Mutiny on the Bounty

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For the book about the mutiny by Charles Nordhoff and James Norman Hall see Mutiny on the Bounty (novel).

The mutiny on the Bounty was a mutiny aboard a Royal Navy ship on 28 April 1789 which has been made famous by several books, films, and other media such as songs. The mutiny was led by Fletcher Christian against the captain, William Bligh. Bligh was then cast adrift in a small open boat with 18 loyal men.

Contents 1 The Bounty 2 HMS or HMAV? 3 The 1787 breadfruit expedition 4 The mutiny 5 Aftermath of the mutiny 5.1 Bligh's epic voyage 5.2 Mutineers in Tahiti 5.3 Last voyage of the Pandora 5.4 Courtmartial 5.5 Second breadfruit expedition 5.6 Mutineers on Pitcairn Island 6 Crew details 7 The mutiny in literature and cinema 8 Discovery of the wreck of the Bounty 9 Modern Bounty reconstructions 9.1 Bounty II 9.2 Bounty III 10 The Bounty on Postage Stamps 11 See also 12 References 13 Further reading 14 External links 14.1 Films 14.2 Replica vessels

[edit] The Bounty

His Majesty's Armed Vessel (HMAV) Bounty began her career as the collier Bethia, built in 1784 at the Blaydes shipyard near Hull. Later she was purchased by the Royal Navy for £2,600 on May 26, 1787 (JJ Colledge/D Lyon say 23rd May), refit, and renamed Bounty.^[1]

She was a relatively small sailing ship at 215 tons, three-masted and full-rigged.^{[citation needed]} After conversion for the breadfruit expedition, she mounted only four four pounders (2 kg cannon) and ten swivel guns.^{[citation needed]} Thus she was very small in comparison to other three-mast colliers used for similar expeditions: Cook's Endeavour displaced 368 tons and Resolution 462 tons.^{[citation needed]}

General characteristics

Displacement:	215 tons
Length:	91 ft (27.7 m)
Beam:	24 feet (7.3 m)
Complement:	46

The only two men ever to command her as the Bounty were Lieutenant William Bligh and Fletcher Christian, the latter of whom illegally took command through mutiny. Bligh was appointed Commanding Lieutenant of Bounty on 16 August 1787, at the age of 33, after a career that included a tour as sailing master of James Cook's HMS Resolution during Cook's third and final voyage (1776-1779). Though commonly portrayed as the epitome of abusive sailing captains, this portrayal has recently come into dispute.^{[citation needed]} Caroline Alexander, in her book The Bounty, points out that Bligh was relatively lenient compared with other British naval officers.^{[citation needed]} Bligh received the appointment because he was considered an exceptionally capable naval officer—an evaluation that would prove to be correct.^{[citation needed]} He enjoyed the patronage of Sir Joseph Banks, a wealthy botanist and influential figure in Britain at the time.^{[citation needed]} That, and his experience sailing with Cook and familiarity with navigation in the area and local customs, were probably prime factors in his appointment.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] HMS or HMAV?

The Bounty was never referred to as "HMS Bounty" or "HMAV Bounty" while she was afloat. The abbreviation H.M.S. only came into common usage around the 1790s^[2], transforming into the initialism HMS in the twentieth century.

Although she was ship-rigged, and commonly referred to as a ship, in the formal vocabulary of the Admiralty the Bounty was not called a ship because she was unrated. Equally there was no organisation formally called the Admiralty: that name is a colloquialism for "The Commissioners for Executing the Office of Lord High Admiral of Great Britain and Ireland, etc.".

In the transcript^[3] of the 1792 trial of the ten crewmen returned on the Pandora the Bounty is referred to as His Majesty's Ship "Bounty" or His Majesty's Armed Vessel "Bounty" three times each, and twice as His Majesty's Armed Vessel the "Bounty".

In the drawings for the 1787 conversion she is referred to as the "Bounty Armed Transport".

The Contents page of the Bounty's medical book is inscribed "His Britannic Majesty's Ship Bounty: Spithead 29th December 1787"^[4]

The title of William Bligh's 1792 account of the mutiny refers to "His Majesty's Ship the Bounty".

Sir John Barrow's 1831 publication refers to "H.M.S. Bounty".

