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William Bligh was gravely ill in the early stages of his second breadfruit voyage, 1791-93, with HM ships Providence and Assistant. He was frequently incapacitated and bedridden during the following two years. It is my contention that this illness not only prevented his skills & abilities from leading the voyage throughout much of its time, but also spared his officers and men from the coarser aspects of his personality; his overbearing self-confidence and self-righteousness, his denigration of others for his own security and self-esteem, and his insensitivity to the problems and feelings of others. Bligh's character was flawed in a way that his abilities as a navigator and sailor were not.
The commander of the escort, Assistant, was brought over to Providence a month into the voyage when it seemed possible Bligh might not survive a relapse of malaria (caught in Batavia after his historic open boat voyage following the Bounty mutiny), heatstroke and what we now call executive stress.
In the hands of competent subordinates the expedition moved smoothly along without the confusion and disruption Bligh's rages caused on Bounty. A larger crew, two ships, marines and lieutenants under him made all the difference. The rages were fewer & the illness kept Bligh away from the men long enough for the voyage to succeed.
Ian Campbell, Ichi-Ban Research Inc, P.O.Box 296 Kings Meadows 7249 Tasmania; 20 June 1995.
Picture: The author, on Norfolk Island (1995), with the Bounty's Kettle. (photo credit: Bevan Nicolai)
After the Bounty adventure & the Court martial that followed, William Bligh was given a chance to redeem himself. He was made leader of a second voyage to transport Breadfruit from Tahiti to Jamaica, promoted to Captain, given Marines for protection & Lieutenants under him; & chose two ships sufficient for his needs--a brand-new WestIndiaman with a Brig as escort. With rank & experience he now had the vested authority to get all he felt necessary for the expedition (Mackaness 1951, Kennedy 1978, 1989). For all his historical ambiguity, Bligh was perhaps the only man for the job as Cook's protege & successor. Quite apart from his role on Resolution after Cook's death, his skill sailing Bounty & feeding its crew, & the extraordinary survival of the Bounty's launch proved this beyond doubt. His navigation & hydrography were sublime, his experience of diet & health second to none (Hough 1979). Now, however, Bounty had shown that Bligh gravely lacked people management skills (Bach 1967 p.29). He was egoistic, self-assured, & insecure. He had no empathy--seamen were children needing constant guidance & supervision. "Much of Bligh's frustration came down to his perception that men did not apply the only system of management that got things done properly." (Kennedy 1989 p.192) Initiative & experience in others was scorned at best & assaulted at worst. He had a hot temper mitigated only by brevity--his temper exploded and blew away on the wind; he could not cope with stress & lashed out to relieve it-& became calm as a result. Once Providence's officers realised this, much of his abuse was disarmed.
Bligh may have been the only man for the job--others with the experience and authority were dead or unavailable. He was, however, not a well man. He had endured a 3000nm open boat voyage with meagre supplies, driven by hatred of Christian and determination to survive. He contracted a mild case of malaria at Batavia in the Dutch.E.Indies after the launch voyage, and endured a long sea passage home after that (Mackeness 1951, Kennedy 1978 et al). There is evidence to show he suffered generally from what we now call executive stress ; he was not able to cope with the strain of command for long periods in a closed environment. There are many instances of inability to deal with his temperament and his inconsistent treatment of those he commanded (Christian 1983, Daniellssen 1962, Darby 1965, etc). On Resolution, Bounty, and on Providence men did not measure up to Bligh and he knew it--and he made it clear. Bligh had what I call a pressure-cooker personality. He could not relieve tension as other men did through exercise, or simply through wine, women and song. Without an outlet tension festered within him until it found a way out. He would explode over a minor incident, often shocking men by his eloquence but moreso by his severity, and then be perfectly contented with the ship and crew (Tobin, letter, 1817 in Mackeness 1949).
Instead of punishing seamen with lashes and confinement he attacked them and their officers verbally. This was "a fairly innocuous way of letting off steam compared to some open to an 18th century sea captain ." (Darby 1965) but not without its risks. As Dening showed (1988, 1992) it was Assaultative, not merely 'bad'. On Bounty it was at its worst. A small ship, no officers, and a close friend and deputy who could not take it, led to history's most memorable, if not significant, mutiny. On Providence the officers learned, and took care to deal with problems before Bligh found them (Darby 1965)--a situation made easier by Bligh's frequent absences due to illness. Bligh's inconsistency still made life difficult; reaction and punishment depended on mood. If bursting with tension, he could become apoplectic over the loss of a grapnel-or a coconut-while in the Barrier Reef "Lookouts found making hats and reading plays" got merely a line in the log (entry, 17 Sep.1792)., not the trial and flogging seamen expected-preferred?-instead. A dogstopper left on an anchor cable that almost lost the ship was verbally reprimanded (16 Sep.1792) where other men would have court martialled.
