Col. Israel Thorndike (1755-1832)

Having served as a Colonel in the Continental Army during the Revolution, he built his fortune exporting flour and fish to the sugar plantations of the Caribbean, buying coffee, sugar, molasses, and rum to sell in the States and European markets. His business interests connected him with the Perkins brothers, and he was also traded in enslaved women, men, and children, buying slaves in one port to sell at another. In 1810, he settled in Boston and served as a State Representative. Like the Perkins, his business interests shifted to the China trade, as well as to investments in New England’s textile industry.⁠ He entered the China and East India trade with his son-in-law, Ebenezer Francis, and David Sears, and they also became involved in manufacturing.