Academic institutions such as Britain's National Archives ^[5],National Maritime Museum^[6], Royal Naval Museum^[7], and Australia's State Library of New South Wales^[8] generally use "HMS".

A somewhat controversial modern usage is to refer to "The HMS Bounty"^[9][10] which equates to "The His Majesty's Ship Bounty", an example of RAS Syndrome.

[edit] The 1787 breadfruit expedition

The ship had been purchased by the Royal Navy for a single mission in support of an experiment: she was to travel to Tahiti, pick up breadfruit plants, and transport them to the West Indies in hopes that they would grow well there and become a cheap source of food for slaves. The experiment was proposed by Sir Joseph Banks, who recommended Bligh as commander, and was promoted through a prize offered by the Royal Society of Arts.

In June 1787, Bounty was refitted at Deptford. The great cabin was converted to house the potted breadfruit plants, and gratings fitted to the upper deck. Her complement was 46 officers and men.

On 23 December 1787, Bounty sailed from Spithead for Tahiti. For a full month, she attempted to round Cape Horn, but adverse weather blocked her. Bligh ordered her turned about, and proceeded east, rounding the Cape of Good Hope and crossing the width of the Indian Ocean. During the outward voyage, Bligh demoted the ship's Sailing Master, John Fryer, replacing him with Fletcher Christian, whom he appointed acting Lieutenant. This act seriously damaged the relationship between Bligh and Fryer, and Fryer would later claim Bligh's act was entirely personal.

Bounty reached Tahiti on 26 October 1788, after ten months at sea.

Bligh and his crew spent five months in Tahiti, then called "Otaheite", collecting and preparing a total of 1015 breadfruit plants. Bligh allowed the crew to live ashore and care for the potted breadfruit plants, and they became socialized to the customs and culture of the Tahitians. Many of the seamen and some of the "young gentlemen" had themselves tattooed in native fashion. Master's Mate and Acting Lieutenant Fletcher Christian married Maimiti, a Tahitian woman. Other warrant officers and seamen of the Bounty were also said to have formed "connections" with native women.

Bligh was not surprised by his crew's reaction to the Tahitians. He recorded his analysis (spelling and capitalisation is retained as in the original):

The Women are handsome ... and have sufficient delicacy to make them admired and beloved - The chiefs have taken such a liking to our People that they have rather encouraged their stay among them than otherwise, and even made promises of large possessions. Under these and many other attendant circumstances equally desirable it is therefore now not to be Wondered at ... that a Set of Sailors led by Officers and void of connections ... should be governed by such powerful inducement ... to fix themselves in the midst of plenty in the finest Island in the World where they need not labour, and where the alurements of disipation are more than equal to anything that can be conceived.

— A Narrative of the Mutiny, etc., by Lieut. W. Bligh, 1790, p. 9.

Three crewmen deserted and were recaptured (Millward, Muspratt & Churchill). Instead of hanging them, as the crime of desertion was usually punished, Bligh ordered them flogged. All three would be among the mutineers.

[edit] The mutiny

After five months in Tahiti, the Bounty set sail with its breadfruit cargo on 4 April 1789. Some 1300 miles west of Tahiti, near Tonga, mutiny broke out on 28 April 1789. From all accounts, Fletcher Christian and several of his followers entered Bligh's cabin, which he always left unlocked, awakened him, and pushed him on deck wearing only his nightshirt, where he was guarded by Christian holding a bayonet. When Bligh entreated with Christian to be reasonable, Christian would only reply, "I am in hell, I am in hell!" Despite strong words and threats heard on both sides, the ship was taken bloodlessly and apparently without struggle by any of the loyalists except Bligh himself. Of the 42 men on board aside from Bligh and Christian, 18 joined Christian in mutiny, two were passive, and 22 remained loyal to Bligh. The mutineers ordered Bligh, the ship's master, two midshipmen, the surgeon's mate (Ledward), and the ship's clerk into Bounty's launch. Several more men voluntarily joined Bligh rather than remaining aboard, as they knew that those who remained on board would be considered de facto mutineers under the Articles of War.

