John Tasker (sea captain)

John Tasker (1742–1800) was a Welsh sea captain and shipowner who became the East India Company's Master Attendant at Bombay (now Mumbai) and purchased the Upton Castle estate in his native Pembrokeshire where he was High Sheriff in 1798.

[3] In the early 1780s he commanded the Shaw Birangore and the Hornby (also owned by the Governor)[4] and, while captain of the latter, captured a vessel sailing under Spanish colours near Macao with a cargo of birds' nests.

[5] He was in business on his own account when, in the early 1780s, he obtained government contracts to carry saltpetre, brimstone and rice from the Malabar Coast to Bombay, provided a packet service for the Bengal Presidency, and imported Madeira wine.

Among the guests was the Hawaiian prince Kaʻiana, also known as Tyaana, at whose request Tasker ordered all broken victuals to be brought on deck so that Ka'iana could feed the Chinese who had gathered alongside the vessel.

[note 7] His appointment as Master Attendant may have owed something to the influence of Governor William Hornby and of John Hunter who was for twenty years a Director of the East India Company.

[25][note 10] Marine support from Bombay was important for land-based forces during the Third Anglo-Mysore War and for attacks on Dutch settlements in India, but the port itself was not under threat during Tasker's period as Master.

It was presumably on account of the protection provided to commercial transport that, when Tasker announced his retirement from office in July 1795, the merchants of Bombay combined to give him their particular thanks for "the prompt assistance afforded the shipping of this port when in a situation of the greatest danger" and for his "exertions and professional abilities so eminently displayed".

He had considered it "too late in life to enter into extensive mercantile connections", and in February 1792 had written to his steward Leach "If I am alive you will see me in three years and to spend the remainder of my days at Upton".

The list of those to whom he bequeathed "handsome gold mourning rings" in his will indicates his social circle comprised many of the principal landed families of South West Wales[note 11] and in 1798 he served as High Sheriff of Pembrokeshire.

[31] By his will and its codicils, all dated three days before his death, he appointed annuities for various relatives and his "black servant Antonio", gave legacies exceeding £14,500 in aggregate, and left his Upton Castle and Carew properties to his grand-niece Maria Jones who had married Rev.