The Eventful History Of The Mutiny And Piratical Seizure by Sir John Barrow

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Against the prisoners Ellison, Burkitt, and Millward, the evidence given
by all the witnesses so clearly and distinctly proved they were under
arms the whole time, and actively employed against Bligh, that it is
unnecessary to go into any detail as far as they are concerned.

The Court having called on the prisoners, each separately, for his
defence, Mr. Heywood delivered his as follows:--

'My lords and gentlemen of this honourable Court,--Your
attention has already been sufficiently exercised in the
painful narrative of this trial; it is therefore my duty to
trespass further on it as little as possible.

'The crime of mutiny, for which I am now arraigned, is so
seriously pregnant with every danger and mischief, that it
makes the person so accused, in the eyes, not only of military
men of every description, but of every nation, appear at once
the object of unpardonable guilt and exemplary vengeance.

'In such a character it is my misfortune to appear before this
tribunal, and no doubt I must have been gazed at with all that
horror and indignation which the conspirators of such a mutiny
as that in Captain Bligh's ship so immediately provoke; hard,
then, indeed is my fate, that circumstances should so occur to
point me out as one of them.

'Appearances, probably, are against me, but they are
appearances only; for unless I may be deemed guilty for
feeling a repugnance at embracing death unnecessarily, I
declare before this Court and the tribunal of Almighty God, I
am innocent of the charge.

'I chose rather to defer asking any questions of the witnesses
until I heard the whole of the evidence; as the charge itself,
although I knew it generally, was not in its full extent, nor
in particular points, made known to me before I heard it read
by the Judge Advocate at the beginning of the trial: and I
feel myself relieved by having adopted such a mode, as it
enables me to set right a few particulars of a narrative which
I had the honour to transmit to the Earl of Chatham,
containing an account of all that passed on the fatal morning
of the 28th of April, 1789, but which, from the confusion the
ship was in during the mutiny, I might have mistaken, or from
the errors of an imperfect recollection I might have
mis-stated; the difference, however, will now be open to
correction; and I have great satisfaction in observing, that
the mistakes but very slightly respect my part of the
transaction, and I shall consequently escape the imputation of
endeavouring to save myself by imposing on my judges.

'When first this sad event took place I was sleeping in my
hammock; nor, till the very moment of being awakened from it,
had I the least intimation of what was going on. The spectacle
was as sudden to my eyes, as it was unknown to my heart; and
both were convulsed at the scene.

'Matthew Thompson was the first that claimed my attention upon
waking: he was sitting as a sentinel over the arm-chest and my
berth, and informed me that the captain was a prisoner, and
Christian had taken the command of the ship. I entreated for
permission to go upon deck; and soon after the boatswain and
carpenter had seen me in my berth, as they were going up the
fore-hatchway, I followed them, as is stated in their
evidence. It is not in my power to describe my feelings upon
seeing the captain as I did, who, with his hands tied behind
him, was standing on the quarter-deck, a little abaft the
mizen-mast, and Christian by his side. My faculties were
benumbed, and I did not recover the power of recollection
until called to by somebody to take hold of the tackle-fall,
and assist to get out the launch, which I found was to be
given to the captain instead of the large cutter, already in
the water alongside the ship. It were in vain to say what
things I put into the boat, but many were handed in by me; and
in doing this it was that my hand touched the cutlass (for I
will not attempt to deny what the carpenter has deposed),
though, on my conscience, I am persuaded it was of momentary
duration, and innocent as to intention. The former is evident,
from its being unobserved by every witness who saw me upon
deck, some of whom must have noticed it had it continued a
single minute; and the latter is proved by the only person who
took notice of the circumstance, and has also deposed that, at
the moment he beheld me, I was apparently in a state of
absolute stupor. The poison, therefore, carries with it its
antidote; and it seems needless to make any further comment on
the subject, for no man can be weak enough to suppose, that if
I had been armed for the purpose of assisting in the mutiny, I
should have resumed a weapon in the moment of triumph, and
when the ship was so completely in the possession of the
party, that (as more than one witness has emphatically
expressed it) all attempts at recovering her would have been
impracticable.

'The boat and ship, it is true, presented themselves to me
without its once occurring that I was at liberty to choose,
much less that the choice I should make would be afterwards
deemed criminal; and I bitterly deplore that my extreme youth
and inexperience concurred in torturing me with apprehensions,
and prevented me from preferring the former; for as things
have turned out, it would have saved me from the disgrace of
appearing before you as I do at this day--it would have spared
the sharp conflicts of my own mind ever since, and the
agonizing tears of a tender mother and my much-beloved
sisters.