[edit] Aftermath of the mutiny

[edit] Bligh's epic voyage

In all, 18 of the loyal crew were in the launch with Bligh; the other four were forced to stay and man the ship with the mutineers. The mutiny took place about 30 nautical miles (56 km) from Tofua (Bligh spelled it Tofoa). Bligh and his loyalists attempted to land here (in a cove which they subsequently called "Murderers' Cove") in order to augment their meager provisions. ^[11] The only casualty during this voyage was a crewman, John Norton, who was stoned to death by some natives of Tofua.

In a remarkable feat of seamanship and navigation, Bligh navigated the overcrowded 23 foot (7 m) open launch on an epic 47-day voyage first to Tofua and then to Timor (site of a Portuguese settlement) equipped only with a sextant and a pocket watch, with no charts or compass. He recorded the distance as 3,618 nautical miles (6710 km). He was chased by cannibals in what is now known as Bligh Water, Fiji, and passed through the difficult Torres Strait along the way, and landed in Portuguese Timor on June 14.^[12] Shortly after the launch reached Timor the cook and botanist passed away. Three other crewmen died in the coming months.

Lieutenant Bligh returned to Britain and reported the mutiny to the Admiralty on 15 March 1790. HMS Pandora, under the command of Captain Edward Edwards, was dispatched on 7 November 1790 to search for Bounty and the mutineers. Pandora carried twice the normal complement of crewmen, as it was expected that the extras would man the Bounty when it was recovered from the mutineers.

[edit] Mutineers in Tahiti

Meanwhile, the mutineers sailed for the island of Tubuai, where they tried to settle. After three months of being terrorized by the cannibalistic natives, however, they returned to Tahiti. Sixteen of the mutineers and the four loyalists who had been unable to accompany Bligh remained there, taking their chances that the Royal Navy would find them and bring them to justice.

Two of the mutineers died in Tahiti between 1789 and 1790. Matthew Thompson shot Charles Churchill and was subsequently stoned to death by Churchill's Tahitian family in an act of vendetta.

[edit] Last voyage of the Pandora

Pandora reached Tahiti on 23 March 1791. Four of the men from the Bounty came on board Pandora soon after its arrival, and ten more were arrested in a few weeks. These fourteen, mutineers and loyal crew alike, were imprisoned in a makeshift cell on Pandora's deck, which they derisively called "Pandora's Box".

On 8 May 1791, Pandora left Tahiti, spending about three months visiting islands to the west of Tahiti in search of Bounty and the remaining mutineers, without finding anything except flotsam (including some spars and a yard on Palmerston Island). Heading west through the Torres Strait, Pandora ran aground on a reef (part of the Great Barrier Reef) on 29 August 1791. The ship sank the next day, and 31 of the crew and four of the prisoners (Skinner, Sumner, Stewart and Hillbrandt) were lost. The remaining 89 of the ship's company and ten prisoners (released from their cage at the last moment) assembled in four small launches and sailed for Timor, in a voyage ironically similar to that of Bligh. They arrived at Timor on 16 September 1791.

[edit] Courtmartial

After being repatriated to Britain, the ten surviving prisoners were tried by a naval court. During the trial, great importance was attached to which men had been seen to be holding weapons during the critical moments of the mutiny, as under the Articles of War, failure to act when able to prevent a mutiny was considered no different from being an active mutineer. In the judgment delivered on 18 September 1792, four men whom Bligh had designated as innocent were acquitted. Two were found guilty, but pardoned; one of these was Peter Heywood, who later rose to the rank of captain himself; the second was James Morrison who also continued his naval career and died at sea. Another was reprieved due to a legal technicality, and later also received a pardon. The other three men were convicted and hanged. In other trials, both Bligh and Edwards were court-martialled for the loss of their ships (an automatic proceeding under British naval law, and not indicative of any particular suspicion of guilt). Both were acquitted.

Bligh resumed his naval career and went on to attain the rank of Vice Admiral. However, his career was marked by another challenge to his authority as Governor of New South Wales. In 1808, the troops of New South Wales arrested Bligh in an incident known as the Rum Rebellion.

[edit] Second breadfruit expedition

Even before Edwards had returned from his search for Bounty, HMS Providence and her tender Assistant began a second voyage to collect breadfruit trees on 3 August 1791. This mission was again championed by Joseph Banks and again commanded by Bligh, now promoted from Lieutenant to Captain. On this second voyage they successfully collected 2,126 breadfruit plants and hundreds of other botanical specimens and delivered them to the West Indies. The slaves on Jamaica, however, refused to eat the breadfruit plant, so the main purpose of the expedition was ultimately a failure. Departing Tahiti on 19 July 1792, Bligh once again successfully navigated the Torres Strait.

