William Pitt the Younger intelligence network of spies and informers to crush the United Irishmen. In April 1797, the Pitt government was badly shaken by the mutiny of the entire fleet at Spithead with the sailors demanding a pay increase to match inflation. The Spithead mutiny occurred at exactly the same moment that the French and their Dutch allies were preparing for an invasion of Great Britain which threw the government into a state of panic. To regain control of the fleet, Pitt agreed to sailors' demands for pay increases and to have George III pardon the mutineers. By contrast, the more political "floating
Pitt Bank and the deepest areas of the former lagoon reach 44 metres. The much smaller Wight Bank is located 6 km to the SE off the southeastern tip of Pitt Bank. This submerged atoll was named after William Pitt the Younger, who was a British prime minister in 1783–1801 and 1804–1806. A buoy, marked by a radar reflector, is moored on the NW side of the bank. Pitt Bank Pitt Bank is a wholly submerged atoll structure in the Southwest of the Chagos Archipelago. It is almost 56 km long Northwest to Southeast, with a width between 20 and 30 km.