Death on the Bounty

In 1789, the crew of H. M. S. Bounty mutinied in mid-Pacific, put Captain William Bligh and 18 loyal men into an open boat, sailed to Tahiti. Instead of starving or drowning, Captain Bligh and his sailors made a voyage of 4,000 miles back to England, sent a frigate to punish the mutineers. When the frigate reached Tahiti, only a few of the mutineers were there to be hanged. The rest had sailed the Bounty to Pitcairn Island where they had beached and burned her and where their descendants still live.

Last year Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer bought Mutiny on the Bounty by James Norman Hall & Charles Nordhoff (TIME, Oct. 17, 1932). Last spring production started with Charles Laughton for Bligh, Clark Gable and Franchot Tone for sailors, San Miguel Island, 35 miles off Santa Barbara, for Pitcairn Island and a $15,000 barge with $50,000 worth of equipment for the Bounty. As unfortunate as her predecessor, the cinema Bounty last month broke a towrope, drifted out to sea with a watchman on board, remained lost for three days.

Last week off San Miguel Island, a heavy squall struck the Bounty, swept away a water tank support, swamped the barge, spilled 25 technicians into the water. Assistant Director James Havens, in charge of the location unit, described how a cameraman named Glenn Strong drowned in the confusion that followed: "Strong went back to retrieve his camera which was on a superstructure. The superstructure collapsed, carrying him into the water with two others. His companions swam to safety. Strong clung to some timber for a time. But in the excitement, no one saw him go down."

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