[edit] Mutineers on Pitcairn Island

Immediately after setting sixteen men ashore in Tahiti in September 1789, Fletcher Christian, eight other crewmen, six Tahitian men, and 11 women, one with a baby, set sail in Bounty hoping to elude the Royal Navy. According to a journal kept by one of Christian's followers, the Tahitians were actually kidnapped when Christian set sail without warning them, the purpose of this being to acquire the women.

The mutineers passed through the Fiji and Cook Islands, but feared that they would be found there. Continuing their quest for a safe haven, on 15 January 1790 they rediscovered Pitcairn Island, which had been misplaced on the Royal Navy's charts. After the decision was made to settle on Pitcairn, livestock and other provisions were removed from the Bounty. To prevent the ship's detection, and anyone's possible escape, the ship was burned on 23 January 1790 in what is now called Bounty Bay. Some of her remains, such as her ballast stones, are still partially visible in its waters. Her rudder is displayed in the Fiji Museum in Suva. An anchor of the Bounty was recovered by Luis Marden in Bounty Bay.

The Pitcairn island community began life with bright prospects. There was ample food, water and land for everyone, and the climate was mild. Although many of the Polynesians were homesick, and the Britons knew they were marooned on Pitcairn forever, they settled into life on Pitcairn fairly quickly. A number of children were born. Fletcher Christian became the established leader of the community, and followed a policy of fairness and moderation toward all. He wanted the Polynesians to have an equal say in community affairs, and was supported in this by several of the Britons. Other mutineers, however, treated the Polynesians as servants, even those of high rank, and attempted to deprive them of land. The natives resented this unfair treatment, which caused relationships between the Britons and the Polynesians to deteriorate. The hostility increased when Jack William's wife died, and one of the Polynesians' consorts was "given" to Williams as a "replacement". Despite Fletcher Christian's efforts to maintain peace, the Polynesian men revolted against their British oppressors.

In 1793, a conflict broke out on Pitcairn Island between the mutineers and the Tahitian men who sailed with them. Four of the mutineers (John Williams, Isaac Martin, John Mills and William Brown) and Fletcher Christian were killed by the Tahitians. All six of the Tahitian men were killed during the on and off fighting, some by the widows of the murdered mutineers and others by each other.

Fletcher Christian was survived by Maimiti and their son Thursday October Christian (originally "Friday October Christian").

Concerning the original Tahitian women: Early on, one died in a fall while gathering eggs from a cliff and another from a respiratory illness (thus precipitating the taking of the Tahitian men's consorts). Later, another woman fell while gathering eggs.

Tabloid rumours persisted that Fletcher left the island and made it back to England. There are other reports that Christian actually committed suicide.

Christian's death caused a leadership vacuum on the island. Two of the four surviving mutineers, Ned Young and John Adams (also known as Alexander Smith), assumed the leadership role, and some peace followed until William McCoy created a still and began brewing an alcoholic beverage from a native plant. The mutineers began drinking excessively and making life miserable for the Pitcairn women.

The women revolted a number of times --with the men continually "granting pardons" (each time threating to execute the next revolt heads) --and some of the women attempted to leave the island on a make shift raft; it swamped in the 'bay'. Life in Pitcairn continued thus until the deaths of McCoy and Quintal, and the destruction of the still.

William McCoy died after a drunken fall. Matthew Quintal was subsequently killed by John Adams and Ned Young after threatening to kill the whole community.

Eventually John Adams and Ned Young were reconciled with the women, and the community began to flourish.

Ned Young succumbed in 1800 to asthma, the first man to die of natural causes.

After Young's death in 1800, Adams assumed the role as leader of the community, and took responsibility for educating its members. Smith started holding regular Sunday services and teaching the Christian religion to the settlement. His gentleness and tolerance enabled the small community to thrive, and peace was restored to Pitcairn Island at last ...one man, nine Tahitian women and dozens of children.

