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Thomas Grantham (merchant)

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Sir Thomas Grantham (bapt. 23 December 1641 – January 1718) was an English merchant and naval officer. In 1664, Grantham was working as a merchant, shipping woollen goods to the English colony of Virginia. Eight years later, he informed Charles II of England that Virginia lacked sufficient weapons and ammunition for self-defence and volunteered his services to that effect. Grantham subsequently arrived in Virginia with a shipment of leather goods and letter of recommendation from Duke of York. Governor Sir William Berkeley received Grantham "with several marks of friendship and esteem" and appointed him admiral of a flotilla of 25 merchantmen which he convoyed back to England in summer 1673. In 1674, as captain of Barnaby, Grantham escorted the London tobacco fleet to Virginia, becoming a prominent tobacco trader and "master of Virginia's waters and an expert on their defenses".