The only published account of this voyage is contained in a small volume
by Mr. George Hamilton, the surgeon, who appears to have been a coarse,
vulgar, and illiterate man, more disposed to relate licentious scenes
and adventures, in which he and his companions were engaged, than to
give any information of proceedings and occurrences connected with the
main object of the voyage. From this book, therefore, much information
is not to be looked for. In a more modern publication, many abusive
epithets have been bestowed on Captain Edwards, and observations made on
the conduct of this officer highly injurious to his reputation, in
regard to his inhuman treatment of, and disgraceful acts of cruelty
towards, his prisoners, which it is to be feared have but too much
foundation in fact.
The account of his proceedings, rendered by himself to the Admiralty, is
vague and unsatisfactory; and had it not been for the journal of
Morrison, and a circumstantial letter of young Heywood to his mother, no
record would have remained of the unfeeling conduct of this officer
towards his unfortunate prisoners, who were treated with a rigour which
could not be justified on any ground of necessity or prudence.
The _Pandora_ anchored in Matavai Bay on the 23rd March 1791. Captain
Edwards, in his narrative, states that Joseph Coleman, the armourer of
the _Bounty_, attempted to come on board before the _Pandora_ had
anchored; that on reaching the ship, he began to make inquiries of him
after the _Bounty_ and her people, and that he seemed to be ready to
give him any information that was required; that the next who came on
board, just after the ship had anchored, were Mr. Peter Heywood and Mr.
Stewart, before any boat had been sent on shore; that they were brought
down to his cabin, when, after some conversation, Heywood asked if Mr.
Hayward (midshipman of the _Bounty_, but now lieutenant of the
_Pandora_) was on board, as he had heard that he was; that Lieutenant
Hayward, whom he sent for, treated Heywood. with a sort of contemptuous
look, and began to enter into conversation with him respecting the
_Bounty_; but Edwards ordered him to desist, and called in the sentinel
to take the prisoners into safe custody, and to put them in irons; that
four other mutineers soon made their appearance; and that, from them and
some of the natives, he learned that the rest of the _Bounty's_ people
had built a schooner, with which they had sailed the day before from
Matavai Bay to the north-west part of the island.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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