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This page is about the ship. For the 1789 mutiny, see Mutiny on the Bounty.

Endeavour replica in Cooktown harbour
Career (Royal Navy) The Royal Naval Ensign in use at the time of Cooke's first voyage of discovery
Name: Endeavour
Operator: Royal Navy
Builder: Thomas Fishburn, Whitby
Launched: 1764
Acquired: 28 March 1768 as Earl of Pembroke
Commissioned: 26 May 1768
Decommissioned: September 1774
Out of service: Sold March 1775
Renamed: Lord Sandwich, February 1776
Fate: Scuttled, Newport, 1778
General characteristics
Class and type: Bark
Tons burthen: 368 71/94 (BM)
Length: 106 ft (32 m)
Beam: 29ft 3in
Sail plan: Full rigged ship
Crew: 85 including 12 Marines
Armament: 10 4-pdrs, 12 swivel guns
For other ships of the same name, see HMS Endeavour.


Bounty replica
The Bounty
Career (Great Britain) Royal Navy Ensign
Name: Bounty
Cost: £1950
Acquired: 26 May 1787
Commissioned: 16 Aug 1787
In service: 15 Oct 1787
Fate: Burned, 23 Jan 1790
General characteristics
Class and type: Armed Vessel
Tons burthen: 220 26/94
Length: 90 ft 10 in (27.7 m)
Beam: 24 ft 4 in (7.4 m)
Depth of hold: 11 ft 4 in (3.5 m)
Sail plan: Full rigged ship
Complement: 44
Armament: 4 4-pounders, 10 swivel guns


The Bounty was a British Navy armed transport vessel famous for being the scene of a notorious mutiny in 1789.

Contents

[edit] Bligh's Description of the Bounty

"The Burthen of the Ship was nearly 215 Tons; Her extreme length on deck 90Ft..10In. & breadth from outside to outside of the bends 24Ft..3 in. A Flush deck & a pretty Figure Head of a Woman in Riding habit; She mounted 4 four pounders & 10 Swivels & her Complement was,

1. Lieut & Commander 2. Masters Mates 1. Gunners Mate

1. Master 2. Midshipmen 1. Carpenters Mate

1. Boatswain 1. Clerk 1. Sailmaker

1. Gunner 2. Qr. Masters 1. Armourer

1. Carpenter 1. Qr.Masr.Mate 1. Carpenters Crew

1. Surgeon 1. Boatswains Mate 1. Corporal

24 Able Seamen

Total. 45 One of which is a Widow's man. There was likewise a Botanist & his Assistant."

[edit] HMS, HMAV, or HM Armed Vessel?

Bligh's account of the mutiny sent to Arthur Phillip, Governor of New South Wales, dated begins:

"Lieut. W. Bligh presents the following account of the loss of His Majesty's Arm'd Vessel Bounty, unto His Excellency Arthur Phillip Esqr. &c.&c.&c. On the 23rd. of December 1787. I sailed from Spithead with H.M.S. Bounty under my Command..."

HMAV seems never to have been used as a ship prefix for the Bounty by the Royal Navy, however it was used by the British Army in the twentieth century for Logistic Landing Craft e.g. HMAV Ardennes commissioned in 1977. It means "Her Majesty's Army Vessel".

It is displays ignorance of the rules of grammar to put the definite article "The" before the possessive pronoun "His" as in "the HMS Bounty". In contrast "HMS the Bounty" or "HM armed vessel the Bounty" are grammatically correct and reflect historical usages. It is correct to refer to "The HMAV Bounty" when referring to the Whangarei built replica because in this case HMAV is not a prefix but is part or the registered name of the ship.

[edit] Myths and Errors

Considering the enormous fame of the Bounty it is unsurprising that numerous myths abound. For example that Bounty could not be called HMS because she was a converted merchant vessel or because she was only commanded by a Lieutenant instead of a ranked Captain. These myths are easy to dispel by reference to examples of Admiralty orders to ranked Captains commanding unrated ships. For example the orders to Captain James Cook commanding HM sloop Resolution dated 6th July 1776 or the Commission of Captain Philip Gidley King to command HM Armed Vessel Reliance dated 6 February 1800. Both Reliance and Resolution were originally merchant ships purchased for the Navy and both are usually referred to as HMS rather than by their technical designation.

Plans discrepancy

Construction

Bethia

Selection

Purchase

Conversion and fitting out

The hemp contractors Welbank, Sharpe and Brown offered their 270-ton Shepherdess, lying at Pickle Herring Chain, value £2050. That is, Welbank Sharp and Brown tendered two ships, Shepherdess and Bethia.

Mackaness in his biography of Bligh unaccountably states that Campbell owned Bethia.

