Sir Richard Whitbourne (1561 – 1635) was an English colonist, mariner and writer. Richard Whitbourne was born near Bishopsteignton in south Devon, England, where he was baptised on 20 June 1561. Whilst apprenticed to a merchant adventurer of Southampton, he sailed extensively around Europe and twice to Newfoundland. He served in a ship of his own against the Great Armada under Lord Admiral Thomas Howard, 1st Earl of Suffolk. He spent the next thirty years in cod fishing off Newfoundland. He assisted the pirates Peter Easton and Henry Mainwaring to seek pardons from James I of England.