Francis Light

Captain Francis Light
The statue of Captain Sir Francis Light at Penang, Malaysia
Born	1740 Dallinghoo, Suffolk, England, Britain
Died	25 October 1794 (1794-10-26) (aged 54) Penang, Malaya
Occupation	Colonial Official
Known for	Founding Penang

Captain Francis Light (1740 – 25 October 1794) was the founder of the British colony of Penang (in modern-day Malaysia) and its capital George Town in 1786.

Light was baptised in Dallinghoo, Suffolk, England on 15 December 1740. His mother was given as Mary Light, though his father preferred to remain anonymous. Taken in by a relative, the nobleman William Negus, after schooling at elementary school with the Negus children, he began an early apprenticeship with a naval surgeon. Researchers initially believed Light to be the illegitimate son of William Negus, but according to Noël Francis Light Purdon, the 6-times great-grandson of Francis Light, Negus received payment for looking after him and acting as his guardian throughout his education.

From 1759 to 1763, Light served as a Royal Navy midshipman. He left to seek his fortune in the colonies, and from 1765 worked as a private country trader.

Light's interest in Penang began in 1771, when he proposed the idea of a British settlement in the neighbourhood of the Malay Peninsular to Warren Hastings, the East India Company's Governor of the Presidency of Fort William. He suggested that the island of Penang might serve as a "convenient magazine for the Eastern trade" but at that time his idea gained no ground.

For about ten years he had his headquarters in Salang, where he revived a failed French trading post. While in Salang he learned to speak and write several languages, including Malay and Thai. In 1785, he warned the Siamese on Phuket Island of an imminent Burmese attack. Light's warning enabled the islanders to prepare for Phuket's defence and subsequently repel the Burmese invasion.