Samuel Enderby was a successful whale oil

Whale oil

Whale oil is the oil obtained from the blubber of various species of whales, particularly the three species of right whale and the bowhead whale prior to the modern era, as well as several other species of baleen whale...

 merchant. In the 18th century, he founded Samuel Enderby & Sons

Samuel Enderby & Sons

Samuel Enderby & Sons was a whaling and sealing company based in London, England, founded circa 1775 by Samuel Enderby . The company encouraged their captains to combine exploration with their business activities, and sponsored several of the earliest expeditions to the subantarctic, Southern Ocean...

, a prominent shipping and whaling

Whaling

Whaling is the hunting of whales mainly for meat and oil. Its earliest forms date to at least 3000 BC. Various coastal communities have long histories of sustenance whaling and harvesting beached whales...

 and sealing

Seal hunting

Seal hunting, or sealing, is the personal or commercial hunting of seals. The hunt is currently practiced in five countries: Canada, where most of the world's seal hunting takes place, Namibia, the Danish region of Greenland, Norway and Russia...

 company.

The Enderby family had been tanners at Bermondsey

Bermondsey

Bermondsey is an area in London on the south bank of the river Thames, and is part of the London Borough of Southwark. To the west lies Southwark, to the east Rotherhithe, and to the south, Walworth and Peckham.-Toponomy:...

,and supported Oliver Cromwell,Daniel Enderby Ist raising money for the army in the Long Parliament as recorded in Hansard and were granted forfeited estates at Lismore, County Waterford

Lismore, County Waterford

Lismore is a town in County Waterford, Ireland. It is located where the N72 road crosses the River Blackwater.-History:It was founded by Saint Mochuda, also known as Saint Carthage. In the 7th century, Lismore was the site of the well-known Lismore Abbey. It is also home to Lismore Castle, the...

, Ireland

Ireland

Ireland is an island to the northwest of continental Europe. It is the third-largest island in Europe and the twentieth-largest island on Earth...

, which were sold in 1660. After that time, the family was active in the 'oil and Russia trade' and traded with the New England

New England

New England is a region in the northeastern corner of the United States consisting of the six states of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut...

 colonies.

On 02/06/1752, Samuel Enderby II married Mary Buxton, a daughter of his business partner at St Paul's Wharf in London. Enderby died in 1797, leaving the company to his three sons Charles, Samuel III, and George.

Fictional References

• In Chapter 100 of the novel Moby-Dick
  Moby-Dick
  Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, was written by American author Herman Melville and first published in 1851. It is considered by some to be a Great American Novel and a treasure of world literature. The story tells the adventures of wandering sailor Ishmael, and his voyage on the whaleship Pequod,...
  
  , the Pequod
  Pequod (Moby-Dick)
  The Pequod is a fictitious 19th century Nantucket whaleship that appears in the 1851 novel Moby-Dick by American author Herman Melville. The Pequod and her crew, commanded by Captain Ahab, are central to the story, which, after the initial chapters, takes place almost entirely aboard the ship...
  
  of Nantucket meets a whaling ship of London named the Samuel Enderby, which has also encountered the White Whale. The Samuel Enderby was a real ship, which was in fact among the three Enderby company ships (the other two were the Fancy and the Brisk) from England that arrived at Port Ross in 1849 carrying the 150 colonists for the new Enderby Settlement. Chapter 101 of Moby Dick discusses Samuel Enderby & Sons whaling company in further detail.