On August 27, with Cheap ignoring the petition to return via Brazil, John Bulkeley secretly rallies allies and frames mutiny as lawful self-preservation, documenting Cheap’s unfitness. To legitimize any break in command, he courts Lieutenant Baynes, who insists on one last written appeal to Cheap. Armed, Bulkeley and Baynes present the document; Cheap refuses. At Pemberton’s hut, the crowd declares for England, but when Cheap confronts them, Baynes recoils, and the attempt collapses.

In the tense days after, Cheap’s support erodes: Purser Harvey defects, and steward Peter Plastow declares for the strait. A pistol standoff between Cheap and Bulkeley fizzles, then Cheap boldly faces the armed mob unarmed; no one strikes him, and he remains nominally in command despite isolation.

Starvation worsens, with Byron recording deaths and the onset of cannibalism. On October 5, after 144 days ashore, the castaways launch the rebuilt longboat, christened the 'Speedwell', offering a real chance to escape. Byron hopes all might depart together, though factions persist.

Before dawn on October 9, Bulkeley assembles an armed party, seizes Cheap in his sleep, and arrests Lieutenant Hamilton. Charged over Cozens’s death, Cheap produces his commission but is bound; Baynes now joins the rebellion. Boatswain King strikes the captive. Bulkeley becomes de facto commander, organizes scant provisions, stows his journal, and issues rules: equal division of food; theft or violence punished by abandonment; all must sign.

Debating Cheap’s fate, Bulkeley argues he is too dangerous and space too limited to carry him as a prisoner. Cheap prefers being left to being transported bound. Bulkeley drafts a justification to the Lord High Admiral and leaves Cheap a damaged yawl, meager stores, and basic instruments. Hamilton and Surgeon Elliot stay with Cheap; seven seceders also remain, while Mitchell has vanished after rafting away—ten in all on the island.

On October 14, 1741, the parties divide: 59 cram into the longboat, 12 into the cutter, and 10 into the barge—81 men bound for the Magellan passage and Brazil. Cheap endures taunts, then exchanges a restrained farewell handshake with Bulkeley. As the flotilla clears the surf, Cheap asks that his story be told, watching their sails fade and fearing his account will be lost.