And of course, Bethia was renamed Bounty. She was chosen by recommendation of Mitchell, assistant to the surveyor of the Navy, ([87]) chosen because she best fitted Banks' specifications - and could be refitted easily, at a cost finally of £4456, making the total investment in her over £6406. Mitchell, with Sir Joseph Banks and someone who was to proceed to the Society Islands on the voyage, met aboard Bethia on 31 May.

[edit] HMS or HMAV?

The Bounty was never referred to as "HMS Bounty" or "HMAV Bounty" while she was afloat. The abbreviation H.M.S. only came into common usage around the 1790s[1], transforming into the initialism HMS in the twentieth century.

Although she was ship-rigged, and commonly referred to as a ship, in the formal vocabulary of the Admiralty the Bounty was not called a ship because she was unrated. Equally there was no organisation formally called the Admiralty: that name is a colloquialism for "The Commissioners for Executing the Office of Lord High Admiral of Great Britain and Ireland, etc.".

In the transcript[2] of the 1792 trial of the ten crewmen returned on the Pandora the Bounty is referred to as His Majesty's Ship "Bounty" or His Majesty's Armed Vessel "Bounty" three times each, and twice as His Majesty's Armed Vessel the "Bounty".

In the drawings for the 1787 conversion she is referred to as the "Bounty Armed Transport".

The Contents page of the Bounty's medical book is inscribed "His Britannic Majesty's Ship Bounty: Spithead 29th December 1787"[3]

The title of William Bligh's 1792 account of the mutiny refers to "His Majesty's Ship the Bounty".

Sir John Barrow's 1831 publication refers to "H.M.S. Bounty".

Academic institutions such as Britain's National Archives [4],National Maritime Museum[5], Royal Naval Museum[6], and Australia's State Library of New South Wales[7] generally use "HMS".

A somewhat controversial modern usage is to refer to "The HMS Bounty"[8][9] which equates to "The His Majesty's Ship Bounty", an example of RAS Syndrome.

[edit] The 1787 breadfruit expedition and mutiny

The ship had been purchased by the Royal Navy for a single mission in support of an experiment: they were to travel to Tahiti, pick up breadfruit plants, and transport them to the West Indies in hopes that they would grow well there and become a cheap source of food for slaves.

In June 1787, Bounty was refitted at Deptford. The great cabin was converted to house the potted breadfruit plants, and gratings fitted to the upper deck. Her complement was 46 officers and men.

On 23 December 1787, Bounty sailed from Spithead for Tahiti. For a full month, she attempted to round Cape Horn, but adverse weather blocked her. Bligh ordered her turned about, and proceeded east, rounding the Cape of Good Hope and crossing the width of the Indian Ocean.

Bounty reached Tahiti on 26 October 1788, after ten months at sea.

Bligh and his crew spent five months in Tahiti, then called "Otaheite", collecting and preparing a total of 1015 breadfruit plants. Bligh allowed the crew to live ashore and care for the potted breadfruit plants, and they became socialized to the customs and culture of the Tahitians. Many of the seamen and some of the "young gentlemen" had themselves tattooed in native fashion. Master's Mate and Acting Lieutenant Fletcher Christian married Maimiti, a Tahitian woman. Other warrant officers and seamen of the Bounty were also said to have formed "connections" with native women.

[edit] The mutiny

After five months in Tahiti, the Bounty set sail with its breadfruit cargo on 4 April 1789. Some 1300 miles west of Tahiti, near Tonga, mutiny broke out on 28 April 1789. From all accounts, Fletcher Christian and several of his followers entered Bligh's cabin, which he always left unlocked, awakened him, and pushed him on deck wearing only his nightshirt, where he was guarded by Christian holding a bayonet. When Bligh entreated with Christian to be reasonable, Christian would only reply, "I am in hell, I am in hell!" Despite strong words and threats heard on both sides, the ship was taken bloodlessly and apparently without struggle by any of the loyalists except Bligh himself. Of the 42 men on board aside from Bligh and Christian, 18 joined Christian in mutiny, two were passive, and 22 remained loyal to Bligh. The mutineers ordered Bligh, the ship's master, two midshipmen, the surgeon's mate (Ledward), and the ship's clerk into Bounty's launch. Several more men voluntarily joined Bligh rather than remaining aboard, as they knew that those who remained on board would be considered de facto mutineers under the Articles of War.

[edit] Discovery of the wreck of the Bounty

Luis Marden discovered the remains of the Bounty in January 1957. After spotting a rudder from this ship in a museum on Fiji, he persuaded his editors and writers to let him dive off Pitcairn Island, where the rudder had been found. Despite the warnings of one islander -"Man, you gwen be dead as a hatchet!" [10] — Marden dove for several days in the dangerous swells near the island, and found the remains of the fabled ship. He subsequently met with Marlon Brando to counsel him on his role as Fletcher Christian in the 1962 film Mutiny on the Bounty. Later in life, Marden wore cuff links made of nails from the Bounty.

