William West (1792-1851)
William West (1792-1851)
1842 William West of Leeds, 'theory and practice of Chemistry', became a member of the Institution of Civil Engineers.[1]
1852 Obituary [2]
Mr. WILLIAM WEST, a member of the Society of Friends, was born in the year 1792 at Wandsworth, Surrey, and after the usual course of practice he settled at Leeds, in 1816, as a chemist.
His natural taste induced him to devote much time to the study of analytical chemistry and science generally, and in 1831 he was appointed Lecturer on chemistry to the Leeds School of Medicine, a post which he filled for fourteen years with great credit.
He was an active promoter of the Philosophical and Literary Society, and eventually became its President elect, as well as the President of the West Biding Geological and Polytechnic Society. He was connected with the London Chemical Society; assisted in the formation, and was a constant attendant at the meetings, of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, frequently contributing papers, and and in 1846 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society.
In 1842 he became an Associate of the Institution of Civil Engineers, and contributed several useful papers, which are published in the Transactions and Minutes, of Proceedings, and for one of them a Telford Medal was awarded in the session of 1846.
During the latter part of his career, particularly after his retirement from business, he took an active part in the proceedings of the Societies with which he was connected, and being extensively employed in scientific investigations for legal cases, for which his patient habits of research and strict integrity, peculiarly fitted him, he was enabled to make many interesting communications to the meetings of these Societies. His philanthropic exertions were constantly engaged on a variety of objects, and at his decease, on the 10th September 1851, at the age of fifty-nine years, a well-merited eulogiuln on him appeared in the journals of the town of his adoption.