Events-04BountyVisit

The H.M.S. Bounty Visits in 2004

A “Bounty” for Marquette! (Slightly edited from the article in the Mariner’s Log by Lee Rowe)

The tall ship HMS Bounty, a replica of the British naval vessel whose crew mutinied in 1788, made a port visit to Marquette on August 27-28, 2004, coinciding with the annual Seafood Festival. Moored at Mattson Park in Marquette’s historic lower harbor, she was open for tours both days.

The Marquette Maritime Museum took the lead in bringing the Bounty to Marquette in cooperation with the Marquette County History Museum, Marquette Country Visitors and Convention Bureau, Lake Superior Community Partnership Tourism Committee, City of Marquette and NMU History Department. The Maritime Museum strongly believes in the value of forging strong partnerships. The Museum also believes part of it’s mission is to provide quality historical opportunities like the Bounty, to the community.

The cost to bring the ship to Marquette was approximately $20,000. While this fee may seem high, these great wood sailing ships are very expensive to maintain and operate, especially since 9/11 and new Coast Guard security requirements. Tickets sold for the tours helped to offset the expense of the visit with any excess going to aid in the costs of the Marquette lighthouse renovation. 3, 995 people toured the ship during the two-day period.

It is rare for the Bounty to stop at a small port like Marquette, and this was the only visit to any Lake Superior port. The Bounty’s visit was only the second tall ship to visit Marquette in a century. The US Brig Niagara’s visit in August 2002 was the first. The Niagara visit was also made possible by the Maritime Museum.

The history of the original HMS Bounty has been portrayed in a movie Mutiny on the Bounty starring Marlon Brando as well as in various documentaries. Today’s Bounty was built in 1960 in Lunenburg, Nova Scotia, for that movie. Since then she has been in many films including Yellowbeard, Treasure Island, Pirates of the Caribbean, and various television documentaries and commercials.

She has changed hands since MGM first had her built. MGM sailed the HMS Bounty around the world to promote the film and brought her to New York for the World’s Fair in 1964. She was moored in St. Petersburg, Florida for 21 years until Turner Broadcasting purchased the MGM film library in 1986. The ship then went to Miami and traveled the West Coast, East Coast, and Great Lakes. In 1993, Turner donated the ship to the city of Fall River, Massachusetts. In 2001, Robert Hansen, a Long Island, NY, businessman purchased the ship. Under his ownership the Bounty underwent over $1.5 million in renovations to make her safe and seaworthy below the waterline. Another $1.5 million in restoration above the waterline is planned.

The original HMS Bounty was 90 feet long, the “new” Bounty is 120 feet in length. 400,000 board feet of timber were used to build the Bounty, and it needs 10 miles of lines for her rigging. While the original Bounty carried 46 men and had berthing for 49, the Bounty of today can carry 100 crew and passengers underway. The original Bounty’s sanitary facilities were the head rail and chamber pots. Today’s Bounty has two modern restrooms (heads) and showers.

The Bounty is the only wooden square-rigger in North America still sailing. She does have a 535 hp Cummins Engine and four electric motors as well as her sails. She carries Four 4-pounder Carriage cannons and 4-pounder swivel cannons. She is lit by electricity instead of the candles used on the original Bounty.

The HMS Bounty that sailed from Spithead, England, on December 23, 1787, had William Bligh as her captain and a crew of 45 men bound for Tahiti. While the majority of crewmembers in the British royal Navy were conscripted, every person in the Bounty’s crew was a volunteer. Bligh chose his friend, Fletcher Christian, as Master’s Mate. They had become acquainted while Bligh was serving as master of the HMS Cambridge. Christian wrote of Bligh that he “treated him like a brother” which makes his later actions incredible.

The mission of the HMS bounty was to collect breadfruit plants to be transplanted in the West Indies as cheap food for the slaves. They remained in Tahiti for six months, which must have seemed like paradise to the crew. Three weeks after they were underway with their cargo of plants, Fletcher Christian and part of the crew mutinied, took over command of the Bounty, and set Captain Bligh and 18 members of the crew adrift in the ship’s 23-foot launch. In an incredible feat of seamanship and navigation, the Captain sailed the launch and 17 of the crew 3618 miles back to civilization. The mutineers returned to Tahiti, and, with other Polynesian men and women, took the ship to Pitcairn Island. They burned the ship and established a settlement and colony on the island that exists today.

In a side note, Captain Bligh was later given command of HMS Providence and returned to Tahiti on another breadfruit mission. While this mission was successful, the slaves hated the breadfruit and refused to eat it.

When Bounty arrived she was a tremendous sight, a specter from a by-gone age making her way into Marquette’s historic harbor!