In 1808 the American sailing ship Topaz, commanded by Mayhew Folger, reached Pitcairn Island and discovered the fate of the Bounty mutineers and their companions. Only John Adams, nine women, and some children still lived. From that time on, the Pitcairn Islanders have maintained contact with the outside world. In 1825, John Adams was granted amnesty for his mutiny; Pitcairn's capital, Adamstown, is named for him. On 30 November 1838, the Pitcairn Islands (which include the uninhabited islands of Henderson, Ducie, and Oeno) were incorporated into the British Empire. In 1856 the British government granted Norfolk Island to the Pitcairners for settlement since population growth was rendering their original refuge uninhabitable.

As of 2007, Pitcairn Islands is a British Overseas Territory with a small population of about 50 inhabitants. Bounty Day is celebrated on 23 January by Pitcairn Islanders in commemoration of the 1790 burning of the Bounty, and on 8 June as the national holiday on Norfolk Island to commemorate the 1856 arrival of settlers from Pitcairn Island.

[edit] Crew details

In the 18th century Royal Navy, rank and position onboard ship was defined by a mix of two hierarchies, an official hierarchy of ranks (commissioned officers, warrant officers, petty officers, and seamen) and a conventionally-recognized social divide between gentlemen and non-gentlemen.

At the top of the official rank hierarchy were the commissioned officers — on a larger warship, the commissioned officers included the captain, several lieutenants to command watches, and the officers commanding the Royal Marines on board the ship. The Bounty, however, carried no marines, and no commissioned officers other than Lieutenant Bligh himself, who served as master and commander of the ship. As he was effectively the captain he occupied a private cabin.

Next below the commissioned officers came the warrant officers, such as the sailing master, master's mates, surgeon, boatswain, purser, and gunner, who were as likely to be considered skilled tradesmen as gentlemen. As the senior warrant officers, the sailing master and his mates were entitled to berth with the lieutenants in the wardroom (though in this case there were no lieutenants there); other warrant officers berthed in the gunroom. Like commissioned officers, warrant officers had the right of access to the quarterdeck and were immune from punishment by flogging. They held their warrants directly from the navy, and the captain could not alter their rank. Roman Catholics were allowed to serve as warrant officers, but not as commissioned officers.

Below the warrant officers came the petty officers, who were technically ratings like the seamen. The petty officers included two separate groups: young gentlemen training to be future commissioned officers, often serving as midshipmen or master's mates, and tradesmen working as skilled assistants to the warrant officers. Although the young gentlemen technically were ratings, holding a rank below warrant officers at the mercy of the captain, as aspiring future commissioned officers they were considered socially superior and were often given a watch (with authority over some warrant officers) or a minor command.

Finally, at the bottom of the hierarchical tree, were the seamen, divided into Able Seamen and Ordinary Seamen. Aboard some vessels, an even lower grade existed called Landsman, who were seamen-in-training with very little or no naval skill. Note, however, that the young gentlemen might also be rated as seamen rather than midshipmen on the ship's books, though they were still considered the social superiors of the seamen, petty officers (excluding other young gentlemen), and most warrant officers, and could be given authority over them.

In the immediate wake of the mutiny, all but four of the loyal crew joined Captain Bligh in the long boat for the voyage to Timor, and eventually made it safely back to England unless otherwise noted in the table below. Four were detained against their will on the Bounty for their needed skills and for lack of space on the long boat. The mutineers first returned to Tahiti, where most of the survivors were later captured by the Pandora and taken to England for trial. Nine mutineers continued their flight from the law and eventually settled Pitcairn Island, where all but one died before their fate became known to the outside world.

