Transcript
HERBERT FORD: We have sent a few strands of each pigtail of hair gathered from the very centre of the pigtail of hair packaged in a special envelope to King's College. Then of course once they have done this DNA testing then we'll go to another test, a maternal genealogical test that will be much more difficult and will be confined only to the feminine side of descendancy. We'll start with the mother of one of the mutineers we know was on Pitcairn Island, and see if she had any daughters - if she did, then did that daughter have any daughters and on down and down and down until a presently living female descendant. If somewhere along the way that daughter did not have any daughters then of course that study in that line stops completely. So you can see it's a rather difficult task that we have.
SALLY ROUND: And could take several years?
HF: It could take several years, that's true. The DNA initial testing will probably go much quicker. But it probably will only tell us whether or not these pigtails are from European people or Polynesian people.
SR: And given that you've studied this extensively, the story of the mutineers, why would these pigtails have been chopped off and put together? I've seen the photo of them - they're sort of linked on a bit of twine.
HF: In that day and time the cutting of pigtails of hair, giving them to or keeping them by different people was kind of a term of endearment and it was not unusual at all. In this particular case, a young lady, Polynesian in character, named Sarah, a daughter of William McCoy, one of the mutineers, well she was not his own daughter, she was the daughter of his Polynesian consort wife and of a Polynesian father, fathered before Tio, which is the mother's name, left Tahiti with the mutineers. That's kind of complicated but that's the way it was and so this young lady - according to the written history - then convinced seven of these nine mutineers that came to Pitcairn to allow her to cut seven pigtails of their hair, and three of the twelve Polynesian women that came to the island also. She was ten months old when the mutineers landed on Pitcairn, and she was brought aboard to Pitcairn Island from the ship in a barrel. So from the time she was the only child on the island, she was quite a special feature of Pitcairn Island.
SR: Can you explain why this need to get some sort of proof of the identity of the mutineers, because there are descendants aren't there on Pitcairn, they've got the surnames of these men?
HF: Yes and on Norfolk Island too. But this is kind of like moutaineers. There's a mountain there and why do we make such trouble to climb this mountain? Well, simply because it's there. But in our case, we have specialised in accuracy. We have determined that we are not going to give any information about the Bounty saga as we call it to people all over the world who contact us that we have any reason to believe is not the truth.
SR: And why do you think there is such an abiding interest in the story of the mutineers?
HF: Well, it has all the emotions, love and romance and murder and adventure and intrigue; all kinds of the emotions that you could think of. And there's something new happening about the saga of the Bounty all the time. I'm reading right at the moment in the study centre two book manuscripts of new books that are coming out. And there's hardly a month goes by that some new book or new major magazine article, or major newspaper or TV documentary, isn't done about the Bounty saga. It's just a story that refuses to die.
SR: And if you do succeeded in this quest to have these pigtails identified and traced back to the mutineers, how significant is this going to be for all those people interested in the Pitcairn story?
HF: I can't answer that, but I can say that it's going to be significant to us because it will have been true to our charter of accuracy, and that's what we're really interested in right now. What we can do, to do the right thing... what other people take from that is going to be up to them.
