Ned Young

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Edward "Ned" Young (c. 1762 – 25 December 1800), was a British sailor and co-founder of the Pitcairn Island settlement. He was noted for his ability to sleep through important events.

Young was born in St. Kitts. He apparently came from a poor family, but did attend school. He joined the crew of the HMS Bounty as a midshipman in 1787 when it sailed from England to Tahiti. After the Bounty departed from Tahiti in 1789 several sailors and officers including Fletcher Christian mutinied against Captain William Bligh. Young was asleep during the mutiny, and did not wake until after it was over. Thus, he neither participated in the mutiny nor was able to fight against it or join Bligh and others who left the ship in a long boat. Young was the only crew member to sleep through this ordeal. However, he soon announced that he fully supported Christian and the mutineers, and that he would never attempt to return to England. Young, Christian, and the rest of those who remained on the Bounty returned to Tahiti. Soon afterwards, Christian decided to sail away to an undiscovered island to evade capture by the British navy. Young, seven mutineers, and some Tahitians joined him. They landed and settled at Pitcairn, a small and remote island.

After several years of living peacefully on the island, the Tahitian men grew tired of being treated badly, and not having as much access to the women as their white counterparts. Tension was also added by the pressure put on the colony by inceasing alcoholism, after a small distillery was built by the mutineers. In October 1793, a war broke out between the mutineers and the four surviving Tahitian men who sailed with them. Five of the mutineers, including Christian, and all of the Tahitian men were killed. Young slept through most of this battle as well, and was protected by the Tahitian women, who largely supported the mutineers. Young did help to hunt down and kill Neho, one of the Tahitian men. The other three surviving mutineers were Matthew Quintal, William McCoy and John Adams. Young was accepted as the leader of the island, and Adams became his friend and deputy, though some sources seem to indicate that the two men had an equal amount of power. They gained much more respect than McCoy and Quintal, who became alcoholics. McCoy fell off a cliff, possibly as suicide, and Quintal afterwards became even more alcoholic and threatened to kill the entire community. Adams and Young killed Quintal to prevent this from happening, making themselves the only two surviving mutineers. Meanwhile, they had established fruit plantations, and had multitudes of children by their Tahitian wives.

In 1799 Young contracted an asthmatic infection. At about the same time, he converted to Christianity. Adams and the other islanders also did so, and Young taught Adams and several of the children to read and write. Young became progressively worse and eventually died of asthma, but Adams continued his work of educating the women and children, taking control over leadership of the island, and lived to see the island rediscovered by American and British ships. Many of Young's descendants live on Pitcairn Island or Norfolk Island.