Who was William Bligh?
Naval commander, well known for the mutiny on
the Bounty.
Date and Place of Birth:
9th September 1754, St Tudy, Cornwall, England.
Family Background:
Local Devon family.
Education:
Local Schools. Went to sea at the age of fifteen.
Chronology/Biography of William
Bligh:
1754: Baptised at
St Andrew's Church, Plymouth, the church where his parents had got
married a year previously.
1770: Joined Royal
Navy on 27th July.
1776-79: First major
appointment was on James Cook's third and
last voyage when he served as Master of HMS Resolution.
1781: Promoted to
Lieutenant on 5th August after action at Dogger Bank.
1782: Took part
in the relief of Gibraltar on 13th October.
1783-87: Entered
the Merchant service after the declaration of peace.
1787: Commanded
the Britannia where Midshipman Fletcher
Christian sailed with him. On 16th August he was appointed to
command H.M.S. Bounty on an expedition organised by Sir Joseph Banks
and the Admiralty. He was to sail to Tahiti to collect breadfruit
plants for transplantation in the West Indies to feed the slave
population. Left Spithead on 23rd December but failed to round Cape
Horn due to storms and went instead via the Cape of Good Hope.
1788: Arrived in
Tahiti on 26th October.
1789: Left Tahiti
on 4th April. On 28th April a mutiny led by Fletcher
Christian was staged. Bligh and 18 loyal members of the crew
were cast adrift in the Bounty's launch. Reached the Dutch Island
of Timor on 12th June after 41 hazardous days at sea, a journey
of 6,705 kilometers. Once there he bought a Dutch Schooner and sailed
for Batavia (Jakarta) and then home to England.
1790: Reached Portsmouth
on 13th March with only 11 crew members surviving.
1791: On 3rd August
he embarked on a second breadfruit voyage in H.M.S. Providence taking
another ship with him.
1793: Returned to
England on 7th August after a successful voyage.
1797: Commanded
a ship at the battle of Camperdown.
1801: Elected a
Fellow of the Royal Society. Commanded a ship at the Battle of Copenhagen
with Lord Nelson.
1806: Offered post
as Captain General and Governor of New South Wales, Australia and
set sail in February. His wife was too ill to travel but his daughter
Mary and her husband Lieutenant John Putland (who became his aide-de-camp)
accompanied him. Arrived at Port Jackson on 6th August
1808: Bligh's reforms
in New South Wales brought him into conflict with the leading men
of the colony, notably John MacArthur. On 26th January MacArthur
sent Major George Johnston to arrest Bligh and assumed control of
the colony.
1811: Johnston was
subsequently arrested and tried for this offence. Bligh was promoted
to Rear Admiral.
1812: On 15th April
his wife died. Bligh and unmarried daughters moved from London to
a Manor House in Farningham, near Maidstone, Kent.
1814: Promoted to
Vice Admiral but did not again take command of a ship.
Marriage:
4th February 1781 to Elizabeth Betham at Orchan
Paris Church, near Douglas, Isle of Man.
Places of Interest:
LONDON:
Museum of Garden History, Lambeth.
National Maritime Museum, Greenwich.
KENT:
Mansion where Bligh retired to still stands,
Farningham, near Maidstone.
Date and Place of Death:
7th December 1817, on visit to London, England.
Age at Death:
63.
Site of Grave:
St. Mary’s Church, Lambeth, London, England next
to his wife.