Crew of the Bounty in 1788-89

Category	Name	Position	Mutiny Status	Notes
Commissioned Officers	Lieutenant William Bligh	Commander
Senior Warrant Officers	John Fryer	Sailing Master	loyal
	Acting Lieutenant Fletcher Christian	Master's Mate	mutinied	to Pitcairn; killed 20 Sep. 1793
	William Elphinstone	Master's Mate	loyal	died in Batavia Oct. 1789
Other Warrant Officers	Thomas Huggan	Surgeon		died in Tahiti 9 Dec. 1788 before mutiny
	William Cole	Boatswain	loyal
	Charles Churchill	Master-at-Arms (Ship's Corporal)	mutinied	to Tahiti; murdered in Tahiti Apr. 1790 prior to trial
	William Peckover	Gunner	loyal
	Joseph Coleman	Armourer	loyal	detained on Bounty against his will; to Tahiti; tried and acquitted
	Peter Linkletter	Quartermaster	loyal	died in Batavia Oct. 1789
	John Norton	Quartermaster	loyal	killed by natives in Tofua 2 May 1789
	Lawrence LeBogue	Sailmaker	loyal
	Henry Hillbrandt	Cooper	mutinied	to Tahiti; drowned in irons during wreck of Pandora 29 Aug. 1791
	William Purcell	Carpenter	loyal
	David Nelson	Botanist (civilian)	loyal	died 20 July 1789 at Coupang
Midshipmen	John Hallett	Midshipman	loyal
	Thomas Hayward	Midshipman	loyal
Midshipmen mustered as Able Seamen	Peter Heywood	Acting Midshipman	loyal	detained against will on Bounty; to Tahiti; sentenced to death, but pardoned; aka Roger Byam in novels by Charles Nordhoff & James Norman Hall
	George Stewart	Acting Midshipman	loyal	detained against will on Bounty; to Tahiti; drowned in irons during wreck of Pandora 29 Aug. 1791
	Robert Tinkler	Midshipman	loyal
	Ned Young	Midshipman	mutinied	to Pitcairn; died 25 Dec. 1800
Petty Officers	James Morrison	Boatswain's Mate	loyal	stayed on Bounty; to Tahiti; sentenced to death, but pardoned
	Thomas Ledward	Surgeon's Mate	loyal	promoted to Surgeon after death of Thomas Huggan; presumed lost at sea in sinking of Welfare 1789
	George Simpson	Quartermaster's Mate	loyal
	John Williams	Armourer's Mate	mutinied	to Pitcairn; killed 20 Sep. 1793
	Thomas McIntosh	Carpenter's Mate	loyal	detained against will on Bounty; to Tahiti; tried and acquitted
	Charles Norman	Carpenter's Mate	loyal	detained against will on Bounty; to Tahiti; tried and acquitted
	John Mills	Gunner's Mate	mutinied	to Pitcairn; killed 20 Sep. 1793
	William Muspratt	Tailor	mutinied	to Tahiti; sentenced to death, but released on appeal and pardoned
	John Smith	Steward	loyal
	Thomas Hall	Cook	loyal
	Richard Skinner	Barber	mutinied	to Tahiti; drowned in irons during wreck of Pandora 29 Aug. 1791
	John Samuel	Clerk	loyal
	William Brown	Botanist's Assistant	mutinied	to Pitcairn; killed 20 Sep. 1793
	Robert Lamb	Butcher	loyal	died at sea 11 Oct. 1789 en route Batavia to Cape Town
Able Seamen	John Adams	Able Seaman	mutinied	to Pitcairn; pardoned 1825, died 1829; aka Alexander Smith
	Thomas Burkitt	Able Seaman	mutinied	to Tahiti; condemned and hanged 29 Oct. 1792 at Spithead
	Michael Byrne	Able Seaman	loyal	detained against will on Bounty; to Tahiti; tried and acquitted
	Thomas Ellison	Able Seaman	mutinied	to Tahiti; condemned and hanged 29 Oct. 1792 at Spithead
	Isaac Martin	Able Seaman	mutinied	to Pitcairn; killed 20 Sep. 1793
	William McCoy	Able Seaman	mutinied	to Pitcairn; committed suicide 1797/98
	John Millward	Able Seaman	mutinied	condemned and hanged 29 Oct. 1792 at Spithead
	Matthew Quintal	Able Seaman	mutinied	to Pitcairn; "executed" 1799 by Adams and Young
	John Sumner	Able Seaman	mutinied	to Tahiti; drowned in irons during wreck of Pandora 29 Aug. 1791
	Matthew Thompson	Able Seaman	mutinied	to Tahiti; murdered Apr. 1790 prior to trial
	James Valentine	Able Seaman		died of scurvy at sea 9 Oct. 1788 prior to mutiny

Crew members' biographical information may be found on the Bounty's Crew Encyclopedia page at the Pitcairn Islands Study Centre (PISC).

