If our Naylor Noggin trophy was to be awarded for the best open boat cruise log in all history, who would it go to? Bearing in mind that the quality and value of accompanying maps/charts are normally taken into account, I reckon it would have to be that much maligned sailor, Captain William Bligh!

Admittedly Bligh’s employee relationships were not too good, but this largely self-educated man not only navigated his overloaded open launch and its starving crew through 6,705 km of stormy uncharted waters in 47 days, but charted it all too! When we submit logs to the DCA Bulletin our charts are usually traced from OS maps or other sources. All Bligh had was his own observations, a sextant and a rain sodden notebook, yet he produced charts and drawings of high professional quality. He provided new and invaluable navigation information for the Friendly Islands, the Fijis, some of the New Hebrides, a passage through the Great Barrier Reef, plus further information on Australia’s Cape York. Bligh also recorded species of plants and creatures hitherto unknown to the scientists of his day.

Incidentally, the builder’s lines for Bligh’s launch have survived, and a replica has been built; it was a tiny boat, probably ‘state of the art’ in its time, but of course intended only for local coastal and river exploration, not for open sea work.

Adding to the problems of Bligh’s open boat voyage was the quality of some of those cast off with him. Some seamen left on the Bounty, despite the risks, would have preferred to be cast off with Bligh, but instead Fletcher Christian dumped three idle and whinging midshipmen and the bolshy Sailing Master who may have covertly supported the mutiny.

At the youthful age of 22, Bligh had been Captain Cook’s Sailing Master on his last voyage, and had been in the fighting on the beach in which Cook was killed. The fine charts made on that great voyage of exploration were largely Bligh’s work, but a bumptious aristocrat claimed all the credit. Nevertheless Bligh had his supporters at the Admiralty, and he was eventually promoted to Vice Admiral, fighting with Lord Nelson at Copenhagen in 1801. (Where Nelson famously turned his blind eye at the order to withdraw). Bligh is buried in the grounds of Lambeth Palace, and his botanical discoveries are displayed in the Museum of Gardening there. The inscription on his tombstone states that he was ‘much loved’. He was at least a caring father to his severely handicapped daughter, at a time when such unfortunate children were usually put away. Paranoiac Bligh may have been, a driven man he was, but no one had ever or will ever again produce such an outstanding open-boat cruise log.