in to JSTOR to access the linked references. Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at http://www.jstor.org/page/ info/about/policies/terms.jsp JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. Saint Catherines Press, History of Science Society and University of Chicago Press are collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Osiris. http://www.jstor.org This content downloaded from 194.117.40.76 on Fri, 12 Feb 2016 16:08:46 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions "It May Be Truth,But It Is Not Evidence":Paul du Chailluand theLegitimation of Evidence in theField Sciences StuartMcCook* INTHE SPRING OF 1861, gorillas had captivatedthe public imaginationin England.The recentpublication of Darwin'sOn theOrigin of Species had fueled theongoing debate about theplace of humansin nature.A key piece of evidencein the debate was the recentlydiscovered gorilla. In the pages of learnedjournals and in themore popular Athenaeum, Richard Owen and Thomas HenryHuxley debated the significanceof gorilla skeletonsrecently brought to England. They based their argumentsabout theuniqueness of man on thephysiology of the gorilla,which was anatomicallycloser to man thanwas anyother animal. Owen arguedthat the human brainhad a lobe, the hippocampusminor, that distinguished it fromall otherliving organisms.Huxley countered by arguingthat the hippocampus minor was notpecu- liar to the humanbrain. The gorilla skulls over which Huxley and Owen debated had been broughtto England withgreat fanfare by a little-knownexplorer named Paul du Chaillu (see Fig. 1).' From 1856 to 1859, Du Chaillu had traveledthrough western equatorial Africa, studyingthe lands and people and collectingflora and fauna. He broughta choice selectionof his collectionsto England earlyin 1861, wherehe was quicklymade a celebrity.He describedhis adventuresto packed halls at the Royal Geographical Society and at theRoyal Institutionin London, witha row of stuffedgorillas on the stage and gorilla skulls on hand beside the lectern.2The eveningafter du Chaillu * Departmentof History,129 DickinsonHall, Princeton,NJ 08544. Thisarticle is basedon mymaster's thesis, "The Monkey Business: Paul Du Chailluand Nonscien- tistRoles Withinthe Scientific Community" (Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, 1990). Prof.Sydney Ross generouslyprovided me with the manuscript that introduced me to the world of Paul du Chaillu. I wouldalso liketo thankP. ThomasCarroll, Deborah J. Coon, Gerald L. Geison,Robert E. Kohler, HenrikaKuklick, Sal Restivo,two anonymous reviewers, and my classmates at Rensselaer Polytech- nic Instituteand PrincetonUniversity for their comments and guidance. ' For twoperspectives of thescientific world of VictorianLondon, see AdrianDesmond, Arche- typesand Ancestors: Paleontologyin VictorianLondon, 1850-1875 (Chicago: Universityof Chicago Press, 1982), particularlypp. 74-76; and NicholaasRupke, Richard Owen: VictorianNaturalist (New Haven:Yale UniversityPress, 1994). Owenand Huxleyrefer to du Chaillu'sgorilla skeletons in,among other places, "The Gorillaand the Negro,,"Athenaeum, 23 March 1861, no. 1743:395-396; andT. H. Huxley,"Man and theApes," Athenaeum 13 April1861, no. 1746:498. 2 LynnBarber, The Heyday of Natural History,1820-1870 (New York:Doubleday & Co., 1980), p. 276. ?) 1996by The Historyof ScienceSociety. All rightsreserved. 0021-1753/96/8401-0001$01.00 OSIRIS, 2ndseries, 1996, 11 : 177-197 177 This content downloaded from 194.117.40.76 on Fri, 12 Feb 2016 16:08:46 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 178 STUART McCOOK Figure 1. "Paul du Chaillu in hisafrican costume," frnom . Storiesof the Gorilla Country - (New York:Harper and Brothers, 1897), xii. lecturedat theRoyal Institution, Owen presented a paperthere on thedistinction betweenthe Negro and the gorilla, based on skullsgiven to himby du Chaillu. Du Chaillu'shoneymoon with the British natural history community was short- lived.Explorations and Adventuresin Equatorial Africa,du Chaillu'snarrative of his travelsin Africa,was publishedin May 1861. Inconsistenciesand ambiguities in thebook provoked a politelyfierce debate that temporarily eclipsed the debate overhumanity's place in nature.The argumentover du Chaillu'sreliability was one of thefew instances when scientists in VictorianEngland publicly discussed