Tall ships are regular visitors to Irish ports these days and, last week, The Bounty paid a visit to Derry. Not the original, of course, but a replica that was built for the 1962 film, 'Mutiny on the Bounty'. That was not the original either and, at the end of that movie, the fiction was that the mutineers burned and sank the ship lest its presence would betray them to Royal Navy vessels which would be searching the South Pacific to find them and bring them to justice.

The visit of the ship to Derry was unscheduled, but very appropriate, as there was a Derry man among the crew of the Bounty at the time of the celebrated mutiny and about whom more anon.

The Bounty had set sail in 1787 to bring breadfruit to the Caribbean to be cultivated as a cheap form of food for the slaves on British plantations there. The captain, William Bligh, had already, as a young naval engineer, built the North Wall on Dublin Bay, thus enhancing the attractiveness of the port for shipping. He has come down in popular legend as a harsh and tyrannical officer, but studies of his ships' logs would indicate that he was no better nor no worse than the typical captain of the British Navy of his time. Captain James Cook was every bit as thorough a disciplinarian: He enjoys the image of a martyred hero, whilst Bligh is always thought of as something of a villain. The movies did not help his reputation. His men considered him as an eccentric and resented the daily dancing exercises which he ordered as a way of keeping his crew fit; he had a fiddler on the boat for the purpose, and could be regarded as one of the pioneers of aerobic exercises performed to music.

The replica ship was en route to Maryport, Cumbria, birthplace of Fletcher Christian, the ringleader of the mutineers. There were apparently frictions between this officer and the captain, most of them arising out of the resentments of Fletcher, who considered himself an aristocrat, against his superior officer who had come up through the ranks and was held in such high esteem by the Admiralty

The expedition succeeded in reaching Tahiti and collecting the specimens which had been sought. The sailors seem to have experienced an idyllic interlude on the "Islands of Paradise" and, consequently, felt it the more difficult to readopt to the humdrum and uncongenial tasks on board the ship when they resumed their duties for the homeward voyage.

The films have Christian confronting Bligh on the bridge of the ship; the actuality was that Christian and those who lived with him seized control of the ship when the captain was asleep in his bunk. And whilst the mutineers by no means included every crew member, they had commanded all of the weaponry on board and were thus effectively in control. Bligh and the 18 men that were loyal to him were cast adrift in a longboat, with minimum supplies of food and water and were left to fend for themselves as best they could. It is a tribute to Bligh's superb skills of seamanship that he was able not only to survive but to navigate his way to Australia, a journey of almost 4,000 miles.

He returned to London where he was obliged to face a tribunal of enquiry into the serious business of the loss of a ship of the line. He was exonerated and given another command. The Admiralty set out in pursuit of the mutineers. Some of them settled on an island called Pitcairn, where their descendants are to be found to this day. The charts that the Navy used had misplaced Pitcairn and the mutineers who had taken up residence there were never found. Fletcher and four followers quarrelled with a group of Tahitians and in the course of the affray Fletcher was killed. For years, a rumour persisted that he had made his way back to England. Ten of those who stayed on board the Bounty were subsequently apprehended by the Royal Navy in various parts of Australasia. They survived to be tried by a naval court; three were hanged, two were found guilty but pardoned, another one was reprieved. Four were designated as innocent by Captain Bligh. One of the acquitted was the Derryman, Michael Byrne, who was able to convince the court that although he remained on board the Bounty, he was not a mutineer or a supporter of the mutiny, but had been forcibly held on board by the others to help them steer and manage the ship.

Bligh resumed his naval career and went on to become a Vice Admiral and, in 1808 when he held a dry land post as governor of New South Wales, he faced an uprising in an incident known as the Rum Rebellion. Perhaps he could have benefited from a course in management studies.

Here is the script, spoken by Charles Laughton as Bligh in the 1935 film: "Casting me adrift 3,500 miles from port of call! You're sending me to my doom eh? Well, you're wrong Christian, I'll take this boat, as she floats, to England if I must. I'll live to see you, all of you, hanging from the highest yardarm in the British fleet..."

Powerful stuff altogether.

In evidence, the court heard that the defendant was being pursued by the Inland Revenue who were dissatisfied that he had filed no comprehensive tax returns for several years. The defendant had been noted playing guitar with a rock band at various venues in the vicinity and it was the belief of the Revenue authorities that he was not doing it without remuneration. He explained that he had never given such matters much thought and having been asked to join the band on an occasional basis, he had decided to do so, without considering the tax and the fiscal implications. "In other words," said the presiding judge, "he thought he would just string along."

The Irish News has reported how a supply of Goldfish in a Falls Road pet shop "flew off the shelves". The only other product to have flown off the shelves was the last Harry Potter novel!

DNA experts have been called in to examine two skulls in Weimar to determine which one belongs to the German poet Schiller. Could it be that one of these is Schiller's as a young man and the other is Schiller in his middle age.

There seems to be a problem with stray dogs in Omagh. The council used to have a van with the inscription, "Dog warden and litter prevention."

Following a dust-up at a recent wedding celebration in Aberdeen, the groom had to be taken to hospital after the bride smashed his head with her stiletto heel. A BBC newsreader added, "He needs his head examined."

The 30th anniversary of the passing of Elvis has come and gone. As the fellow said, "The brand plays on."