Posted on 12/07/2017 8:29:38 AM PST by Borges
William Bligh, commanding lieutenant of HMS Bounty and victim of the notorious mutiny, died 200 years ago today on December 7, 1817.
1. William Bligh was born in 1754 and served as cabin boy and captain’s servant on HMS Monmouth from 1761, when he was still only six.
2. His father worked as a customs officer.
3. In 1776, he was chosen by James Cook to be sailing master on the Resolution on Cook’s third and final voyage to the Pacific.
4. At the time of the mutiny in 1789, HMS Bounty was on a mission to find breadfruit plants in Tahiti and transport them to the West Indies.
5. Bligh was cast adrift with 18 loyal crewmen with enough food and water for about a week.
6. They were also given four cutlasses, a compass, and a quadrant, but no maps.
7. Bligh made it to Timor, which was more than 4,000 miles away. The journey took 47 days.
8. From 1790 to 1805, Bligh resumed his naval career and was appointed Commander or Captain of a dozen further ships.
9. He served as Governor of New South Wales from 1806-1808.
10. The ackee fruit of Jamaica was named Blighia sapida after he introduced it to the Royal Society.
“How come for every historical person of even minor note, there’s someone making the case that they were gay?”
I can’t help you on that one. History is rife with such practices.
[Quote] Many books of quotations include a caustic quote attributed to Winston Churchill (1874-1965) in which he supposedly called British naval tradition nothing but “rum, sodomy, and the lash.” (Sometimes given as “rum, buggery and the lash,” using the old British slang term “buggery” to refer to homosexual sex.)
The earliest source commonly cited for this quip is the diary of former British diplomat, politician and author Harold Nicolson (1886-1968).
In a diary entry dated August 17, 1950, Nicolson recorded some anecdotes about Churchill.
One involves a version of the “rum, sodomy, and the lash” quote.
But the version Nicolson wrote about that day included “prayers” in the litany. His diary entry says:
…when Winston was at the Admiralty, the Board objected to some suggestion of his on the grounds that it would not be in accord with naval tradition. ‘Naval tradition? Naval tradition?’ said Winston. ‘Monstrous. Nothing but rum, sodomy, prayers and the lash.’ [Unquote]
Yes, you're right, I forgot about that. It's amazing that any (actually most) of them made it off that island alive.
As I recall, another member of Bligh's lifeboat died very shortly after arriving in Australia. Dehydration destroyed his kidneys.
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