The Quintals Of
p. 25 · Read in the full issue
Norfolk Is.
WITH the death of Cornelius Quintal (“Uncle Cornish”) at Norfolk Island on February 10, 1934 (writes Mr. W. D.
Evans, in the “Sydney Morning Herald” of January 19) the band of 194 Pitcairners who arrived on June 8, 1856, by the “Morayshire” is slowly disappearing.
Cornelius Quintal was a grandson of Mathew Quintal, one of the youngest members—he was only 21—of the “Bounty” mutineers, who sent Lieutenant William Bligh, R.N., with 18 loyal mem bers of the crew on a 3600-miles voyage to Koepang, in Timor, in the ship’s launch. Later, young Quintal joined Fletcher Christian, leader of the mutiny, and eight other “Bounty’’ men when they sailed with 12 Tahitian women and six Tahitian men for Pitcairn Island.
Many Quintals, speaking perfect Eng lish, in addition to their quaint Tahitian- English patois, continued Mr. Evans, are domiciled on historic Norfolk Island to day. So, too, are many other descend ants of the Bounty crew, and of those who linked up with them on Pitcairn Island in 1818 and 1828.
Another worthy member of the Quintal family was a sergeant in a New Zealand contingent, which was engaged in veldt and kopje fighting in the Boer War. Ser geant Quintal was a fine athletic type of soldier, lighter-complexioned than many of the half-caste Maoris of the force. He was an excellent horseman, cool-headed, and possessed of bulldog courage.
The intermarriage of the Pitcairn Islanders over a period of 111 years, con cluded Mr. Evans, found no reflex of de generacy, or decadence in physical or mental attributes, in the case of this dauntless fighter.