An archaeological team from James Cook University, led by Ph.D student Nigel Erskine, recovered the last of the 4 pounders from the wreck site in 1999. The gun was brought to Townsville (NQ) in Australia where it underwent conservation treatment at the Museum of Tropical Queensland. The gun will be returned to Pitcairn Island after an allotted period for display.

[edit] Modern Bounty reconstructions

A replica of Bounty in Darling Harbour, Sydney.
A replica of Bounty in Darling Harbour, Sydney.

When the 1935 film was made, sailing vessels were still in wide use: existing vessels were adapted to play Bounty and Pandora.

[edit] Bounty II

The Royal Navy's Bounty has been reconstructed twice. MGM commissioned a replica of Bounty for their 1962 film, named the Bounty II. This vessel was built to the original plans and in the traditional manner in a shipyard in Lunenburg, Nova Scotia. However, all the dimensions were increased by approximately one third to accommodate the large 70 mm cameras used. MGM kept this vessel in service. When Ted Turner bought MGM he used this vessel for entertaining. Eventually MGM donated the vessel to a charity.

Although lack of expensive maintenance caused the vessel to lose her United States Coast Guard license for a time, Tall Ship Bounty was restored, initially at the Boothbay Harbor Shipyard in 2002, with restoration of the vessel's bottom planking. Moored in its winter home in St. Petersburg, Florida, it again became available for charter, excursions, sail-training, and movies (most recently in Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End,.[11] and the adult film Pirates). In April 2006, the Bounty again arrived in Boothbay Harbor for further renovation, a refurbishing of the ship's front end, and topside decking. Following this renovation, the Bounty is scheduled to repeat the famous voyage of the original Bounty [12]

On 9 August 2007, the Bounty made an unscheduled stop at Derry, Northern Ireland. The ship has just completed a $3m restoration and is making a seven week UK tour prior to embarking on a world tour via South Africa and New Zealand to Pitcairn and Tahiti. The UK tour begins with her arrival at the birthplace of mutiny leader Fletcher Christian in Maryport, Cumbria, at midday on Tuesday 14 August 2007. The ship was about three days ahead of schedule which is why it sought out Derry for a 'quiet' stopover before completing the journey to Maryport. [13] On 23 August 2007 the ship docked in Torquay, Devon, and for several days could be seen on the Paramount Imperial Hotel's webcam.

[edit] Bounty III

The second Bounty replica, named "H.M.A.V. Bounty", and informally known as "Bounty III", was built in New Zealand in 1979 and used in the 1984 Dino De Laurentiis film The Bounty. The hull is constructed of welded steel oversheathed with timber. For many years she served the tourist excursion market from Darling Harbour, Sydney, Australia, before being sold to HKR International Limited in October 2007. She is now a tourist attraction at Discovery Bay, on Lantau Island in Hong Kong, and has an additional Chinese name “Chi Ming”.

[edit] The Bounty on Postage Stamps

Pitcairn Island's first postage stamps were issued on 15 October 1940[14] with a portrait of the ship entitled "H.M. Armed Vessel Bounty" on the 6d stamp.

The third definitive issue of 1964 depicted "H.M. Armed Vessel Bounty" on the 1d denomination, changed to 1 cent in 1967.

In 1976 Bounty was shown as "H.M.S. Bounty" on the 10c stamp.

Bicentenary Sheetlets and first day covers were issued in 1990 depicting Bounty as "HMAV Bounty".

In 2004 a set of stamps and first day covers were issued to celebrate "HMAV Bounty" the 1979 replica then based in Sydney.

In 2007 a set of stamps and first day covers were issued to celebrate "HMS Bounty" the 1962 USA based replica.

[edit] See also

[edit] Replica vessels


[edit] spare

On 29 March 1791 Lord Grenville, the Prime Minister, refers to "Captain Bligh in His Majesty's Ship the Bounty" when he writes to the Lords of the Admiralty to inform them of King George's intention that a second breadfruit voyage should be made, this time with two vessels.[15]

Edward Christian includes "His Majesty's Ship the Bounty" in the title of his unofficial 1794 publication of the minutes of the court-martial [16]


Minutes of the Proceedings of the Court-Martial held at Portsmouth, August 12, 1792. On Ten Persons charged with Mutiny on Board His Majesty's Ship the Bounty, with an Appendix , Containing A full Account of the real Causes and Circumstances of that unhappy Transaction, the most material of which have hitherto been withheld from the public.



