Humphry Davy Davy's laboratory assistant, Michael Faraday, went on to enhance Davy's work and would become the more famous and influential scientist. Davy is supposed to have even claimed Faraday as his greatest discovery. Davy later accused Faraday of plagiarism, however, causing Faraday (the first Fullerian Professor of Chemistry) to cease all research in electromagnetism until his mentor's death. Of a sanguine, somewhat irritable temperament, Davy displayed characteristic enthusiasm and energy in all his pursuits. As is shown by his verses and sometimes by his prose, his mind was highly imaginative; the poet Coleridge declared that if he "had not been the
Humphry Davy failure, despite the fact that, as Frank A. J. L. James comments, "The somewhat ironical problem ... was not that they were unsuccessful. They did after all preserve the copper as Davy said they would. The problem was that the protectors, on most ships, had a chemical side effect which provided nutrients for weeds, barnacles etc. thus fouling the ships". Elections took place on St Andrew's Day and Davy was elected on 30 November 1820. Although he was unopposed, other candidates had received initial backing. These candidates embodied the factional difficulties that beset Davy's presidency and which eventually defeated him.