'Add to my youth and inexperience, that I was influenced in my
conduct by the example of my messmates, Mr. Hallet and Mr.
Hayward, the former of whom was very much agitated, and the
latter, though he had been many years at sea, yet, when
Christian ordered him into the boat, he was evidently alarmed
at the perilous situation, and so much overcome by the harsh
command, that he actually shed tears.

'My own apprehensions were far from being lessened at such a
circumstance as this, and I fearfully beheld the preparations
for the captain's departure as the preliminaries of inevitable
destruction, which, although I did not think could be more
certain, yet I feared would be more speedy, by the least
addition to their number.

'To show that I have no disposition to impose upon this Court,
by endeavouring to paint the situation of the boat to be worse
than it really was, I need only refer to the captain's own
narrative, wherein he says that she would have sunk with them
on the evening of the 3rd May, had it not been for his timely
caution of throwing out some of the stores, and all the
clothes belonging to the people, excepting two suits for each.

'Now what clothes or stores could they have spared which in
weight would have been equal to that of two men? (for if I had
been in her, and the poor fellow, Norton, had not been
murdered at Tofoa, she would have been encumbered with our
additional weight), and if it be true that she was saved by
those means, which the captain says she was, it must follow
that if Norton and myself had been in her (to say nothing of
Coleman, M'Intosh, Norman, and Byrne, who, 'tis confessed,
were desirous of leaving the ship), she must either have gone
down with us, or, to prevent it, we must have lightened her of
the provisions and other necessary articles, and thereby have
perished for want--dreadful alternative!

'A choice of deaths to those who are certain of dying may be a
matter of indifference; but where, on one hand, death appears
inevitable, and the means of salvation present themselves on
the other, however imprudent it might be to resort to those
means in any other less trying situation, I think (and hope
even at my present time of life) that I shall not be suspected
of a want of courage for saying, few men would hesitate to
embrace the latter.

'Such, then, was exactly my situation on board the _Bounty_;
to be starved to death, or drowned, appeared to be inevitable
if I went in the boat; and surely it is not to be wondered at,
if, at the age of sixteen years, with no one to advise with,
and so ignorant of the discipline of the service (having never
been at sea before) as not to know or even suppose it was
possible that what I should determine upon might afterwards be
alleged against me as a crime--I say, under such
circumstances, in so trying a situation, can it be wondered
at, if I suffered the preservation of my life to be the first,
and to supersede every other, consideration.

'Besides, through the medium of the master, the captain had
directed the rest of the officers to remain on board, in hopes
of retaking the ship. Such is the master's assertion, and such
the report on board, and as it accorded with my own wishes for
the preservation of my life, I felt myself doubly justified in
staying on board, not only as it appeared to be safer than
going in the boat, but from a consideration also of being in
the way to be useful in assisting to accomplish so desirable a
wish of the captain.

'Let it not--for God's sake--let it not be argued that my
fears were groundless, and that the arrival of the boat at
Timor is a proof that my conduct was wrong. This would be
judging from the event, and I think I have plainly shown that,
but for the death of Norton at Tofoa, and the prudent order of
the captain not to overload the boat, neither himself nor any
of the people who were saved with him, would at this moment
have been alive to have preferred any charge against me, or
given evidence at this trial.

'If deliberate guilt be necessarily affixed to all who
continued on board the ship, and that in consequence they must
be numbered with Christian's party--in such a strict view of
matters it must irrevocably impeach the armourer and two
carpenter's mates, as well as Martin and Byrne, who certainly
wished to quit the ship. And if Christian's first intention of
sending away the captain, with a few persons only, in the
small cutter, had not been given up, or if even the large
cutter had not been exchanged for the launch, more than half
of those who did go with him would have been obliged to stay
with me. Forgetful for a moment of my own misfortunes, I
cannot help being agitated at the bare thought of their narrow
escape.

'Every body must, and I am sure that this Court will, allow
that my case is a peculiarly hard one, inasmuch as the running
away with the ship is a proof of the mutiny having been
committed. The innocent and the guilty are upon exactly the
same footing--had the former been confined by sickness,
without a leg to stand on, or an arm to assist them in
opposing the mutineers, they must have been put upon their
trial, and instead of the captain being obliged to prove their
guilt, it would have been incumbent upon them to have proved
themselves innocent. How can this be done but negatively? If
all who wished it could not accompany the captain, they were
necessarily compelled to stay with Christian; and being with
him, were dependent on him, subject to his orders, however
disinclined to obey them, for force in such a state is
paramount to every thing. But when, on the contrary, instead
of being in arms, or obeying any orders of the mutineers, I
did every thing in my power to assist the captain, and those
who went with him, and by all my actions (except in neglecting
to do what, if I had done, must have endangered the lives of
those who were so fortunate as to quit the ship) I showed
myself faithful to the last moment of the captain's stay, what
is there to leave a doubt in the minds of impartial and
dispassionate men of my being perfectly innocent? Happy indeed
should I have been if the master had stayed on board, which he
probably would have done, if his reasons for wishing to do so
had not been overheard by the man who was in the bread-room.

