Editor’s Note: On this day in 1754, William Bligh was born so it’s fitting that he kick off the latest series of 12 articles about great figures from British History.
William Bligh was a sailor and ship’s captain best remembered for his role in the famous mutiny, which took place on his ship HMS Bounty, while attempting to transport breadfruit trees from Tahiti to the Caribbean. He was also the governor of New South Wales when Australia was a British colony and was deposed by a rebellion. He rose to Vice-Admiral, sailed with Captain James Cook and served under Horatio Nelson.
Key Facts
- Born 1754, died 1817
- Sailor, Captain and vice-Admiral in the British Navy
- Governor of the colony of New South Wales, Australia
- Remembered for his role in the infamous ‘Mutiny on the Bounty’
A Short Biography
William Bligh was born on the 9th of September, 1754, probably in Plymouth, Devon, where his father was a customs officer, although his family home was the modest, but grandly-named, Tinten Manor, near Bodmin, Cornwall. By the age of seven he was already in the Navy, a not-uncommon practice at that time and the first step on a naval career. At 16, he became a midshipman, the most junior rank in the Navy and spent three years serving on the HMS Crescent.
In 1776, now aged 22, he was appointed by Captain James Cook to be the sailing master on the HM Sloop Resolution for Cook’s final voyage. A sailing master was what we would today call a navigator, responsible for the complex task of keeping the ship on course, using a compass, sextant and the recently invented marine chronometer. This last instrument – a very accurate clock – made precise chart-making possible for the first time and the British Navy was engaged in charting the world.
This was Cook’s third voyage of discovery in the Pacific Ocean and he was searching for the fabled Northwest Passage above North America that would link Europe and Asia. He did not discover the Northwest Passage, but he did make formal contact with Hawaii. It was on Hawaii that he was killed while trying to take the Hawaiian king hostage. Bligh and the rest of the ships arrived back in England in 1780 and Bligh was able to give important information about Cook’s voyage.
In 1781, he married Elizabeth Betham and almost immediately set sail again with the Royal Navy as a senior master, being involved in the Battle of Dogger Bank and the Siege of Gibraltar, both battles in Europe between Britain, Spain, France and Holland connected with the American War of Independence.
After America won its independence, much of the Royal Navy was demobilized and berths were hard to come by for younger officers, so Bligh joined the Merchant Navy as a commanding lieutenant, a position that was effectively captain, on smaller ships without other officers. Such was his situation in 1787 when he was given command of the HM Armed Vessel Bounty, a 90-foot, 215-ton, three-mast ship. Bligh was the only officer, with 43 sailors and two botanists on board.
The ship was tasked with sailing to Tahiti to collect breadfruit trees and transport them to the Caribbean. This was a scheme devised by his patron, the wealthy botanist Sir Joseph Banks, whose fame had been made with his plant collections from his travels with Cook on his first voyage, discovering the east coast of Australia. His breadfruit scheme was intended to provide a cheap source of food for slaves in the Caribbean working on the sugar plantations.
Failing, due to bad weather, to round Cape Horn at the southern tip of South America to reach the Pacific, the Bounty turned east and sailed around the Cape of Good Hope to enter the Pacific from the West. The delay meant that when they finally arrived in Tahiti in October, 1788, the trees were not ready and Bligh had to remain in Tahiti for five months.
Life in the British Navy at that time was harsh, with flogging and hanging routine punishments for sailors. The work was hard, living conditions barbaric and the diet appalling. So when Bligh allowed the sailors to live on land to take care of the 1,015 potted breadfruit trees, the easy and free life of the island was an irresistible draw. Many of the sailors ‘went native’, entering into relationships with island girls and in the case of Master’s Mate and Acting Lieutenant Fletcher Christian, marrying one. Christian had been appointed by Bligh during the voyage to replace his original Lieutenant, John Fryer.
