Like his brother Gerald MUSGRAVE-WOOD, Leeds-born John Musgrave-Wood was well known in Polperro circles. He became the political cartoonist 'Mel Emmwood', working for the Tatler and Bystander, then the Sunday Express and the Evening Standard, and finally the Daily Mail.

He contributed an oil painting and several caricatures to the 1948 exhibition of the East Cornwall Society of Artists.

The family were well-known in Polperro as their sister Florence Wood set up an antiques business in the village after the death of her husband in 1935.