Seeking Due Credit for Discovery of Mental Heredity

Herbert Spencer

Update: Found it! The letter (signed "B.") urging credit to Philip St George Cooke for the idea of mental evolution appeared in the Detroit Free Press February 29, 1880:

MENTAL EVOLUTION.
Cooke, Spencer, Youmans.

To the Editor of the Detroit Free Press:

In an article in the October number of the North American Review, 1879, by Prof. E. L. Yonmans, on “Spencer’s Evolution Philosophy,” that author is credited with the discovery of mental and moral heredity, or mental evolution, so called; and this principium is treated as the basis of the work “Principles of Psychology,” published 1855, which Prof. Youmans says “revolutionized mental science,” placing it “upon a new basis.” The following extracts are all that is necessary to quote for my present purposes:

“The evolution of life involving accumulated changes through a long series of generations is, of course, based upon the principles of heredity; and this principle was recognized by Mr. Spencer as fundamental in the sphere of psychical life.

“Mr. Spencer showed in 1855 that this doctrine, applied to mind, ends a chronic antagonism between two classes of psychological students.

“The progress of modern thought furnishes no example so remarkable as this of a book appearing ahead of its time. While yet the notion of evolution was regarded as a baseless fancy unworthy the attention of sober-minded thinkers, Mr. Spencer revolutionized natural science by applying it to psychology.”

Now it appears to me that whatever credit may be due for originating or discovering the theory in question, or the ideas on which it is based, should be bestowed where it belongs.

From about the year 1827, till the Mexican war in 1846, P. St. G. Cooke, now Gen. Cooke, as an officer of the United States army, was almost constantly on duty on the Western plains and among the Rocky Mountains, where he found occasion to observe and study the life, character and destiny of the American Indians. In the midst of his active military service he also found time to make full notes of his observations and reflections, which he sent, in the form of articles, to the Southern Literary Messenger, then published at Richmond, Va. In the number of February, 1843, twelve years before Herbert Spencer’s discovery, the following extract may be found:

"To attempt to teach savages letters and the mysteries of the Christian religion (not even intelligible to the most cultured intellect) is evidently to contemn the experience of all nations. But taking for our guidance the gradual advances of Europeans, whose histories we possess, let them first be taught, step by step, the lessons of civilization; let us first on endeavor to make them herdsmen which alone will be found a difficult and most important advance; afterward direct their attention to agriculture and the simplest mechanic arts. The mental endowments of civilized men seem inherited like physical distinctions possessed at our birth. Let us not, then, shock the natures of savages by attempting to force upon them at once the manners and customs, the acquirements and the creed which the gradual progress and the recorded lessons of eighteen centuries have perfected for us, and ingrafted in our natures."

It appears that Gen. Cooke thus presents fully and graphically the same idea of mental and moral heredity which Prof. Youmans credits to Mr. Spencer, and this many years before the word “evolution” was adopted in the discussion of the subject. Nor could this have been a hasty, undigested or lightly considered idea of the General. He was using it in argument, and he brings it in as one which he had maturely considered, and which was material to be kept in view by the government in their treatment of the Indians.

He may lay claim to its authorship. Mr. Spencer was not the first, as stated by Prof. Youmans, to originate or discover the idea or principle in question. Gen. Cooke was several years in advance of Mr. Spencer, and so far as the record now stands, he takes rank of all others in the discovery and in the annunciation of the basis on which Mr. Spencer has erected his superstructure.

B.

Philip St George Cooke wanted his nephew John Esten Cooke to press PSGC's claim for discovery of "mental heredity," long before Herbert Spencer.  PSGC saved an old letter from JEC promising to write about it, as Penny Barrott explains at Famous Men, Silent Women

In Detroit, General Cooke or a friend had already begun the campaign to get due credit for the discovery, as reported in the Army and Navy Journal, March 13, 1880:

A writer in the Detroit Free Press claims for Gen. P. St. George Cooke, U. S. Army, the first suggestion of the doctrine of mental and moral heredity, or mental evolution so called which, according to Prof. Youmans, appeared first in Herbert Spencer’s “Principles of Psychology" and “revolutionized mental science." “ From about the year 1827," the writer says, "till the Mexican war in 1846, P. St. George Cooke, now Gen. Cooke, as an officer of the United States Army, was almost constantly on duty on the Western plains and among the Rocky Mountains, where he found occasion to observe and study the life, character, and destiny of the American Indians. In the midst of his active military service he also found time to make full notes of his observations and reflections, which he sent, in the form of articles to the Southern Literary Messenger, then published at Richmond, Va. In the number of February, 1843, twelve years before Herbert Spencer‘s discovery, the following extract may be found:

‘To attempt to teach savages letters and the mysteries of the Christian religion (not even intelligible to the most cultured intellect) is evidently to contemn the experience of all nations. But taking for our guidance the gradual advances of Europeans, whose histories we possess, let them first be taught, step by step, the lessons of civilization; let us first on endeavor to make them herdsmen which alone will be found a difficult and most important advance; afterward direct their attention to agriculture and the simplest mechanic arts. The mental endowments of civilized men seem inherited like physical distinctions; are possessed at our birth. Let us not, then, shock the natures of savages by attempting to force upon them at once the manners and customs, the acquirements and the creed which the gradual progress and the recorded lessons of eighteen centuries have perfected for us, and engrafted in our natures.'"

PSGC was keen to establish precedence, so I don't understand why he did not cite the earlier printing of the same passage (almost verbatim) in the article "An Appeal for the Indian" by "F. R. D."  This "Appeal" appeared in the Army and Navy Chronicle for April 16, 1840.