1. David Mushet was a Scottish engineer, known for his inventions in the field of metallurgy.
19 Facts About David Mushet
1. 2.
When David Mushet was a boy, his father established a foundry at Croft Street in Dalkeith.
3.
David Mushet left school at the age of 19, but did not go to work at his father's foundry.
4.
David Mushet's employers, becoming jealous of him, dismissed him from the Clyde Iron Works in the same year.
5.
In 1805 David Mushet moved to Derbyshire, to become manager of the Alfreton Ironworks.
6.
In 1808 David Mushet was approached by Thomas Halford, a wealthy investor from London, who owned two furnaces at Whitecliff, in the Forest of Dean, Gloucestershire.
7.
Halford was having difficulty with the quality and quantity of iron being produced at his works and offered to pay for David Mushet's help in overcoming the production problems he was encountering.
8.
David Mushet designed and supervised a major rebuilding of the Whitecliff Ironworks, but the time he was spending in the Forest of Dean became instrumental in the complete breakdown of relations with his colleagues at the Alfreton works.
9.
David Mushet ran the furnaces at Whitecliff for six months, but then quickly disengaged himself from the partnership.
10.
David Mushet was not known to act impulsively, and the reasons for this decision are not fully known.
11.
David Mushet was appointed a director of the British Iron Company in 1826 although not without misgivings among some of the shareholders as to his suitability for such a post.
12.
David Mushet was on the committee of the Severn and Wye Railway and Canal Company and used his position to stifle the expansion of steam railways into the Forest; which threatened the monopoly of his tramroads.
13.
In 1845 David retired to Monmouth and conveyed Darkhill to his 3 sons, with the youngest, Robert Mushet, becoming the manager.
14.
David Mushet married Agnes Wilson in 1798 and their first child, Margaret, was born in 1799.
15.
David Mushet spent his formative years studying metallurgy with his father and was to become a noted metallurgist, though was never to receive full recognition, financial or personal, for his achievements.
16.
David Mushet died at Monmouth on 7 June 1847, but even in death was surrounded by bitter and public family feuding.
17.
David Mushet was an early advocate of animal rights and opponent of vivisection but was not a vegetarian.
18.
David Mushet authored an essay which was entered into a writing competition sponsored by the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.
19.
David Mushet's essay condemned animal cruelties such as hunting, overworking of stagecoach horses and the use of dogs as draught-animals.