[edit] The mutiny in literature and cinema

• Although William Bligh has frequently been portrayed as a middle-aged man in stage and screen productions about the Bounty, he was thirty-four years old at the time of the mutiny, having been born in 1754.

• Mary Russell Mitford wrote her poem 'Christina, the Maid of the south Seas' in 1811, following the 1810 publication of Captain Mayhew Folger's rediscovery of Pitcairn.

• "Pitcairn's Island", A new Melo Dramatic Ballet of Action, opened in Drury Lane in April 1816 following publication in the Naval Chronicle of an account of the 1814 visit to Pitcairn of Captain Sir Thomas Staines, of the Briton, and Captain Philip Pipon, of the Tagus.

• Lord Byron published his poem The Island in 1823.

• Sir John Barrow's 1831 book "The Eventful History of the Mutiny and Piratical Seizure of H.M.S. Bounty: Its Cause and Consequences" ensured the enduring fame of the Bounty and her people.

• A trilogy of novels (Mutiny on the "Bounty" (1932), Men Against the Sea, and Pitcairn's Island) by Charles Nordhoff and James Norman Hall (also published in one volume as The Bounty Trilogy), as well as the movies and television shows based on them, relate fictionalized versions of the mutiny.

• A first movie was made in Australia in 1916.

• The second movie version was the Australian film In the Wake of the Bounty (1933), starring Errol Flynn as Fletcher Christian. The next movie was Mutiny on the Bounty (1935), which won the Oscar for Best Picture that year. It starred Charles Laughton as Bligh and Clark Gable as Christian.

• Another Mutiny on the Bounty was released in 1962, starring Trevor Howard as Bligh and Marlon Brando as Christian. (This version was considered definitive for at least a generation.) The 1962 movie has Fletcher Christian dying from injuries sustained in the fire aboard Bounty.

• Bengt Danielsson, a Kon-Tiki crew member, wrote What Happened on the Bounty in 1962.

• A fifth film, The Bounty (1984), starred Anthony Hopkins as William Bligh and Mel Gibson as Fletcher Christian.

• The Simpsons portrayed the "Mutiny on the Bounty" story in the episode "The Wettest Stories Ever Told".

• In Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, Admiral James T. Kirk and the crew of the late Starship Enterprise decide to return to Earth to face a court martial for having stolen the Enterprise to rescue their friend Captain Spock. They return to earth in a captured Klingon Bird-Of-Prey, which Leonard McCoy re-names HMS Bounty.

• Val McDermid explores the fate of Fletcher Christian in her novel The Grave Tattoo.

• Rasputina wrote a song about the fate of the mutineers called "Choose Me For Champion", and one about Fletcher Christian called "Cage In a Cave".

[edit] Discovery of the wreck of the Bounty

Luis Marden discovered the remains of the Bounty in January 1957. After spotting a rudder from this ship in a museum on Fiji, he persuaded his editors and writers to let him dive off Pitcairn Island, where the rudder had been found. Despite the warnings of one islander -"Man, you gwen be dead as a hatchet!" ^[13] — Marden dove for several days in the dangerous swells near the island, and found the remains of the fabled ship. He subsequently met with Marlon Brando to counsel him on his role as Fletcher Christian in the 1962 film Mutiny on the Bounty. Later in life, Marden wore cuff links made of nails from the Bounty.

[edit] Modern Bounty reconstructions

When the 1935 film was made, sailing vessels were still in wide use: existing vessels were adapted to play Bounty and Pandora.

[edit] Bounty II

The Royal Navy's Bounty has been reconstructed twice. MGM commissioned a replica of Bounty for their 1962 film, named the Bounty II. This vessel was built to the original plans and in the traditional manner in a shipyard in Lunenburg, Nova Scotia. However, all the dimensions were increased by approximately one third to accommodate the large 70 mm cameras used. MGM kept this vessel in service. When Ted Turner bought MGM he used this vessel for entertaining. Eventually MGM donated the vessel to a charity.

