KARL Lorbach has written a book that is bound to shake to the core any lovers of the accepted history of the mutiny on the Bounty. Conspiracy on the Bounty, taglined Bligh’s Convenient Mutiny, was 10 years in the making. Karl says it was not agenda driven, and he never planned to be an author, but certain discoveries he made throughout his life and through his interest in maritime history prompted him to write the book. “So many things came into my face, I just thought I’d have to make the time to put pen to paper,’’ the former marine engineer and boat builder says. Karl says there are hundreds of books and a whole industry surrounding Bountiana but he believes his book to be original because he questions whether Bligh was put out at all by the mutiny on the Bounty instigated by Fletcher Christian, and examines why he might have made so little effort to suppress it. “Not since 1987, when John Bach published The Bligh Notebook, has a single shred of new evidence been tabled or published,’’ he says. Karl’s book, in fact, suggests that it may have been in Bligh’s interest that the mutiny happened because his mission was failing. “I did worldwide research and the bibliography tells its own story,’’ Karl says, “and what’s in the book is only the tip of the iceberg. “Conspiracy on the Bounty challenges that neither Bligh nor Christian were martyrs because neither individual deserves that stamp. “If my book is confronting, it’s only because some will insist upon retaining the romantic melancholy of the legend, a legend so sacred that no investigator must be allowed to crack its shell.’’ The Cairns author’s thesis centres on the cargo of breadfruit that Bligh was cultivating on Tahiti and had on board the Bounty. Used as food for slaves, it was said to be a precious commodity at the time and Bligh’s mission was to bring it to the colonies. “The book relies on the breadfruit evidence,” Karl says, “not only the plant physiology but also the strategic empire – why it was necessary at the time”. Karl believes there was a cover-up about Bligh’s breadfruit plants and the strategic nature of his voyages. According to Karl, Bligh’s miseries were three-fold; he believed the French were going to win the breadfruit race as they had ships ahead of him en route to the Torres Strait, the plants he had onboard were not fl ourishing despite his claims to the contrary – a missing logbook does nothing to rebut this theory, and his ship was entirely unsuitable to navigate the Torres Strait. All these reasons that would have made his mission a failure, a failure he never had to endure because of the mutiny. Read the full interview with Karl at: cairns.au/article/2013/07/06/244873_lifestyle.html Denise Carter The Cairns Post (The Cairns Post Pty Ltd is part of News Limited.)
Posted on: Wed, 11 Sep 2013 03:45:00 +0000
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