Fletcher of the Bounty

by Graeme Lay

  Fletcher picked up a nettle, a length of knotted rope, and began to strike the youth hard about his bare back and shoulders. He dropped the compass and fled back to his canoe, crying out. The others followed, including the young women. Then, from his canoe, one of the men hacked through the rope attached to the anchor buoy. Furious, from the foredeck Fletcher fired his musket at the man. It missed. He shouted to Churchill, who held a scatter gun, ‘Fire into the canoe!’ The shot struck the occupants, who howled with pain. Minutes later all the canoes began to paddle hurriedly back to the shore.

  Determined to press home this advantage, Fletcher ordered the boats to follow. Both cutters were rowed in to the beach, all aboard armed with muskets and pistols. The canoes had been dragged up onto the sand. When the warriors began to hurl stones at the sailors, striking some of them, Fletcher told the men. ‘Fire at them!’

  Those holding muskets leapt from the boats, aimed and fired. Four warriors fell, dead or wounded. The rest turned and fled into the bush above the foreshore.

  The sailors peered into the canoes. There they saw several lengths of plaited rope. Stewart picked one up. ‘What are these for, do you suppose?’

  ‘Trussing their prisoners, I’d say,’ Fletcher replied. ‘But for the muskets, we could have been tied up with them.’ He called out to the others, ‘We’ll tow the canoes back to the ship, for added security.’

  That evening they held a meeting by candlelight in the officers’ mess, around a flask of Canary Island red wine. Present with Fletcher were the men he considered most reliable: Stewart, Mills, Churchill and Morrison. He told them: ‘This island, I believe, should be the one we settle on.’

  Stewart looked dismayed. ‘Surely not, in view of today’s fracas.’

  ‘That was but a minor confrontation. And one that demonstrated our greatly superior force.’

  Churchill leaned forward. ‘But we don’t know how many warriors the island holds. Its population may be considerable.’

  Fletcher shook his head. ‘I doubt it. A few hundred, perhaps. And we have the cannons, muskets and pistols. Suitably fortified, we could defend ourselves from any native attack.’

  Silence descended on the cabin. Responding to it, Fletcher pressed his case. ‘Because the lagoon is not easily accessible, and the island is small, it’s unlikely that any other European ships will call here. They would have no reason to do so. I believe Tupuai will offer us sanctuary.’

  ‘And do you still intend that we first return to Tahiti?’ asked Morrison.

  ‘Yes. To obtain supplies, and our women.’ Fletcher stood up. ‘Tomorrow we will go ashore and leave gifts for the people here, then leave for Tahiti.’

  The boats landed near the easternmost point of the island. After following a trail inland they came to a cluster of thatched fares. All had been abandoned. After witnessing the power of the muskets their inhabitants had evidently fled and were in hiding. Fletcher left half a dozen hatchets and some nails on the mat in one house, then they returned to the ship.

  Later that day Bounty was towed through the pass. Her sails set, with Fletcher at the helm, she sailed on a northward course for Tahiti.

  MATAVAI BAY, 6 JUNE 1789

  Canoes by the dozen came out to greet them, their occupants waving, chanting and beating drums. They surrounded Bounty even before her anchors were lowered. Delighted to be back, the crew rushed to the rails, seeking their special taios and waving to them.

  The bushy-haired figure of Tu was first to come aboard, followed by his wife Itia and their retinue. He carried garlands of tiare flowers.

  Fletcher bowed to the chiefly couple and Tu beamed. ‘Ia ora na, Titereano.’ He placed a garland around Fletcher’s neck and they pressed noses. Then he looked around the deck. ‘Where is Parai?’

  Fletcher had prepared a story. He replied in Tahitian, ‘Captain Parai is on an island we discovered after we left here.’ He pointed west. ‘It is called Ay-too-tuk-ee.’ Tu nodded. His people knew of this island. Tupaia, who had been there, had told them about it. The Tahitians knew it as ‘Tootate’.

  Fletcher continued. ‘And Captain Tute was living there, we also found.’

  Tu’s jaw dropped. ‘Tute was on Tootate?’

  ‘Ae. And his ship, Resolution, was there too. Tute is very well. He took Captain Parai, the breadfruit plants and some of Bounty’s men on board his ship.’ As this lie was told, Fletcher noticed Itia’s face fall. He had been aware that for some reason Itia fancied Bligh. Takes one short fatty to fancy another, he concluded.

