David Carnegie Andrew Agnew

“ The fourth son of William Wood was Charles Wood (who died in 1799) , assay-master in Jamaica for thirty years, a man remarkable for energy and ability, and of such high moral and religious principles that, notwithstanding the notorious corruption of the age, he never took a perquisite. ”

“ At Jamaica he signalized himself by a discovery (substances and products, although known to the inhabitants of uncultivated regions, are always said to be undiscovered until made known to the scientific world) , as to which Knight, in his Cyclopaedia of Industry, says, “Platina, or Platinum, is an important metal which was first made known in Europe by Mr. Wood, assay-master in Jamaica, who met with its ore in 1741.” ”

“ When exposed by itself to the fire, either in grains or in larger pieces, it is of extreme difficult fusion, and hath been kept for two hours in an air furnace in a heat that would run down cast-iron in fifteen minutes: which great heat it hath endured without being melted or wasted ”