HMS BOUNTY sailed from Spithead, England on December 23, 1787 with Captain Bligh and a crew of 45 men bound for Tahiti. Their mission was to collect Breadfruit plants to be transplanted in the West Indies as cheap food for the slaves. After collecting those plants. Bounty was under way toward home, when on the morning of april 28, 1789, Fletcher Christian and part of the crew mutinied, took over the ship and set the Captain and 18 members of the crew adrift in the ship's 23 foot launch. Bligh sailed the launch and 17 of the crew 3618 miles back to civilization. The mutineers took the Bounty back to Tahiti, and with 6 Polynesian men and 12 women, took the ship to the isolated site at Pitcairn island. After burning the ship and a violent beginning, they established a settlement and colony on Pitcairn Island that still exists.

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