His early career had been marked by taciturn periods, distance from other officers, a superiority complex, explosive rages over matters more often small than great. He was not a man who communicated well with other men or understood them--at all. On Resolution with Cook he had learned a style of command unsuited to his temperament and body language. Unlike Cook he was short, pale, delicate; effeminate-looking. His blistering rages looked silly rather than awesome. "He was always throwing away any dignity he had--a little man in a rage." (Beaglehole 1967 p.22) Bad relations with the other officers aboard meant he was the only officer not rewarded with promotion when they returned in 1780. Even the master of the other ship, Discovery, Nathaniel Portlock, was given a commission and sent to the North-West coast of America. In 1791 he would accompany Bligh in Assistant.
Within three weeks of setting out on this second breadfruit voyage Bligh was crippled by stress and illness in the Canary Islands. His health had not broken on the trip home from the open boat voyage, nor in the months of writing and lobbying in London. It had not broken till the beginning of this voyage, when it was too late to replace him--and now he thought himself "near to death" (Dening 1992 p.10) Paralysed by "A severe fever, of a very putrid tendency"--malaria and a migraine--he had the commander of the escort vessel the Assistant, Nathaniel Portlock, his old friend, brought over to command Providence for Bligh was "unsure how long I might survive". (log, 31 Aug.1791). The two ships departed South two days later with Bligh still bedridden, where he would remain almost until CapeTown two months later. They paused overnight at the Cape Verde Islands, searching for somewhere Bligh could rest ashore, but heat and disease there drove them on. Bond, Bligh's relation and the first Lieutenant of Providence, viewed his transfer to Assistant at Teneriffe "with profound relief" despite the loss of contact with his messmates (loss of them was made up for by the loss of contact with Bligh). His return to Providence at CapeTown upon Bligh's near-recovery was "attended with frightful discomfort." (Christian 1982 p.188). Bligh's relationships on this voyage were no smoother than on earlier ones; only the men, and their capacity to absorb abuse, had changed. Bond, unlike Christian, stood up to Bligh, and had other officers to share the strain, as well as not being so close to him (Mackaness 1960 p.23-7).
Bligh's condition varied from headaches and exhaustion to raging fever as the malaria and stress hormones fought it out. It is now commonly known that stress and environment have a considerable effect on capability and health. Stress can suppress the immune response and lead to infection (Lazarus, R, 1981) It is also known that disease can recur months or even years after first infection and cause permanent damage. Stress and illness result not so much from what or how we are doing but from how we perceive it (Weiten 1991). Bligh felt alone and surrounded by incompetents, and overreacted to everything. For the first time in his life stress was being directed inwards rather than outwards. His personality problems; intolerance and an inability to relieve tension, had become medicalised--somaticised--they were no longer merely emotional and psychological. At CapeTown he went inland briefly, and though the fever was gone the migraine remained--and would intermittently for the rest of his life.
Across the Indian Ocean, to the Pacific and on to Tahiti migraine afflicted him continually, save for the pause in Tasmania. Strain twisted the muscles on one side of his face (log, 14 Mar.1792) . In Tahiti and other hot humid places he was struck again and again, leaving Portlock and the other officers to run the operation; their way, not his. Migraine attended all his dealings with the Tahitians, even forcing him to go ashore at evening to bathe in the cool of a river (log, May 1792). Migraine and stress followed Bligh through the central Pacific, left him for the vital Barrier Reef passage, but returned again in Torres Strait and at Koupang. At this very unhealthy port, he was no worse or better though he only lost one man to sickness there (log, 6 Nov.1792). Worry about the declining health of the breadfruit harried Bligh again at sea in the long passage via St.Helena to the Caribbean.
In Jamaica he was so ill that the surgeon, Edward Harwood, confined him ashore. Only in the Atlantic on the final leg did he recover. Far from being better by CapeTown on the way to Tahiti as some authors make it seem, his illness lasted the voyage, and beyond.
The illness' effects were deep. Not only incapacitating Bligh for short periods so the officers had to act for him (which given his insecurity must have been very hard to accept), this also meant Bligh was even further apart from the crew on this larger ship, with its officer corps and clearly-defined structure. Unlike Bounty's hodgepodge where everyone knew each other too well, it lessened the damage he could do. Only the officers really experienced this and only when Bligh was well. When he wasn't, the rage and stress (and the migraine it caused) felled him immediately. Though the officers took considerable abuse (some deserved), they did not break as Christian had. Significantly, the breakdown ocurred very early in the voyage, and it was singular. His preparations and planning meant there was an officer corps to act for him, and officers and crew could adjust to an ill captain as well as an intemperate and inconsistent one. On Bounty there had been a general collapse of morale and discipline at Tahiti which affected everyone. On Providence only Bligh broke; on Bounty everyone did a little, and it was too late for them to adjust once Fletcher's crisis appeared.
