NavList:

Frank.  Thank you for your comments on my post concerning William Bligh the Navigator.  Some you agreed with, some you thought needed greater precision on my part. If this thread is to go anywhere, and I certainly hope it does, I agree.  There’s been so much written about William Bligh, especially with respect to the events surrounding the Bounty voyage, that it’s important to separate what’s primary evidence, what’s secondary evidence, and what’s fiction, the fiction being in danger of being picked up and taken as fact.  Even primary evidence needs to be combed for vested interests.  I started to address everything you mentioned, but it got too cumbersome so let’s just consider what Bligh was allowed to take with him in the launch for the moment.

You’ll have realised by now that Bligh is a particular hero of mine although I’d be the first to agree that, despite his many skills, there were times when his man management left something to be desired.  Upon picking up any book concerning the late 18th, early 19th century Royal Navy, the first place I go to is the index to see if Bligh is mentioned.  The only problem with this, plus frequent Google searches, is that I can remember reading things, but I can’t for the life of me remember where I read them.  Therefore, my get out phrase “It’s now believed that William Bligh had slightly more equipment than he claimed” really means “It’ll take all night to find the particular references which I know lie on my bookshelves somewhere”.  However, here goes.

Bligh says in his narrative of the mutiny “He [Mr Samuel] also got a quadrant and compass into the boat, but he was forbidden, on pain of death, to touch either, map, ephemeris, book of astronomical observations, sextant, time-keeper, or any of my surveys or drawings.”  Later, upon deciding to sail for Timor, he says “……. we bore away across the sea, where the navigation is but little known, in a small boat, twenty three feet long from stem to stern, deep laden with eighteen men; without a chart, and nothing but my own recollection and general knowledge of the situation of places, assisted by a book of latitudes and longitudes, to guide us, …..”  In addition, he must have had some way of knowing the Sun’s declination, or he couldn’t have worked out meridian passage latitudes.  He only needed the declination at local noon, so if he knew the declination for that day and the next at Greenwich and his approximate longitude, he could work that out, so he could manage with a very small table of declinations for several years ahead such as appears in some almanacs.

However, some writers suggest he had more than this. Richard Dunn & Rebekah Higgitt in “Finding Longitude” page 147 state that he also had Hamilton Moores “Practical Navigator” and Dunthorpe and Maskelyne’s “Tables requisite” although the source isn’t referenced.  They also say that he had a sextant by Jesse Ramsden.  Lady Belcher says in 1871 “Christian then handed over the side, and placed in Bligh's hands, a book of nautical tables and his own sextant, saying, "That book, sir, is sufficient for every purpose, and you know my sextant to be a good one."”  This would appear to be taken from Boatswains Mate James Morrison’s journal where he says “after Mr. Bligh was In the Boat he [beggd] for His Commission and Sextant; the Commission was Instantly Given him with his Pocket Book and private Journal by Mr. Christians order, and He took His own Sextant which Commonly Stood on the Dripstone Case and Handed it into the Boat with a Daily Assistant, saying 'there Captain Bligh this is sufficient for [evry] purpose and you know the Sextant to be a good one”.  A statement similar to this appears in Jules Vernes “The Mutineers of the Bounty” 1879 when Christian says “[I] Also, give him my nautical charts, and my own sextant”, but but did Vernes just expand on Belcher, and did Belcher copy from Morrison?  David Barrie says in “Sextant” Ch4 “Equiped only with a sextant and a compass”, and in Ch 4 reference 3 he says “Bligh claimed in his published account of the voyage that he was allowed to take only a ‘quadrant’, but his journal shows that he actually had a sextant and navigational books”  I’ve tried to find this “Journal” and have been struggling. Don Seltzer writing in NavList 24Jul2013 “Was Fletcher Christian a great navigator” talks of using the Corral site for a digitised version of “Bligh’s Journal”, but all I can find there is “Bounty’s (Captains) Logbook”.  All I’ve been able to find elswhere are: Bounty’s (Captains) Logbook, Bligh’s published accounts of the voyage to the south seas and the Bounty Mutiny, and the Launch Notebook. The first three speak only of a quadrant and the Logbook lists Bounty’s sextants in the remarks for 1Dec87.  It seems to me that we need to be more precise when we talk of Bounty records.  Is Bligh’s personal naval officer’s journal available or not, or are we confusing Bounty’s (Captain’s) Logbook with it?  In any case does Bligh acknowledge anywhere having a sextant and two sets of navigational tables with him in the launch?  Dave

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