Merchantman: Between 1787 and 1793 Popham was engaged in a series of commercial ventures in the Eastern Sea, sailing for the Imperial Ostend Company.

[4] Popham sailed Etrusco to China and took on board a cargo valued at £50,000, the property of himself and two merchants, apparently French.

Etrusco arrived at Ostend in July 1793, where the English frigate HMS Brilliant seized her and then brought her back to England.

[a] Etrusco was claimed as a prize for having French property on board, and condemned as a droit of admiralty for infringing the British East India Company's (EIC) monopoly by bringing tea from China.

[7] Lloyd's List reported that the armed ship Etrusco, from the West Indies, had foundered on 25 August in a gale of wind but that her crew had been saved.