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In an article in the Pitcairn Island Study Group (USA) Log (Jan-March 2005), I suggested that an alleged portraiture of `Captain Bligh' be removed from Paul Lareau's `Mutiny on the Bounty' web site because it was not one of the authenticated `faces' of my ancestor Vice-Admiral William Bligh, R.N., F.R.S., (1754-1817).
Notwithstanding, it had been used to head an old article by Dr. Herb Ford of the Pitcairn Island Study Center`. Re: [`The Mutiny's Cause -- A New Analysis'] published some years ago in the PISG Log. This had not gone unchallenged for implying that heavy drinking by Captain Bligh may have been the cause of all the trouble aboard the Bounty.
As I recall, Dr. Sven Wahlroos (not exactly a `Bligh supporter') was irate and scathing in his follow-up article which hammered Herb Ford's analysis for it's lack of historically proven facts and opinions posing as facts. Likewise, I had my say in the PISG Log, inducing a gentlemanly, partly contrite published response from Herb Ford; insofar overstepping the boundaries between fact and imagination.
This led me to believe, perhaps foolishly, that the mischievous analysis was indeed "dead in the water". But recently, I discovered it had been brought back to life on the web, illustrated with a phoney "Captain Bligh" portrait.
Although Paul Lareau has promptly removed the offending portrait, the Herb Ford article (again) stands unchallenged, and it's all back to square one --from my point of view.
It was interesting to read Paul Lareau's web comments about how Herb Ford had made it "QUITE CLEAR that he was expressing an opinion, and an admittedly somewhat unexplored theory contrary to more frequently prevalent opinions of Bligh and his crew..."
In re-reading the "analysis", and unless I've gone blind, I cannot see one instance where Herb Ford states in so many words, "Oh, by the way, this is only my opinion, not necessarily fact.
To begin with, he refers to "HMS Bounty". I understand that he is still reluctant to except what anyone can verify from official archive documents held at the Public Record Office, Kew, England: - that Bligh's ship was called His Majesty's Armed Vessel or HMAV Bounty.
[Explanation: - the 18th Century British Royal Navy only granted ships with the prefix HMS for "His Majesty's Ship" when ranked Captains took command. When ranked lieutenants (pronounced as lieu, not "left") and/or ranked Commanders became "captain" their ships bore other titles. Example: - Captain (lieutenant) Cook's ship was His Majesty's Bark Endeavour.]
However, when Herb Ford states: - "In terms of mutinies", (the Bounty) "was not exceptional", one needs to know if that is a fact, or just an opinion?
You see, firstly, there's a bit of a problem with the so-called "mutiny" itself. For by dictionary definition a mutiny is the military equivalent to a civilian Strike. And without going into volumes, suffice to say that the hijacking of the Bounty (under Georgian Articles of War, article #15) was officially described as a `piratical seizure'. Those who were eventually tried and convicted in a Court of Law, were described as "pirates" or "piratical villains". [Re: PRO `Minutes of the Court Martial']
Secondly, bearing in mind that no other 18th century British Royal Navy expeditionary ship was taken intact in the South Seas by a handful of volunteer officers and seamen who cold-bloodedly cast almost half the ship's crew adrift to what appeared to be certain death, etc, etc; surely the word `unique' has to go someway towards assessing the Bounty's capture as exceptional?
As to the question of why Fletcher Christian's minority gang of "armed ruffians" was determined to steal the ship and practically everything in her, there is none so blind who cannot see the always obvious truths revealed in the pirates' actions, not words. And if bank-robbers don't need any excuses or justifications for being the money-motivated thieves that they are, why should sea-going opportunists-come -pirates?
Where Herb Ford concludes, that the mutiny could have been triggered by "strong drink" which "may well have been Bligh's weakness in his Bounty days", I have to repeat: - Herb, there is not a shred of historic evidence to support this submission.
On the other hand, while the captain enjoyed his evening glass, or two, of Madeira wine, there is plenty of evidence to prove that he could not have been a drunkard to have performed his many duties, when on duty. Besides, should it not be a case of someone needing to prove a theory, rather than someone else being required to disprove an unproven theory? While even unproven accusations sling mud, which sticks.
As for the pirates, Hollywood's heroes, of course they could have left documents or written home about their motives, or about any accusations or grievances for the sake of posterity to determine what was in their minds at the time. But they didn't because they chose not to. On the contrary, they destroyed any incriminating documents to cover their tracks, and didn't care a hoot when setting out like gun-toting millionaires on a leisurely nine month-long, drunken and/or drug abetted cruise around the South Pacific, leaving in their wake a trail of kidnap, rape, and bloodshed.
