JOHN ADAMS

ADAMS, JOHN (formerly known as Alexander Smith) (b. Stanford Hill, Middlesex 1757, d. Pitcairn Island, 5 March 1829). Able seaman, mutineer and patriarch.

John Adams took a prominent part in the mutiny and seizure of HMS Bounty on 28 April 1789 (his nickname was 'Reckless Jack') and along with others of the crew, their Tahitian women, and six island males as servants, settled on Pitcairn Island on 15 Jan 1790. He arrived as the consort of Oburaei (who bore him no children), by Vahineatua he had three daughters, and by his wife of later years, Teio, one son George. By 1808, when an American ship's captain, Mayhew Folger, discovered the colony, Adams was the lone survivor of the mutineers (who had met violent ends) with some eight or nine women and several children.

Two vivid dreams, including his past transgressions and the dire punishments that awaited him in hell, were motivating factors in Adam's subsequent repentance and conversion. Early visitors to Pitcairn extolled his merits as a kindly, wise, thoroughly regenerated, and deeply religious and moral patriarch. By the time of George Hunn Nobbs (q.v.) arrival in 1828 (the year before Adams' death) religious services had developed to the extent that observers wavered between boredom at their length and repetitiousness, and awe at what they were witnessing. Sir Thomas Staines, captain of HMS Briton commented that 'The pious manner in which all those born on the island have been reared, the correct sense of religion which has been instilled into their minds by this old man, has given him the pre-eminence over the whole of them'.

Greg Dening, Mr Bligh’s Bad Language: Passion, Power and Theatre on the Bounty(Cambridge, 1992); David Silverman, Pitcairn Island (Cleveland, 1967); Sir Thomas Staines, 'Account of the Descendants of Christian and Other Mutineers of the Bounty', Naval Chronicle 33, 217-18

RAYMOND NOBBS