  Tu was frowning now. ‘Why did not Parai or Tute return with you to Tahiti?’ he demanded.

  ‘They were needed on Ay-too-tuk-ee. To collect more breadfruit plants to take back to Peretane.’

  Although Tu nodded, he seemed doubtful. Fletcher’s hands had turned sweaty. I’m not a natural liar. Unlike Bligh.

  He continued his fiction: ‘Tute and his son Parai have sent me here to collect many goats, pigs and chickens, to take to them on Ay-tootuk-ee. We will pay you for these goods in iron, of course.’ He gestured towards the companionway. ‘Now, please come below and share some wine with me.’

  ‘You have come back, Titereano.’

  ‘I promised I would, didn’t I?’

  ‘Ae. Maeva, maeva.’

  He held her tightly, felt her heart beating against him. He put his face in her hair, drew in its fragrance of tiare and monoi. ‘Ua here vauia oe, Isabella.’

  She held him tightly, her tears wetting his neck. ‘Titereano, ua here vauia oe.’ Then she drew back, and led him into the fare, to the sleeping mats.

  He cried out with relief. There had been so much hatred these past weeks, and so much despair. But now there was this love and comfort, and he felt reborn by it. He was at peace again.

  Kneeling alongside him, Isabella dabbed his forehead and cheeks with a piece of ’ahu cloth. ‘Rest now, Titereano, rest now.’

  Gradually his breathing slowed. His heartbeat too.

  Rain poured down. Sheets of water cascaded from the eaves, forming a watery curtain between them and the rest of the world. Isabella opened a drinking nut and they took turns swigging from it, letting the juice flow down their chins. Then, lying side by side, he told her what had happened. She sat up, shocked.

  ‘You put Parai in a vaka? And he sailed away?’

  ‘Yes. With eighteen others.’

  She frowned. ‘But why did you not kill Parai? For what he did to you.’

  Avoiding her gaze he said, ‘I could not kill him. But in that small vaka, with so many men . . .’ He closed his eyes. ‘It might as well have been murder.’

  As the hideous events came rushing back he turned away, trying to block out what had happened. Then he said, ‘Before the mutiny I thought I would kill myself. In every direction I looked, I saw only darkness. Killing myself seemed the only answer.’

  ‘Don’t ever speak of such an evil!’

  ‘But when I thought of you, and our times together, I could not do it. My love for you was stronger than my hatred for Parai.’ He forced a smile. ‘So I overcame that terrible thought.’

  Isabella nodded. ‘Ae, that is good. For us.’

  The rain had eased but the eaves were dripping. From the forest surrounding the fare, an insect chorus began. Again Isabella dabbed his face and chest with the cloth, murmuring affection as she did so. He loved the afterwards of their love-making; the grateful touching and embracing, their halting, hybrid conversation.

  There was much to talk about.

  ‘I must leave Tahiti again soon, Isabella.’

  ‘Uh? But you have only just come back.’

  ‘I know. But it would be death for me to stay. King George will send ships from Peretane to look for me, and to capture me and the others.’

  He didn’t add, And I will be hanged aboard one of the king’s ships. And in the naval tradition, not by a quick drop through a trapdoor, but by being trussed and noosed and hauled aloft to a yardarm. A death by slow strangulation, my choking an
d shitting and pissing watched by a drooling crowd.

  ‘But where will you go?’

  ‘To Tupuai.’

  ‘No! Stay here, on Tahiti. I will hide you, in the mountains. We will live there.’

  ‘Mauruuru, Isabella. But no, people would tell, and we would be found and I would be arrested.’ He slipped his hand under her hair. ‘I will take Bounty back to Tupuai. And you and the others must come too.’

  17 June 1789

  At last I can attend to my journal again.

  The ten days we spent on Tahiti were frantic, as we took aboard supplies for our new settlement on Tupuai. We have aboard a menagerie, so that Bounty could be renamed Fletcher’s Ark, as Morrison quipped to me yesterday. Hundreds of hogs, fifty goats, dozens of chickens and some cats and dogs. We even have a cow and a bull, left on Tahiti by Cook. For some reason these did not breed. I very much hope they will get over their reluctance to do so after we set them ashore on Tupuai. So the decks are crammed with the livestock and poultry and resound with the creatures’ snuffling, braying and clucking. The ship stinks like a barnyard. Never mind, the animals will be indispensable to our future.