Although lack of expensive maintenance caused the vessel to lose her United States Coast Guard license for a time, Tall Ship Bounty was restored, initially at the Boothbay Harbor Shipyard in 2002, with restoration of the vessel's bottom planking. Moored in its winter home in St. Petersburg, Florida, it again became available for charter, excursions, sail-training, and movies (most recently in Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End,.^[14] and the adult film Pirates). In April 2006, the Bounty again arrived in Boothbay Harbor for further renovation, a refurbishing of the ship's front end, and topside decking. Following this renovation, the Bounty is scheduled to repeat the famous voyage of the original Bounty ^[15]

On 9 August 2007, the Bounty made an unscheduled stop at Derry, Northern Ireland. The ship has just completed a $3m restoration and is making a seven week UK tour prior to embarking on a world tour via South Africa and New Zealand to Pitcairn and Tahiti. The UK tour begins with her arrival at the birthplace of mutiny leader Fletcher Christian in Maryport, Cumbria, at midday on Tuesday 14 August 2007. The ship was about three days ahead of schedule which is why it sought out Derry for a 'quiet' stopover before completing the journey to Maryport. ^[16] On 23 August 2007 the ship docked in Torquay, Devon, for several days.

[edit] Bounty III

The second Bounty replica, named "H.M.A.V. Bounty", and informally known as "Bounty III", was built in New Zealand in 1979 and used in the 1984 Dino De Laurentiis film The Bounty. The hull is constructed of welded steel oversheathed with timber. For many years she served the tourist excursion market from Darling Harbour, Sydney, Australia, before being sold to HKR International Limited in October 2007. She is now a tourist attraction at Discovery Bay, on Lantau Island in Hong Kong, and has an additional Chinese name “Chi Ming”.

[edit] The Bounty on Postage Stamps

Pitcairn Island's first postage stamps were issued on 15 October 1940^[17] with a portrait of the ship entitled "H.M. Armed Vessel Bounty" on the 6d stamp.

The third definitive issue of 1964 depicted "H.M. Armed Vessel Bounty" on the 1d denomination, changed to 1 cent in 1967.

In 1976 Bounty was shown as "H.M.S. Bounty" on the 10c stamp.

Bicentenary Sheetlets and first day covers were issued in 1990 depicting Bounty as "HMAV Bounty".

In 2004 a set of stamps and first day covers were issued to celebrate "HMAV Bounty" the 1979 replica then based in Sydney.

In 2007 a set of stamps and first day covers were issued to celebrate "HMS Bounty" the 1962 USA based replica.

[edit] See also

• Ship replica (including a list of replicas)
• HMS Hermione (1782) Scene of a far more bloody mutiny in 1797
• Descendants of the Bounty Mutineers

[edit] References

[edit] Further reading

• A Voyage to the South Sea, undertaken by command of His Majesty, for the purpose of conveying the bread-fruit tree to the West Indies, in His Majesty's Ship the Bounty, commanded by Lieutenant William Bligh. by William Bligh, 1792, from Project Gutenberg. Bligh's own account of the mutiny
• The Eventful History of the Mutiny and Piratical Seizure of H.M.S. Bounty: Its Cause and Consequences by Sir John Barrow, published in 1831, from Project Gutenberg
• Mutiny on the Bounty - An English Graphical Bibliography
• Mutiny on the Bounty Text of original narratives, journals, documents, letters, and court martial transcripts.
• A Bounty of Science
• HMS Pandora (at the Museum of Tropical Queensland web site)
• A Brief History Of Mutiny by Richard Woodman (London: Constable & Robinson Ltd., 2005)
• History of Pitcairn
• Pitcairn Island Study Center
• William Bligh, "The Bounty Mutiny: Captain William Bligh's Firsthand Account of the Last Voyage of HMS Bounty". St Petersburg, Florida, Red and Black Publishers, 2008, ISBN 978-1-934941-06-5

[edit] External links

[edit] Films

• The Mutiny of the Bounty (1916) at the Internet Movie Database
• In the Wake of the Bounty (1933) at the Internet Movie Database
• Mutiny On The Bounty (1935) at Filmsite.org
• Mutiny On The Bounty (1935) at the Internet Movie Database
• Mutiny On The Bounty (1962) at the Internet Movie Database
• The Bounty (1984) at the Internet Movie Database

[edit] Replica vessels

• Ships used in the 1935 film
• The replica of HMS Bounty built for the 1962 MGM movie
• The Bounty built for the 1984 Mel Gibson/Anthony Hopkins Movie