From the officers comes information about Bligh's condition and personality. Aware of the adverse publicity around Bounty , these men did not say anything on their return. They depended on Bligh for promotion and references and had joined the ship anticipating it, given the fame and fortune associated with such voyages since Drake (Tobin, in Mackaness 1960 p.80). There was to be little on their return, largely due to the revenge of the Christian and Heywood families. The officers of Providence and Assistant confined thoughts and feelings to letters and notes and I have drawn heavily upon these, showing as they do Bligh away from the historic events of Bounty and the Rum Rebellion. This is what he was like usually, normally.
The lieutenant of marines, a distant relation of Bligh's called Thomas Pearce left only this: "From Bligh's odious behaviour during the voyage he would as soon shoot him, as one would a dog, had it not been for the law. " (Christian 1982 p.178-9) George Tobin, 3rd Lt, said (in 1817) "there was no settled system of tyranny exercised by him to produce dissatisfaction. It was in those violent tornados of temper that he lost himself, yet, when all went well could a man be more placid and interesting ... once or twice I felt the unbridled licence of his power of speech yet never without receiving an emolient plaister to heal the wound. " (Tobin to Bond in Mackeness 1949 p.33) Bond, 1st Lt of Providence and Bligh's step-nephew, went further: "the very high opinion he has of himself makes him hold every one of our profession with contempt, perhaps envy. Nay, the Navy is but a sphere for fops and lubbers to swarm in without one gem to vie in brilliancy to himself." (Mackaness 1976 p.69) "From particular traits in his conduct believed him insane at times."
Bligh was guilty of "a dictatorial insistence on trifles, everlasting fault-finding, slights in matters of common courtesy, passionate condemnation of little errors of judgement...being really unconcious of the amount of provocation he had given ... in good times all arrogance and insult and in real danger a change to cordiality and kindness." (Christian 1982 p.179) Bligh said he suffered from "ebullition of the mind" (agitation of boiling water or lava) "when faced with" what he considered "dereliction of duty." "This convulsed his body as well as his tongue" (Dening 1992 p.60). Providence's officers show he 'ebullited' away quite frequently--but they "clewed up many passing squalls in time" and thus avoided many (Tobin journal 1792). Bond unlike Christian knew "notwithstanding his passion is partly to be attributed to a nervous fever he has been attacked by the greater part of the voyage, the chief part of his conduct must have arisen from the fury of an ungovernable temper." He knew much of the abuse was due to Bligh's illness and the rest to stress, and the officers could counteract much of it.
Bligh was a man who suffered from incredible self-assurance and ego. He believed he was always right and increasingly later in life that he could never be wrong (Beaglehole 1967 p.24). He viewed dissent as incompetence or malice and argument as attack on his very being. He had to be first-and seen and respected as such in all things, wherever he went. "Every order challenged his authority and changed the landscape of his quarterdeck." (Dening 1992 p.60-1). Worse, he could not keep his opinions to himself and frequently embarrassed with his open and egotistical denunciations of other men merely because they did not operate the way he did. Better men than Edwards of Pandora were labelled incompetent or old-fashioned and stupid by Bligh, though not always without reason. Cook and Bligh both railed against the intransigence and conservatism of captains and Admiralty which continued the provisioning of ships with salt food and rotten water despite proof that sauerkraut and cleanliness prevented most sea ailments (as against those caught in port) and kept crews alive with minimum effort.
On his ships, and Providence as much as any, everything had to be done Bligh's way. He flew into rages against junior officers who worked without express orders or used their initiative. "Every dogma of power and consequence has been taken from the Lieutenants in order to establish his reputation." (Bond to brother Thomas in Mackeness 1960 p.71) He never learned to delegate without trying to oversee and manage everything; he never trusted his subordinates with the intelligence and skill he valued in himself and expected of them; he could never admit he was wrong; and he never kept to himself criticism of other men. In short, Bligh learned to sail and navigate and chart, and learned to feed and support his men. But he never learned to command. He was insensitive to the feelings and ideas of others to an astonishing degree, and he never, ever, became aware of it. This, more than anything, led to his fall by small slips from the apogee of the Providence voyage, leading a convoy home. "After Providence he made no more discoveries, save of his limitations-and of those he was always incredulous." (Beaglehole 1967 p.11) Illness and stress made Bligh do and say things he never would have on land or when well, beyond the bounds of criticism and insult. Insensitivity meant he didn't realise how much harm and upset he caused--and conceit made him think he was right anyway. He never came down with a bump; life merely reinforced his faith in himself and his mistrust of others which made him lash out under stress.
