LDUSC-Noel-34

Francis Galton was far from the first to propose correlations between the psychology and physicality of a person. He was partly influenced by the established practices of physiognomy, or the study of how a person’s character manifests in their appearance, including phrenology.  First developed in the late eighteenth century by German physician Franz Joseph Gall, phrenology entailed the measurement and examination of the size and shape of the head to determine a person’s personality and abilities. It was believed that the brain could be divided into various regions, each of which represented a mental faculty. These regions could be physically larger or smaller depending on the strength of that faculty in the person. The movement soared in popularity among the middle classes in Britain in the early nineteenth century, thanks in part by the dissemination of phrenological writings by George Combe, but was largely dismissed as pseudoscience by mid-century (Tomlinson, 1997). Despite this, the movement was influential in Galton’s approach to the working classes and criminality, with the exception of a few key differences reflective of his beliefs in inherited ability. 

Phrenologists commonly used death masks to study the head structures of subjects ranging from the highly respected to the lowest of criminals (Berveling, 2020, p.6). This particular death mask is drawn from the collection of phrenologist Robert Noel, who acquired a variety of masks while traveling through Europe between 1837 and 1845 (Noel, 1883). The label hung below the plaster chin reads “Irmscher ~ N;34” and, ominously, “Murderer – decapitated 1840.” The subject was Carl Gottlob Irmscher, a German labourer who was executed for the murders of his wife and child in Saxony. Irmscher was motivated by the debts his wife had amassed before their marriage and the fact that they had three children when he had only wanted one. Issues were only exacerbated by general poverty and the fact that their second child, a son, had been unwell since birth and often required expensive medical care (Noel, 1883, p.60). On the 27th of October 1838, Irsmcher first murdered his son by submerging his head in water until he drowned. He then killed his wife with several blows to the head with a hatchet. Despite an initial attempt to feign innocence, Irmscher was arrested for the murders (Noel, 1883, p.60). He was sentenced to death and later confessed to the whole ordeal prior to his execution by sword in Dresden in 1840 (Noel,1883, p.61).

Noel was present at the Medical Chirurgical Academy in Dresden when Irmscher’s corpse was brought in. Upon seeing it, he requested that a cast be produced by noted plasterer Franz Papatschy (Noel, 1883, p.61). The cast would have been made from plaster that was poured into two molds that together formed Irmscher’s head. While the head would have been oiled to prevent sticking to the mold, remnants of Irmscher’s eyebrow hairs remain stuck to the mask (Andrews, 1988). Upon Noel’s death, his mask collection was bequeathed to his cousin, the Earl of Lovelace, whose wife later gifted it to the Galton Laboratory in 1911 (Beirne, 1993, p.219). When the Laboratory was demolished in 1968, the collection was taken in by The Slade School, where they were largely forgotten until being reunited with the Galton Collection in the 1990s (Hink, 2014). They have since come under the care of UCL Museums and Collections. 

Writing in 1924, Karl Pearson stated that Galton “belonged to a generation in which…the belief in some form of phrenology [was] still appreciable” and that “he was really attempting to make a true science out of the study of physiognomy” (p.301). Galton’s quest to establish a link between appearance and character in his composite photography work in particular echoed phrenology. The two practices were also driven by similar contemporary social anxieties. Not only did nineteenth century Britain see revolutionary changes in areas inclusive of education, women’s rights and scientific discovery, but also rising fears over wider societal degeneration, particularly with regards to the working classes and the development of a depraved “criminal class.” This prompted many to apply scientific methods in attempts to identify and classify criminals, as demonstrated by phrenology and Galton’s work (Pavlich, 2009, pp.171-2).  

While phrenologists believed a person’s life conditions could shape them both physically and psychologically, Galton contrastingly believed “intellectual and moral gifts are as strictly matters of inheritance as any purely physical qualities” (1872, p.176). He wrote that “whether it be in character, disposition, energy, intellect, or physical power, we each receive at our birth a definite endowment,” demonstrating the shift from the phrenologist’s belief in everyone’s ability to improve (1909, p.3). Heavily influenced by Darwin, Galton was convinced that the working class had essentially evolved separately from the more respectable middle and upper classes (Pavlich, 2009, p.174). Therefore, while phrenology lent certain principles, Galton’s work departed from them in his beliefs in inherited degeneration within the working classes.  

Despite their differences, both phrenology and Galton’s work were part of a wider movement which served to justify the belief in the superiority of the middle and upper classes and succeeded in further othering the working class. This aided in cementing prejudices against the working class still seen today. 

By Emma McKean