For instance, there `s the little-mentioned and never Hollywood movie re-enacted episode regarding the slaughter of over 60 Polynesian men, women and children on the island of Tubuai; the result of a revenge attack by the pirates. Also the callous murder of a friendly native canoeist who greeted the Bounty off the beautiful lagoon-rimmed shores of Rarotonga, Cook Islands, only to be shot dead for no reason. All this, long before reaching Pitcairn Island where the legendary "mutineers" then began murdering each other.
The sole-surviving Bounty former crewmember turned pirate; turned born-again Christian; turned saviour of Pitcairn's embryo community, Able Seaman John ("Reckless Jack") Adams, alias Alexander Smith, was the man who finally revealed his reason for the "mutiny" -- that never was.
In an interview with a visiting ship's captain, Adams stated that he for one never had any real pique against Captain Bligh, and that often in succeeding years, he said, tears were shed on Pitcairn when Bligh's name was mentioned. Most poignantly, Adams stated that he and the others did what they did because "we only wanted to return to our loved ones on Otaheite" (Tahiti).
Having lived in the South Pacific, this is something I can relate to and understand. This is a common, simple truth generations of mariners and visitors who have fallen in love with "paradise" can confirm. Indeed, it was what Captain Bligh always assumed to be the cause of the Bounty's misfortune and loss: - that Christian and his cohorts had `assured themselves of a better life among the Otaheitians' (than they would otherwise have on returning to England). But no, no, no, say the novelists on the opposite side of the world, there has to be more in it than that!
May I hasten to add that in reiterating these sometimes hard-to-bear facts of history when first visiting my now friends on Pitcairn Island in 1971, and other descendants in other parts of the South Pacific, it was in a spirit of goodwill and reconciliation that I aimed to induce a better understanding of what our common heritage was. My mission was to bring about an awareness of the differences between the legend the Pitcairners were living -- courtesy of the outside world -- and the realities leading to their existence.
Over succeeding decades, many of them have excepted that Christian never hated Bligh, and that the real 32 year-old captain was nothing like the Hollywood character(s) who captained the celluloid Bounty(s).
That aboard the real Bounty, no-one was ever flogged or keel-hauled to death, or made to climb to the topmast for a drinking ladle, then down again just for a mouthful of water under a burning tropical sun. But millions around the world are still seeing and believing this tripe as the movies (all based on novels) continue to be shown on television.
If I may say so without being accused of "prejudice," the Pitcairn Islanders are fundamentally good people, despite some individuals bringing about recent adverse publicity. And I hope that their future generations will understand why I believe that no descendants of famous/infamous forebears, should ever be bullied or made to feel responsible for what their ancestors did or did not do, centuries ago. For certain, I would never wish upon them what most Bligh family members have had to endure for many years.
As for those novelists or "I'll find another angle" type academics who have perpetrated and perpetuated so many myths, perhaps I may be forgiven for showing no quarter. For no Hollywood moviemaker; no television producer or hack writer has any so-called `poetic license' or God-given right to `rewrite' somebody else's history, and by doing so, rob them of their true heritage, whatever it is, for the sake of "entertainment".
Yet for various reasons and whenever the Hollywood `Mutiny on the Bounty' brainwashed brigade see some of their myths blown sky-high by the facts of history, they scurry to find another mendacious stick to beat Captain Bligh's character back into the realms of pulp fiction.
They really hate having to concede that among his many talents as a professional, he was an accredited scientist as a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS) -- an elite British institution consisting of "top men" in their fields of expertise. That he was one of the most caring and successful expeditionary ships' captains, also a battle-honored hero, along side Cook and Nelson respectively.
But in their eyes where Bligh is concerned, it is not enough that he was only human after all. He made no secret about having a temper, like Captain Cook, like Nelson, like Jesus Christ. But who hasn't got a temper? Yet he never beat up his wife and children. He never fought in any duels --like many an egoist "gentlemen" among his contemporaries -- and he never killed anyone in cold blood. He smoked an occasional clay pipe of tobacco, and sipped on glasses of good wine. But he never became an alcoholic or a drug-abuser hooked on opium, like millions then, and today. And because he upheld the traditions of his family as Royalists in the service of King George III, (among Bligh's cousins was a knight and a Lord} he was to be made a scapegoat for all the ills of his era. He was to be targeted and his character assassinated, as if a blue-coated version of those 18th Century Redcoats so hated by American revolutionists.
Above all, David, what they want you to forget is that this much-maligned man William Bligh, was in the same boat literally and figuratively as your ancestor, the Bounty's faithful Doctor Thomas Denman Ledward. What they shared in common --among those who suffered as castaways in the Bounty's longboat, plus those held as aboard ship as prisoners -- was that they were all VICTIMS of "one of the most atrocious acts of piracy ever committed". [Bligh's Log].
Perhaps one day when that 20th century-born tyrant called `Political Correctness' is exposed and defeated as the scouge of Society it has become, victims will no longer be perceived as criminals, and criminals as victims.