John Wood

Master John Wood (died 1570), was a Scottish courtier, administrator and secretary to the Earl of Moray. He was assassinated on 15 April 1570. Career John Wood was the son of Andrew Wood of Largo, and was educated at St Leonards College at the University of St Andrews, graduating in 1536 and so used the title "Master", referring to his degree. It has been suggested he became vicar of Largo. John Wood's connection with Queen Mary's half brother, Lord James Stewart, afterwards Earl of Moray, began as early at least as 1548, when he accompanied him to France. About September 1560 he accompanied an embassy to England, recorded by Thomas Randolph, who in a letter of 23 September 1560 promised to send to William Cecil with Wood a copy of Knox's History of the Reformation, "as mykle as ys written thereof". John Wood was a supporter of the Scottish Reformation, and at the first General Assembly of the kirk in December 1560 he was selected as one of those at St. Andrews "best qualified for preaching of the word and ministering of the sacraments." Wood accompanied Lord James in his embassy to Queen Mary in France in 1561; and Nicholas Throckmorton, the English ambassador at Paris described Wood as one "in whom there is much virtue and sufficiency." He recommended that Wood's devotion to the English interest should be rewarded with a pension.