Copy of a letter written by Lord Grenville, to the Lords of the Admiralty, 29 March 1791 (Series 49.07)

http://image.sl.nsw.gov.au/banks/40208.jpg

On 29 March 1791 Prime Minister Lord Grenville refers to "Captain Bligh in His Majesty's Ship the Bounty" when he writes to the Lords of the Admiralty to inform them of King's intention that a second breadfruit voyage should be made, this time with two vessels.[17]

http://www2.sl.nsw.gov.au/banks/ The Papers of Sir Joseph Banks at the State Library of New South Wales



In the plans for the 1787 conversion she is referred to as the "Bounty Armed Transport".



The Bounty was never referred to as "HMS Bounty" or "HMAV Bounty" while she was afloat. The abbreviation H.M.S. only came into common usage around the 1790s[18], transforming into the initialism HMS in the twentieth century.

Although she was ship-rigged, and commonly referred to as a ship, in the formal vocabulary of the Admiralty the Bounty was not a ship because she was unrated. Equally true is that there was no organisation formally called the Admiralty: that name is a colloquialism for "The Commissioners for Executing the Office of Lord High Admiral of Great Britain and Ireland, etc.".

In the transcript[19] of the 1792 trial of the ten crewmen returned on the Pandora the Bounty is referred to as His Majesty's Ship "Bounty" or His Majesty's Armed Vessel "Bounty" three times each, and twice as His Majesty's Armed Vessel the "Bounty".

The Contents page of the Bounty's medical book is inscribed "His Britannic Majesty's Ship Bounty: Spithead 29th December 1787"[20]

The title of William Bligh's 1792 account of the mutiny refers to "His Majesty's Ship the Bounty".

Sir John Barrow's 1831 publication refers to "H.M.S. Bounty".

Britain's National Maritime Museum[21] and Royal Naval Museum[22], and Australia's State Library of New South Wales[23]all use "HMS".


A fortunately rare modern usage is to refer to "The HMS Bounty[24][25]", which is grammatically nonsensical.

[edit] References

  1. ^ FAQ on "HMS", Royal Naval Museum. Retrieved on 2008-02-26.
  2. ^ Transcript of the Court-Martial of the Bounty Mutineers. Retrieved on 2008-02-26.
  3. ^ the Bounty's medical book, National Maritime Museum. Retrieved on 2008-02-26.
  4. ^ Treasures from The National Archives, Mutiny on the Bounty. Retrieved on 2008-03-05.
  5. ^ search for "HMS Bounty", National Maritime Museum. Retrieved on 2008-02-26.
  6. ^ The Mutiny on HMS Bounty, Royal Naval Museum. Retrieved on 2008-02-26.
  7. ^ William Bligh's Official Hms Bounty Log, 16 Aug. 1787 - 20 Aug. 1789. Retrieved on 2008-03-02.
  8. ^ Mutiny! The real history of the HMS 'Bounty', Journal of Maritime Research. Retrieved on 2008-02-26.
  9. ^ "Mutiny on the HMS Bounty". Retrieved on 2008-02-26.
  10. ^ National Geographic Icon Luis Marden Dies. National Geographic (2003-03-03). Retrieved on 2007-05-13.
  11. ^ Brando's bounty's sailing in. Bristol Evening Post. Pg. 6. July 5, 2007.
  12. ^ Portland, Maine Press Herald, 2 May 2006
  13. ^ Derry Journal
  14. ^ The Pitcairn Islands Philatelic Bureau.
  15. ^ Copy of a letter written by Lord Grenville, to the Lords of the Admiralty, 29 March 1791 (Series 49.07), State Library of New South Wales. Retrieved on 2008-03-11.
  16. ^ The Bounty Mutiny By William Bligh, Edward Christian. Retrieved on 2008-03-11.
  17. ^ Copy of a letter written by Lord Grenville, to the Lords of the Admiralty, 29 March 1791 (Series 49.07). Retrieved on 2008-03-11.
  18. ^ FAQ on "HMS", Royal Naval Museum. Retrieved on 2008-02-26.
  19. ^ Transcript of the Court-Martial of the Bounty Mutineers. Retrieved on 2008-02-26.
  20. ^ the Bounty's medical book, National Maritime Museum. Retrieved on 2008-02-26.
  21. ^ search for "HMS Bounty", National Maritime Museum. Retrieved on 2008-02-26.
  22. ^ The Mutiny on HMS Bounty, Royal Naval Museum. Retrieved on 2008-02-26.
  23. ^ William Bligh's Official Hms Bounty Log, 16 Aug. 1787 - 20 Aug. 1789. Retrieved on 2008-03-02.
  24. ^ Mutiny! The real history of the HMS 'Bounty', Journal of Maritime Research. Retrieved on 2008-02-26.
  25. ^ "Mutiny on the HMS Bounty". Retrieved on 2008-02-26.