  Our human cargo is no less interesting. Having necessarily left some Bligh loyalists such as Norman and Byrne on Tahiti, and sworn them to secrecy as to our destination should English ships later arrive, I have my own men and their women with us. Foremost among these is Isabella who, though she did not want me to leave Tahiti, elected to go with me when she realised I had no choice in the matter. If we had tried to hide, people on the island would be sure to give our location away to the English authorities, for reward. Bounty hunters, so to speak.

  I could not wish for a more loyal or loving woman than Isabella. My men have nick-named her ‘Mainmast’, because of her tallness and upright bearing, but I prefer my English name for her. Her favourite place on Bounty is in the bow. She stands there whenever conditions permit, wearing an ahufara — a bark cloth shawl — around her shoulders, one hand on the spritsail halyard, staring ahead, the wind blowing her hair. She makes a living figurehead, a great deal lovelier than the real one fixed to the prow beneath her.

  Other of the men who are with their Tahitian lovers are Stewart, who has his Teria, whom he calls Peggy after his mother. Alex Smith has Te’ehuteatuanonoa, whom he (understandably) prefers to call Jenny. Will McCoy has his Te’o, known as Mary and Tom McIntosh also has a Mary. They are all loyal women.

  This is the very first time most of us have been on a Royal Navy vessel which carries women. I relish the difference it makes. The men take more care over their conduct and suppress their brutishness. For their part, the women assist in the galley, wash the men’s clothes and feed the livestock. They are resented only by the men who do not have women of their own. These have declared that they will take women of Tupuai as their lovers, and in view of the beauties who came aboard when we were there previously, this ambition is understandable.

  On our second day at sea several stowaways emerged from hiding below decks. These are mainly the friends of some of my men, such as Coleman’s taio, Tupairu. More surprising was the emergence of Hitihiti, the Bora Boran who sailed with Cook on a segment of his voyage in 1773. He is such an eager participant in our venture that I feel he will be an asset. He is also high-born, which may give him mana with the Tupuaians. Less welcome, because of their vulnerability, are the seven local boys and one girl who secreted themselves aboard during our disorderly departure. But now, as before, there can be no turning back. We are obliged to keep them.

  So our complement of supernumeraries consists of eight Tahitian men, nine Tahitian women, the boys and the girl. These, plus my sailors, will be the foundation settlers of our new community, which I am determined will be one of peace and productivity.

  I recall once finding in my cousin’s library on the Isle of Man a book entitled ‘Utopia’, by Sir Thomas More. It depicted a society on an island in the Atlantic Ocean, one which possessed a perfect harmony of living. More’s idea of such a society appeals to me greatly. Thus, in my mind’s eye I envisage on Tupuai a community which has such qualities. It will be based on human cooperation, pastoralism, crop-growing and grazing, as on More’s Utopia. There are sufficient seeds of English crops remaining in Bounty’s hold, along with our many livestock, for this vision to be realised.

  We possess, in short, every ingredient for our own South Sea Utopia.

  TUPUAI, 13 SEPTEMBER 1789

  The spear flew from the bush, hurled by an unseen hand. It struck Burkett, standing alongside Fletcher, in his left side. Screaming, he fell to his knees. Fletcher called to Timoa, one of the Tahitians, ‘Look to him!’

  Timoa put his arm around Burkett and dragged him back. Another of the Tahitians, Niau, pulled out the spear.

  A group of Tupuaian warriors burst from the trees, waving spears and clubs. They wore pandanus skirts and caps embellished with black feathers. Around their waists were belts and pouches which held stones. From yards away they took the stones from their pouches and hurled them at Fletcher’s men with deadly accuracy. One struck Morrison on his forehead. He dropped, stunned. Then they ran straight at Fletcher’s party, screaming and waving their spears. Niau hurled the spear he had removed from Burkett’s side like a javelin, and it went deep into the chest of one of the warriors.

