![]() After turning back towards England, Pandora ran aground on the Great Barrier Reef, with the loss of 31 crew and four prisoners from Bounty. Fourteen were captured in Tahiti and imprisoned on board Pandora, which then searched without success for Christian's party that had hidden on Pitcairn Island. Twenty-five men remained on board afterwards, including loyalists held against their will and others for whom there was no room in the launch.Īfter Bligh reached England in April 1790, the Admiralty despatched HMS Pandora to apprehend the mutineers. After three weeks back at sea, Christian and others forced Bligh from the ship. Relations between Bligh and his crew deteriorated after he allegedly began handing out increasingly harsh punishments, criticism, and abuse, Christian being a particular target. A five-month layover in Tahiti, during which many of the men lived ashore and formed relationships with native Polynesians, led those men to be less amenable to military discipline. Bligh navigated more than 3,500 nautical miles (6,500 km 4,000 mi) in the launch to reach safety, and began the process of bringing the mutineers to justice.īounty had left England in 1787 on a mission to collect and transport breadfruit plants from Tahiti to the West Indies. The mutineers variously settled on Tahiti or on Pitcairn Island. Disaffected crewmen, led by acting-Lieutenant Fletcher Christian, seized control of the ship from their captain, Lieutenant William Bligh, and set him and eighteen loyalists adrift in the ship's open launch. ![]() The mutiny on the Royal Navy vessel HMS Bounty occurred in the South Pacific Ocean on 28 April 1789. Fletcher Christian and the mutineers set Lieutenant William Bligh and 18 others adrift 1790 painting by Robert Dodd. ![]()
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