'Captain Bligh in his narrative acknowledges that he had left
some friends on board the _Bounty_, and no part of my conduct
could have induced him to believe that I ought not to be
reckoned of the number. Indeed from his attention to and very
kind treatment of me personally, I should have been a monster
of depravity to have betrayed him. The idea alone is
sufficient to disturb a mind where humanity and gratitude
have, I hope, ever been noticed as its characteristic
features; and yet Mr. Hallet has said that he saw me laugh at
a time when, Heaven knows, the conflict in my own mind,
independent of the captain's situation, rendered such a want
of decency impossible. The charge in its nature is dreadful,
but I boldly declare, notwithstanding an internal conviction
of my innocence has enabled me to endure my sufferings for the
last sixteen months, could I have laid to my heart so heavy
an accusation, I should not have lived to defend myself from
it. And this brings to my recollection another part of Captain
Bligh's narrative, in which he says, "I was kept apart from
every one, and all I could do was by speaking to them in
general, but my endeavours were of no avail, for I was kept
securely bound, and no one but the guard was suffered to come
near me."

'If the captain, whose narrative we may suppose to have been a
detail of every thing which happened, could only recollect
that he had spoken generally to the people, I trust it will
hardly be believed that Mr. Hallet, without notes, at so
distant a period as this, should be capable of recollecting
that he heard him speak to any one in particular; and here it
may not be improper to observe that, at the time to which I
allude, Mr. Hallet (if I am rightly informed) could not have
been more than fifteen years of age. I mean not to impeach his
courage, but I think if circumstances be considered, and an
adequate idea of the confused state of the ship can be formed
by this Court, it will not appear probable that this young
gentleman should have been so perfectly unembarrassed as to
have been able to particularize the muscles of a man's
countenance, even at a considerable distance from him; and
what is still more extraordinary is, that he heard the captain
call to me from abaft the mizen to the platform where I was
standing, which required an exertion of voice, and must have
been heard and noticed by all who were present, as the captain
and Christian were at that awful moment the objects of every
one's peculiar attention; yet he who was standing between us,
and noticing the transactions of us both, could not hear what
was said.

'To me it has ever occurred that diffidence is very becoming,
and of all human attainments a knowledge of ourselves is the
most difficult; and if, in the ordinary course of life, it is
not an easy matter precisely to account for our own actions,
how much more difficult and hazardous must it be, in new and
momentous scenes, when the mind is hurried and distressed by
conflicting passions, to judge of another's conduct; and yet
here are two young men, who, after a lapse of near four years
(in which period one of them, like myself, has grown from a
boy to be a man), without hesitation, in a matter on which my
life is depending, undertake to account for some of my
actions, at a time, too, when some of the most experienced
officers in the ship are not ashamed to acknowledge they were
overcome by the confusion which the mutiny occasioned, and are
incapable of recollecting a number of their own transactions
on that day.

'I can only oppose to such open boldness the calm suggestions
of reason, and would willingly be persuaded that the
impression under which this evidence has been given is not in
any degree open to suspicion. I would be understood, at the
same time, not to mean anything injurious to the character of
Mr. Hallet, and for Mr. Hayward, I ever loved him, and must do
him the justice to declare, that whatever cause I may have to
deplore the effect of his evidence, or rather his opinion, for
he has deposed no fact against me, yet I am convinced it was
given conscientiously, and with a tenderness and feeling
becoming a man of honour.

'But may they not both be mistaken? Let it be remembered that
their long intimacy with Captain Bligh, in whose distresses
they were partakers, and whose sufferings were severely felt
by them, naturally begot an abhorrence towards those whom they
thought the authors of their misery,--might they not forget
that the story had been told to them, and by first of all
believing, then constantly thinking of it, be persuaded at
last it was a fact within the compass of their own knowledge.

'It is the more natural to believe it is so, from Mr. Hallet's
forgetting what the captain said upon the occasion, which, had
he been so collected as he pretends to have been, he certainly
must have heard. Mr. Hayward, also, it is evident, has made a
mistake in point of time as to the seeing me with Morrison and
Millward upon the booms; for the boatswain and carpenter in
their evidence have said, and the concurring testimony of
every one supports the fact, that the mutiny had taken place,
and the captain was on deck, before they came up, and it was
not till after that time that the boatswain called Morrison
and Millward out of their hammocks; therefore to have seen me
at all upon the booms with those two men, it must have been
long after the time that Mr. Hayward has said it was. Again,
Mr. Hayward has said that he could not recollect the day nor
even the month when the _Pandora_ arrived at Otaheite. Neither
did Captain Edwards recollect when, on his return, he wrote to
the Admiralty, that Michael Byrne had surrendered himself as
one of the _Bounty's_ people, but in that letter he reported
him as having been apprehended, which plainly shows that the
memory is fallible to a very great degree; and it is a fair
conclusion to draw that, if when the mind is at rest, which
must have been the case with Mr. Hayward in the _Pandora_, and
things of a few months' date are difficult to be remembered,
it is next to impossible, in the state which every body was on
board the _Bounty_, to remember their particular actions at
the distance of three years and a half after they were
observed.