  To Hitihiti, Fletcher shouted, ‘Fire at them!’ He did so, and the face of one of the warriors exploded. Fletcher raised his own musket and aimed at a thickset man. He fired and the warrior dropped, clutching his belly. Morrison, now recovered, fired at a warrior who crashed to the ground. Hitihiti had reloaded, and he aimed and fired again. He was a crack shot; another warrior fell. But more were rushing up from the rear. Realising they were outnumbered, Fletcher shouted to his group, ‘Back to the taro garden! Take cover behind the embankment!’

  They retreated to a clearing in which there were taro beds behind walls of earth. Lying under cover of one of the walls, musket barrels resting on them, they resumed firing upon the war party, who had pursued them to this open ground. Fletcher chose a target, aimed and fired. Another man dropped, struck in the belly. Quickly Fletcher reloaded.

  The firing continued for another twenty minutes. Fletcher and his men, sheltered by the earth wall, were able to fire from their position unassailably. But the attackers kept coming, screaming and hurling their spears, most of which flew over the heads of the defenders.

  Hitihiti lay next to Fletcher. ‘That man their leader,’ he said, pointing at an older warrior with a headdress. He was exhorting the warriors by brandishing his club. ‘I get him,’ Hitihiti said. He aimed, fired, and the leader spun about and fell to the ground, his chest torn open. The rest of the war party stopped in their tracks. Then two of them bent down, picked up the dead man and dragged him away into the bush.

  Fletcher stood up. Placing the butt of his musket on the ground, he used it to support himself. He felt shattered, and his body streamed with sweat.

  What had happened today was a terrible business, the culmination of weeks of misunderstandings and conflict.

  Further along the embankment, Burkett’s wound was being staunched with cloth by Timoa. Morrison lay on his back, swigging from a water flask.

  Hitihiti grinned at Fletcher. ‘We beat them, Titereano. Many killed.’

  Fletcher nodded. But he thought, what has become of my Utopia?

  Later that day he called the men to assemble on Bounty’s mid-deck. The ship was anchored in the lagoon off the north-east coast of the island, opposite the garrison they were constructing, which Fletcher had named Fort George.

  Aware that he needed more than ever to demonstrate leadership, as Fletcher addressed the assembly he tried to suppress his disillusionment over what had happened.

  ‘Today’s battle resulted in many native deaths. And some of our people were wounded.’ Burkett grunted, and pointed to his bandaged side. ‘Tinarou and his warriors will doubtless seek vengeance. In the face of this continuing hostility, we must conside
r whether or not to continue to stay on Tupuai.’ His eyes swept the group. ‘If we stay we can finish building Fort George and thereby establish a secure base for our community. To this end, chief Ta’aroa, who rules over the Natieva district, is our ally.’

  A hand went up. It was Churchill’s. ‘How much longer will it take to finish the fort?’ he asked.

  ‘I estimate, to complete the walls and moat, will take another three months’ work,’ Fletcher replied.

  There were mutterings from the company. Digging the moat, shifting the sticky earth in the heat with hoes, spades and mattocks — hammered out on a makeshift anvil by armourer Coleman — was exhausting work, as Fletcher well knew. He had been the leader of the digging parties. And lately, work on the fort’s construction had stalled.

  ‘If we vote to leave Tupuai and return to Tahiti, those of you who did not mutiny will be able to remain there with your taios and be uplifted by the next English ship to call.’

  ‘And the ones who got rid of Bligh?’ This demand came from Alex Smith, who had begun a relationship with a Tupuaian woman.

  ‘We cannot stay on Tahiti,’ Fletcher replied. ‘We will sail on, in search of another sanctuary.’

  Silence descended on the meeting. All were aware that cracks had appeared in their community during these past weeks. The causes were differences over how they should proceed from now on. Several people wanted to leave this island. Tupuai’s people had proved to be fractious, and resentful of the Popa’a presence. Some of the mutineers wanted the Bounty dismantled, so that it would not attract the attention of any passing ship; others wanted the vessel kept so that it would allow them to leave the island if it was necessary to do so. Most worrying, Bounty’s women had heard a rumour that the ship’s Tahitian men and the Tupuaians were plotting an alliance in order to overthrow all the Popa’a men.

  There was also a problem with Tupuai’s women. While agreeing to have sex with Bounty’s men ashore, in exchange for red feathers from the Friendly Isles, they refused to stay aboard the ship or sleep with them at the fort. The fact that the Tupuaian women were so alluring did nothing to resolve this dilemma.