Bounty mutineers' descendants argued in 2004 that burning the ship in 1790 put Pitcairn outside British law, and the Privy Council rejected it in 2006

On 28 April 1789 Fletcher Christian took HMAV Bounty and set William Bligh adrift in the ship's launch with 18 loyalists. Bligh sailed 3,618 nautical miles to Timor. The mutineers settled on Pitcairn and burned the ship in 1790. In 1808, as governor of New South Wales, Bligh was arrested by about 400 soldiers of the New South Wales Corps. He died in 1817 with six daughters; his twin sons had died as infants. His New South Wales properties (Copenhagen, Camperdown, Mount Betham, Simpson's Farm and Tyler's Farm) were administered and sold between 1838 and 1846. His tomb is at the Garden Museum in Lambeth. In 2004 seven men on Pitcairn, one third of the island's men, faced 55 sexual-offence charges. The island had 47 people. The defence argued that the mutineers had renounced British citizenship by burning the Bounty, so British law did not apply. The Pitcairn Supreme Court rejected that on 18 April 2004. On 24 October 2004 six men were convicted on 35 charges. They included the mayor, Steve Christian, who says he descends from Fletcher Christian; he received three years. His son Randy received six years. The Privy Council dismissed the sovereignty argument in July 2006, and the final appeals failed on 30 October 2006.