The Bounty Mutiny

The Bounty Mutiny
Author: William Bligh
Publisher: Penguin
Total Pages: 289
Release: 2001-05-01
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 1101177098

The names William Bligh, Fletcher Christian, and the Bounty have excited the popular imagination for more than two hundred years. The story of this famous mutiny has many beginnings and many endings but they all intersect on an April morning in 1789 near the island known today as Tonga. That morning, William Bligh and eighteen surly seamen were expelled from the Bounty and began what would be the greatest open-boat voyage in history, sailing some 4,000 miles to safety in Timor. The mutineers led by Fletcher Christian sailed off into a mystery that has never been entirely resolved. While the full story of what drove the men to revolt or what really transpired during the struggle may never be known, Penguin Classics has brought together-for the first time in one volume-all the relevant texts and documents related to a drama that has fascinated generations. Here is the full text of Bligh's Narrative of the Mutiny, the minutes of the court proceedings gathered by Edward Christian in an effort to clear his brother's name, and the highly polemic correspondence between Bligh and Christian-all amplified by Robert Madison's illuminating Introduction and rich selection of subsequent Bounty narratives. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.

Captain Bligh's Portable Nightmare

Captain Bligh's Portable Nightmare
Author: John Toohey
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 165
Release: 2019-03-19
Genre: History
ISBN: 1510729208

At dawn on April 28, 1789, Captain William Bligh and eighteen men from HMS Bounty were herded onto a twenty-three-foot launch and abandoned in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. Thus began their extraordinary journey to Java. Covering 4,162 miles, the small boat was battered by continuous storms, and the men on board suffered crippling illness, near starvation, and attacks by islanders. The journey was one of the greatest achievements in the history of European seafaring and a personal triumph for a man who has been misjudged by history. Captain Bligh's Portable Nightmare reveals Bligh's great mapmaking skills, used to particular effect while he was exploring with Captain Cook. We discover his guilt over Cook's death at Kealakekua Bay. We learn of the failure of the Bounty expedition and the myths that surround the mutiny led by Lieutenant Fletcher Christian, the trials and retributions that followed Bligh's return to England, his successes as a navigator and as a vice admiral fighting next to Nelson at the Battle of Copenhagen. Combining extensive research with dazzling storytelling, John Toohey tells a gripping tale of seafaring, exploration, and mutiny on the high seas, while also dismissing the black legend of the cruel and foulmouthed Captain William Bligh and reinstating him not just as a man of his times but as a true hero.

Captain Bligh and Mr Christian

Captain Bligh and Mr Christian
Author: Richard Hough
Publisher: Chatham Publishing
Total Pages: 320
Release: 2000
Genre: Admirals
ISBN: 9781861761323

The Bounty set out in 1788 to transport breadfruit from Tahiti to the West Indies as a cheap source of food for slaves. But the combination of the tough discipline of Bligh and the attractions of life in the South Sea Islands drove Fletcher Christian and part of the crew to mutiny, and Bligh along with those loyal to him were set adrift in the ship's launch. Their remarkable 3,600-mile, open-boat voyage to Timor is one of the great feats of navigation, while the story of the mutineers' discovery of the uninhabited island of Pitcairn and their attempt to fashion a community away from the pursuing ships of the Royal Navy is as tense as it is horrific. This drama of mutiny, courage, remarkable voyages, human deceit and treachery, first published in 1972, provides an account of this episode of maritime history.

Mr Bligh's Bad Language

Mr Bligh's Bad Language
Author: Greg Dening
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 470
Release: 1994-03-25
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780521467186

Captain Bligh and the mutiny on the Bounty have become proverbial in their capacity to evoke the extravagant and violent abuse of power. But William Bligh was one of the least violent disciplinarians in the British navy. It is this paradox which inspired Greg Dening to ask why the mutiny took place. His book explores the theatrical nature of what was enacted in the power-play on deck, on the beaches at Tahiti and in the murderous settlement at Pitcairn, on the altar stones and temples of sacrifice, and on the catheads from which men were hanged. Part of the key lies in the curious puzzle of Mr Bligh's bad language.

