John West (mathematician)

Fourth child of Samuel West and Margaret Mein, his father died in 1766.

West matriculated in the University of Saint Andrews in 1769 thanks to financial help of the presbytery clerk Dr.

[2] He was assistant of professor Vilant, who had poor health, but lacking of prospects in his native land, he emigrated to Jamaica,[3] in 1784, the same year that Elements of Mathematics and A System of Shorthand were published.

[4] In Jamaica, West was initially teacher in the Manning's Free School at Savanna-la-Mar in Westmoreland Parish.

[6] Before his death, he sent the manuscript of Mathematical Treatises to his old student John Leslie, who published it in 1838.