So it’s not surprising that when the ship finally did set sail, the crew were not happy to be leaving Paradise. They were so unhappy in fact, that less than a month out, on the 28th of April, 1789, Christian and 18 of the crew mutinied and took control of the ship, without loss of any life. Their plan was to return to Tahiti, so Bligh and several of the crew that had remained loyal, were set adrift in the ship’s 23-foot row-boat, with some supplies. Bligh used his impressive skills in navigation to guide the boat 3,618 nautical miles to Timor, the nearest European settlement in present-day Indonesia – at that time a trading colony divided between the Dutch and the Portuguese.
The mutineers did eventually return to Tahiti, where most of them stayed, to be captured by the Royal Navy two years later. Fletcher Christian, some sailors and some Tahitian men and women sailed on to the uninhabited Pitcairn Island, where the last survivor and the remains of the Bounty were discovered 35 years later.
On his return to England Bligh was court-martialed, acquitted, published an account of his amazing voyage and returned to Tahiti as the Captain of HMS Providence to complete his transportation of those breadfruits. They did not prove popular with the slaves, but while in Jamaica Bligh collected the Ackee Fruit, which was named after him as Blighia sapida.
Mutinies over conditions were relatively common during these times and Bligh was also involved in the ‘Spithead’ and ‘Nore’ Mutinies, which affected a number of vessels. He also went on to command HMS Glatton under Horatio Nelson at the Battle of Copenhagen in 1801.
His old friend, Sir Joseph Banks, then arranged for him to be appointed Governor of the colony of New South Wales, in Australia. His arrogant manner and failure to make friends with those he controlled led him into trouble and in 1808 Australia’s only uprising, the Rum Rebellion, occurred with wealthy settlers raising a petition and marching soldiers on Government House, deposing Bligh. He was again set adrift, this time in a full-sized boat, the HMS Porpoise, in which he sailed for Hobart, on the island of Tasmania. He could not get permission to re-take the rebellious colony and remained on board the vessel for two years before finally sailing for England. A new system of governance of the Australian colony was introduced.
Back in England, Bligh continued to rise through the Navy, reaching the rank of vice-admiral, but never really engaged in any further significant voyages or duties. He died at his home on Bond Street, London on the 7th of December, 1817.
His Legacy
Much maligned in the past, today Bligh’s reputation has been largely restored with a more balanced view of his abilities and shortcomings. The Bounty Mutiny has become a by-word for rebellion against oppression, even though the conditions on the ship were certainly no worse than on other vessels of the time.
Breadfruit did not take hold as a food in most of the Caribbean Islands, except for Puerto Rico.
Sites to Visit
His grave is in St. Mary’s churchyard, Lambeth. His tombstone is topped with a carving of a breadfruit.
There is a blue plaque on Bligh’s house, at 100 Lambeth Road, London. The house is now a B&B.
There is a second plaque at Reardon Street, London, the site of another of his homes.
Tinten Manor is a listed building and still stands in St Tudy, Cornwall.
There is a statue of Bligh on George Street, Sydney, Australia. It was erected in 1987 to “restore the proper image of a much maligned and gallant man.”
Further Research
There are several biographies and accounts of the Mutiny available, including:
BLIGH: William Bligh in the South Seas, by Anne Salmond
The Bounty Mutiny, by William Bligh and Edward Christian
The Fortunate Adversities of William Bligh, by Roy Schreiber
Captain Bligh’s Portable Nightmare: From the Bounty to Safety – 4,162 Miles Across the Pacific in a Rowing Boat, by John Toohey
Captain Bligh: The Man and His Mutinies, by Gavin Kennedy
Vice Admiral William Bligh RN FRS: A Biography by J.H.Bligh, by John Heath Bligh
There are a numerous film versions of the Mutiny, including:
- George Cross in The Mutiny of the Bounty (1916)
- Mayne Lynton in In the Wake of the Bounty (1933)
- Charles Laughton in Mutiny on the Bounty (1935)
- Trevor Howard in Mutiny on the Bounty (1962)
- Anthony Hopkins in The Bounty (1984)