I've just begun research on John Taylor and would appreciate some help from anybody who may have some clue as to his ancestry.

I have been told, John was a runaway slave who made his way to Nantucket around the 1850s He took a job on one of the Whalers which made it's way to Bass Strait between Tasmania and Victoria, Australia. John Taylor must have made quite a bit of money at the job because he settled in Port Fairy and built a very grand hotel named 'The Star of the West' in 1856, which still stands today.
He married and his decendants continued to run the hotel and live in the Port Fairy district. From oral history I have heard that John Taylor never complained about his time on the vessel and was paid the same money as a white man and treated fairly by his captain. In Port Fairy he was very well liked and respected. That's about all I do know, and so it seems, does anybody else know.

I know about Nantucket,the whalers, the runaway slaves and Port Fairy and the Whaling industry. It's just John Taylor I'm interested in.