Bligh

Bligh
Author: Anne Salmond
Publisher: Penguin Random House New Zealand Limited
Total Pages: 714
Release: 2011-08-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 1742287816

In Bligh, the story of the most notorious of all Pacific explorers is told through a new lens as a significant episode in the history of the world, not simply of the West. Award-winning anthropologist Anne Salmond recounts the triumphs and disasters of William Bligh's life and career in a riveting narrative that for the first time portrays the Pacific islanders as key players. From 1777, Salmond charts Bligh's three Pacific voyages – with Captain James Cook in the Resolution, on board the Bounty, and as commander of the Providence. Salmond offers new insights into the mutiny aboard the Bounty – and on Bligh's extraordinary 3000-mile journey across the Pacific in a small boat – through new revelations from unguarded letters between him and his wife Betsy. We learn of their passionate relationship, and her unstinting loyalty throughout the trials of his turbulent career and his fight to clear his name. This beautifully told story reveals Bligh as an important ethnographer, adding to the paradoxical legacy of the famed seaman. For the first time, we hear how Bligh and his men were changed by their experiences in the South Seas, and how in turn they changed that island world forever. 'Remarkable . . . The mutiny has inspired some marvellous books, of which this is possibly the finest.' --Jim Eagles, New Zealand Herald

The Voyage of H. M. S. Bounty

The Voyage of H. M. S. Bounty
Author: William Bligh
Publisher:
Total Pages: 228
Release: 2008-06
Genre: History
ISBN: 9781846774911

A timeless story of the Royal Navy The story of Captain Bligh, the quest for breadfruit and the mutiny is perhaps one of the most famous concerning the Royal Navy in the great days of sail. Much of this can be attributed to the several motion pictures made of the story. Predictably, fact was far from fiction. This book-written by Captain Bligh himself-reveals a fine and able officer, well regarded by peers and superiors, who set about a difficult task that led ultimately to the infamous ordeal of mutiny within his crew. As Fletcher Christian and the mutineers took his vessel and returned to the pleasures of Tahiti, Bligh and the other loyal unfortunates in his open boat began the long struggle for survival which would see the deaths of many of them. Bligh recounts the entire history of the voyage of the Bounty from commission to mutiny to final deliverance, enhanced with much detail of interest to students of navigation and maritime history. A true classic.

Bligh

Bligh
Author: Rob Mundle
Publisher: Grub Street Publishers
Total Pages: 401
Release: 2013-01-19
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 1783378417

Beyond the Bounty: A biography of the Royal Navy officer from “a master of the maritime narrative” (The Sydney Morning Herald). The eighteenth century was an era when brave mariners took their ships beyond the horizon in search of an unknown world. Those chosen to lead these expeditions were exceptional navigators, men who had shown brilliance as they ascended the ranks in the Royal Navy. They were also bloody good sailors. From ship’s boy to vice-admiral, discover how much more there was to Captain Bligh than his infamous bad temper. Meet a twenty-four-year-old Master Bligh as he witnesses the demise of his captain and mentor, Cook; a thirty-four-year-old Lieutenant Bligh at the helm of the famous Bounty then cast adrift by Fletcher Christian on an epic forty-seven-day open-boat voyage from Tonga to Timor; and a thirty-six-year-old Captain Bligh as he takes HMS Providence, in the company of a young Matthew Flinders, on a grand voyage to Tahiti and back. This book goes beyond the character we’ve seen in movies—into the real life of a complex and remarkable seaman.

Bligh and the Bounty

Bligh and the Bounty
Author: William Bligh
Publisher:
Total Pages: 328
Release: 1936
Genre: Bounty Mutiny, 1789
ISBN:

Entries from the diary of British Royal Navy officer and colonial governor William Bligh recount the infamous events that took place on the HMS Bounty in 1789. Despite his adventurous career under Captain James Cook and Horatio Nelson, British Royal Navy officer and colonial governor William Bligh (1754-1817) is now remembered for his harsh treatment of his crew that triggered their mutiny in 1789, an account that is told in Bligh's own words in this volume. The commander and 18 seamen were set adrift in an open boat and came ashore after sailing 3600 miles, a tale that continues to captivate readers even today.

Mutiny on the Bounty

Mutiny on the Bounty
Author: Charles Nordhoff
Publisher: Back Bay Books
Total Pages: 420
Release: 1989-04-11
Genre: Fiction
ISBN:

A British crew mutinies against the cruel commander of the Bounty in 1787.

The Armed Transport Bounty

The Armed Transport Bounty
Author: John McKay
Publisher: Anova Books
Total Pages: 136
Release: 2001
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780851778938

An account of the purchase by the Navy of the merchant vessel Bethia and her subsequent conversion into a naval transport The Bounty, as she was renamed, was made eternally famous by the mutiny against Captain Bligh in 1789.