Elias Hasket Derby (August 16, 1739 — September 8, 1799) was an American merchant based in Salem, Massachusetts who owned or held shares in numerous privateers.

After the war, Derby converted his large, swift Grand Turk to commercial use, and sent it as the first New England vessel to trade directly with China.

By specializing in the East Indies trade, Derby became not only one of the wealthiest and most celebrated traders of the post-Revolutionary period in Salem, Massachusetts, but at one point reputedly the richest man in the United States.

By 1760, his father owned a fleet of at least thirteen vessels engaged in coastal, West Indian and Southern Atlantic trade.

The Derbys' Grand Turk, launched in May 1781, was Salem's largest privateer, and became the most successful; it captured seventeen prizes between 1781 and 1782 in the last years of the war.

On August 19, 1776, Derby acted as a proponent merchant agent on behalf of Commander/Captain Joseph White and his marines of the sloop Revenge, in a prize case related to their capture of the brigantine Anna Maria, a British vessel laden with a variety of goods.

Derby had sent one of his captains, James Gibaut, to Hanover, Massachusetts to supervise the construction by Thomas Barstow, at his Two Oaks yard.

Grand Turk was chiefly paid for by barter, with goods (rum, butter) being exchanged for the labor and materials.

The early forays and specialization in the East Indian markets by Salem merchants largely resulted in their remarkable, if temporary, prosperity, and supported growth in the city.

The voyage was successful, and in December 1785 the Grand Turk under Ebenezer West, master, and William Vans, supercargo, again cleared Salem bound for the Cape.

Vans and West continued on to Mauritius, at the time under French control and recently opened as a way station to United States vessels.

Subsequently, Randall Ouery and Sebier de la Chataignerais, French merchants of Mauritius who had purchased the Turk's cargo, offered a solution.

Sebier and Ouery were undercapitalized, and once they paid the many "charges & duties & presents" at Canton, they could not afford to continue the voyage to Boston.

Their captains were instructed to work in tandem: they went first to Batavia of the Dutch East Indies and solicited additional freight there for Canton.

The Derbys entered the India textile trade in earnest, sending no fewer that five ships there over the next four years.

The eldest daughter of Derby and his wife, Elizabeth, married (eloped with) Captain Nathaniel West of Salem.