He waited long for another command, fought twice under Nelson, but was not safe enough to become one of Nelson's chosen few. He lost a ship at the Nore mutiny and was courtmartialled for abuse in 1804. The governorship of N.S.W. was no promotion at all, it was part of the deal that got him off the courtmartial with a warning; and it got him away from the Admiralty where his ideas and invective could do less harm (Mackeness 1951, Kennedy 1989 et al). On the way to and at N.S.W. his character and attitude rubbed men up the wrong way (his ship was fired on by the convoy commodore for attempting to lead the convoy himself! and he ruined the man afterwards (Humble 1976 p.187). Though he was supported by the populace, the Rum Corps ousted him and were never adequately punished. He eventually made Rear and then Vice-Admiral, though he did not sail as such. Beyond a certain point promotion did not depend on achievement, and his early success and Sir Joseph Banks' influence guarded him from the harsher consequences of his words and actions.
Bligh's temperament and illness on this voyage have always been known to historians, but overlooked and undervalued. Writers have viewed the illness within the context of his whole life rather than from Bligh's perspective. He is ill but recovers quickly; effect and duration, and the relationship between fever, stress-migraine, and personality has not been explored. Clearly they were related, and were present throughout the trip and for years after. Stress and illness nearly killed Bligh, forced his officers to lead the voyage and act for Bligh even more than they would normally. His behaviour was much the same as before and after, Bond showed its causes were apparent, and its effects could be limited. Bligh had become manageable. His forethought and preparations of men, ships and organisation had preserved the operation in a way the pennypinching before Bounty could not. The ships sailed on, the officers ran the operation when Bligh could not, his experience and skills were still available; the Breadfruit were gathered, tended, and delivered. Despite Bligh's physical and emotional troubles the voyage succeeded--and was forgotten. Stress, insecurity, and illness caused his actions and reactions not only on Providence but before and after, and therefore the causes of the Bounty mutiny and the Rum Rebellion are much clearer. He is partly responsible for all that happened; both good and bad, neither wholly one or the other. The time for assigning singular blame and responsibility is long past. The voyage of Providence is more than the turning point in Bligh's career, it is the key to understanding his whole life and character.
| 1754 | BLIGH BORN |
| 1770 | BLIGH JOINS THE ROYAL NAVY |
| 1776-80 | VOYAGE AS MASTER OF RESOLUTION UNDER COOK, WITH DISCOVERY |
| 1780-83 | UNEMPLOYED |
| 1783-87 | VOYAGES AS CIVILIAN FOR DUNCAN CAMPBELL - MEETS FLETCHER CHRISTIAN 1786 |
| 1787-89 | THE VOYAGE OF BOUNTY |
| 1790-91 | ENGLAND, COURT MARTIAL, LOBBYING |
| 1791-93 | THE VOYAGE OF PROVIDENCE AND ASSISTANT |
| 1794-95 | UNEMPLOYED |
| 1795-99 | ACTIVE SERVICE IN THE NAVY - THE GREAT NORE MUTINY |
| 1800-04 | ACTIVE SERVICE SURVEYING IN THE NAVY - THE WARRIOR COURT MARTIAL |
| 1805 | MADE GOVERNOR AND TRAVELS TO N.S.W. |
| 1806-08 | GOVERNOR OF N.S.W - THE RUM REBELLION |
| 1809-11 | IN RESERVE ON HALF PAY - MADE REAR AND LATER VICE ADMIRAL |
| 1817 | BLIGH DIES |
This paper grew out of my B.A.honours thesis and is a direct result of the good-natured insistence of my supervisor Dr.Tom Dunning on my generating an abstract for the conference and the Proceedings that accompany it. It was made possible by his perpetual guidance and encouragement, my mother's funding and even greater forebearance, and the assistance of many kind and helpful people. I am indebted to Graham Rayner at the University of Tasmania Rare Book Room; grateful for a referral to the National Library of Australia from Adrian Cunningham at the Pacific Manuscripts Bureau; Dr.Kathy Dunning for information and guidance on stress, personality and illness; and the squarerigger crews of EYE OF THE WIND, BOUNTY, ENDEAVOUR, ANNA KRISTINA and others. Of great help have been the University and State Libraries of Launceston and Hobart, Dr. Dan Huon, Professors Campbell McKnight and Michael Bennett; my seminar colleagues for their continuing interest, support, and envy; and Susie Bell, for the inspiration of ill-chosen words spoken in haste--this is all your fault, you realise...?
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