issues of whatconstituted good scientificpractice and whomade a good scientist,rather thanwhat constituted good scientifictheory. AlthoughPaul du Chailluis deservedlynot considered one ofthe great figures in Victorianscience, his case bringsto lightsome issues of interestto historiansof science.In recentyears historian s of science have begun to look at people who were essentialto theproduction of scientificknowledge, but who remained hidden from This content downloaded from 194.117.40.76 on Fri, 12 Feb 2016 16:08:46 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions "IT MAY BE TRUTH" 179 publicview. Steven Shapin has written about the "invisible technicians" who worked on RobertBoyle's experiments.3 The Victorianera had its own shareof invisible technicians,most of whom normally remained out of the public eye. Invisibility was somewhatharder to establish in the field sciences, however, since the field collectors couldnot easily be writtenout of thestory of hownatural history specimens were obtained.Still, the scientific communities in Englandand the United States devel- oped strategiesof accommodatingfield collectors that ensured that they remained relativelyinvisible. The controversyover du Chailluthrew a spotlightonto a process thatnormally remained behind the scenes. Historiansof science have also recentlybegun to look at the production of knowl- edgein thefield sciences and to explorehow it differs from knowledge production inthe laboratory. The controversyover du Chailluillustrates the fragility of the pro- cess of legitimationof scientificknowledge in naturalhistory during the Victorian era. Field observationsin naturalhistory depended very heavily on theperceived credibilityof theperson who madethem. Observations without clear provenance hadgreatly diminished value. As withart objects, the provenance of natural history objectsdepended partly on concreterecords and partly on thecredibility of the per- son who offeredit. Credibilitywas, in turn,strongly tied to thesocial standingof theobserver. Du Chaillu'sclass, educational background, and race quickly became keyissues in thedebate over the scientific worth of the Explorations. The strategies thatdu Chaillu'sdetractors used to tearhim down and those that his supporters used to defendhim give a detailedpicture of theprocess by whichobjects collected in thefield became scientific evidence. THE MAKING OF A FIELD EXPERT, 1831-1861 Paul du Chaillu'svoyage to equatorial Africa took place during the heyday of scien- tificexploration, which began with the voyages of Cook in thelate eighteenth cen- tury.Scientists, bureaucrats, and businessmen at the European and American centers of powersought information about the unknownregions of Asia, Africa,and America.This knowledge was partof the establishment ofEuropean political, eco- nomic,and intellectual hegemony over the region.4 Metropolitan governments, mu- seums,botanical gardens, zoos, and scientificsocieties eagerly sought natural historyobjects and observations from travelers to theseunknown regions. Du Chailluwas probably born around 1831. His father,Charles-Alexis Duchaillu, was a Frenchtrader who had workedon theIle Bourbon(Reunion) before moving to the Gabon in the mid-1840s.5Little is knownabout his mother,who certain StevenShapin, "The InvisibleTechnician," American Scientist, 1989, 77:554-563. 4 See MichaelAdas, Machinesas theMeasure of Men: Science,Technology, and Ideologiesof WesternDominance (Ithaca, N.Y.: CornellUniv. Press, 1989), 133-165; WilliamH. Goetzmann, NewLands, New Men: America and theSecond GreatAge of Discovery (New York:Penguin, 1987). 5 The best historicalreconstruction and analysisof du Chaillu's life appears in H. H. Bu- cher's"Canonization by Repetition:Paul du Chailluin Historiography,"Revue Franfaise d'Histoire d'Outre-Mer,1979, 66:15-32. Throughpainstaking research, Bucher reconstructs du Chaillu'searly years,which du Chailludeliberately obscured. Michel Vaucaire's Paul du Chaillu: GorillaHunter Beingthe Life and ExtraordinaryAdventures of Paul du Chaillu(New York:Harper & Bros.,1930) is an uncriticallycelebratory biography of du Chaillu.Unfortunately, it is vagueabout du Chaillu's lifebefore he came to America.Other reliable biographical fragments are Helen EverstonSmith, This content downloaded from 194.117.40.76 on Fri, 12 Feb 2016 16:08:46 UTC