'As to the advice he says he gave me, to go into the boat, I
can only say, I have a faint recollection of a short
conversation with somebody--I thought it was Mr. Stewart--but
be that as it may, I think I may take upon me to say it was on
deck and not below, for on hearing it suggested that I should
be deemed guilty if I stayed in the ship, I went down
directly, and in passing Mr. Cole, told him, in a low tone of
voice, that I would fetch a few necessaries in a bag and
follow him into the boat, which at that time I meant to do,
but was afterwards prevented.

'Surely I shall not be deemed criminal that I hesitated at
getting into a boat whose gunnel, when she left the ship, was
not quite eight inches above the surface of the water. And
if, in the moment of unexpected trial, fear and confusion
assailed my untaught judgement, and that by remaining in the
ship I appeared to deny my commander, it was in appearance
only--it was the sin of my head--for I solemnly assure you
before God, that it was not the vileness of my heart.

'I was surprised into my error by a mixture of ignorance,
apprehension, and the prevalence of example; and, alarmed as I
was from my sleep, there was little opportunity and less time
for better recollection. The captain, I am persuaded, did not
see me during the mutiny, for I retired, as it were, in
sorrowful suspense, alternately agitated between hope and
fear, not knowing what to do. The dread of being asked by him,
or of being ordered by Christian to go into the boat,--or,
which appeared to me worse than either, of being desired by
the latter to join his party, induced me to keep out of the
sight of both, until I was a second time confined in my berth
by Thompson, when the determination I had made was too late to
be useful.

'One instance of my conduct I had nearly forgot, which, with
much anxiety and great astonishment, I have heard observed
upon and considered as a fault, though I had imagined it
blameless, if not laudable--I mean the assistance I gave in
hoisting out the launch, which, by a mode of expression of the
boatswain's, who says I did it voluntarily (meaning that I did
not refuse my assistance when he asked me to give it), the
Court, I am afraid, has considered it as giving assistance to
the mutineers, and not done with a view to help the captain;
of which, however, I have no doubt of being able to give a
satisfactory explanation in evidence.

'Observations on matters of opinion I will endeavour to
forbear where they appear to have been formed from the impulse
of the moment; but I shall be pardoned for remembering Mr.
Hayward's (given I will allow with great deliberation, and
after long weighing the question which called for it), which
cannot be reckoned of that description, for although he says
he rather considered me as a friend to Christian's party, he
states that his last words to me were, "Peter, go into the
boat," which words could not have been addressed to one who
was of the party of the mutineers. And I am sure, if the
countenance is at all an index to the heart, mine must have
betrayed the sorrow and distress he has so accurately
described.

'It were trespassing unnecessarily upon the patience of the
Court, to be giving a tedious history of what happened in
consequence of the mutiny, and how, through one very imprudent
step, I was unavoidably led into others.

'But, amidst all this pilgrimage of distress, I had a
conscience, thank heaven, which lulled away the pain of
personal difficulties, dangers, and distress. It was this
conscious principle which determined me not to hide myself as
if guilty. No--I welcomed the arrival of the _Pandora_ at
Otaheite, and embraced the earliest opportunity of freely
surrendering myself to the captain of that ship.

'By his order I was chained and punished with incredible
severity, though the ship was threatened with instant
destruction: when fear and trembling came on every man on
board, in vain, for a long time, were my earnest repeated
cries, that the galling irons might not, in that moment of
affrighting consternation, prevent my hands from being lifted
up to heaven for mercy.

'But though it cannot fail deeply to interest the humanity of
this Court, and kindle in the breast of every member of it
compassion for my sufferings, yet as it is not relative to the
point, and as I cannot for a moment believe that it proceeded
from any improper motive on the part of Captain Edwards, whose
character in the navy stands high in estimation both as an
officer and a man of humanity, but rather that he was actuated
in his conduct towards me by the imperious dictates of the
laws of the service, I shall, therefore, waive it, and say no
more upon the subject.

'Believe me, again I entreat you will believe me, when, in the
name of the tremendous judge of heaven and earth (before whose
vindictive Majesty I may be destined soon to appear), I now
assert my innocence of plotting, abetting, or assisting,
either by word or deed, the mutiny for which I am tried--for,
young as I am, I am still younger in the school of art and
such matured infamy.

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