CHAPTER XIV 



THE VOYAGE OF THE "PANDORA," 1791 

 EDWARD EDWARDS 



" PANDORA " SENT TO APPREHEND " BOUNTY " MUTINEERS. ARRESTS FOURTEEN AT 

 TAHITI. REACHES MURRAY ISLANDS. WRECKED AT PANDORA ENTRANCE WHILE 

 SEARCHING FOR A PASSAGE THROUGH BARRIER REEF. MANY DROWNED. SURVIVORS 

 TAKE TO BOATS. BOATS THREAD BARRIER REEF AND REACH QUEENSLAND COAST 

 NEAR ORFORD NESS. NORTHWARD TO MOUNT ADOLPHUS ISLAND. SKIRMISH 

 WITH NATIVES. WESTWARD. HORN ISLAND. WOLVES (DINGOES). HUNGER AND 

 THIRST. THROUGH FLINDERS PASSAGE (BETWEEN HORN AND WEDNESDAY ISLANDS) 

 AND PRINCE OF WALES CHANNEL. GOOD ISLAND. TIMOR. PASSENGERS TO 

 SPITHEAD. TRIAL AND PUNISHMENT OF MUTINEERS. 



THE " Pandora" a frigate carrying 160 men and 24 guns, 

 was commanded by CAPTAIN (afterwards Admiral) 

 EDWARD EDWARDS. Her commission was to capture 

 and bring to punishment the mutineers who had seized 

 the " Bounty" one of His Majesty's ships of war, and turned her 

 Captain and his adherents adrift in an unvictualled open boat. 

 The fullest record of this voyage is the narrative of the Surgeon, 

 George Hamilton. 1 Next in importance as regards detail, though 

 probably more reliable as to the navigation, are the Commander's 

 Reports to the Admiralty, especially one dealing with the wreck 

 on the Barrier Reef and the subsequent passage of the survivors, 

 in four boats, through Torres Strait. 1 Then a Chart of the 

 Voyage, up to the date of the wreck, was constructed by Lieu- 

 tenant Hayward, and was published in 1798 by Alexander 

 Dalrymple. From the above materials, Flinders compiled a 

 short account of the voyage for his introductory chapter of Terra 

 Australis (I, XVI). On his own chart, he copied the route, as far 

 as the wreck, from Dalrymple ; but he frankly admitted that, as 

 regards the boat voyage, the imperfection of the narrative had 

 baffled his editorial capacity. No serious attempt to identify 

 the route followed by the boats appears to have been made up to 

 1915, when Basil Thomson, 8 formerly of the Colonial Service and 



1 A Voyage Round the World in H.M. Frigate " Pandora," by George Hamilton, 

 Surgeon, R.N. Berwick and London, 1793. 



a Report dated Batavia, 25th November, 1791 ; endorsed " 29th May, 1792, from 

 Amsterdam." 



3 Voyage of H.M.S. " Pandora," dispatched to arrest the Mutineers of the " Bounty " ; 

 being the Narratives of Captain Edward Edwards, R.N., the Commander, and George 

 Hamilton, the Surgeon. London, Francis Edwards, 1915. 



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