Eddystone Point lies on the north-east coast of

Tasmania ) , nickname = , image_map = Tasmania in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of Tasmania in AustraliaCoordinates: , subdivision_type = Country , subdi ...

, Australia at 40.994 S/148.349 E.

History

The first European to sight Eddystone Point was the Dutch navigator,

Abel Tasman Abel Janszoon Tasman (; 160310 October 1659) was a Dutch seafarer, explorer, and merchant, best known for his voyages of 1642 and 1644 in the service of the Dutch East India Company (VOC). He was the first known European explorer to reach New ...

. In December 1642, Tasman sailed along the entire east coast of

Van Diemen's Land Van Diemen's Land was the colonial name of the island of Tasmania used by the British during the European exploration of Australia in the 19th century. A British settlement was established in Van Diemen's Land in 1803 before it became a sep ...

(Tasmania). He recorded that he tried to follow the coast around this headland, but he could not penetrate the wind wall. The howling westerly gale indicated that here was a strait, not a bay, so Tasman resumed his easterly course to continue his continent-hunting. The next European visitor was

Tobias Furneaux Captain Tobias Furneaux (21 August 173518 September 1781) was an English navigator and Royal Navy officer, who accompanied James Cook on his second voyage of exploration. He was one of the first men to circumnavigate the world in both directions ...

in HMS Adventure during

James Cook James Cook (7 November 1728 Old Style date: 27 October – 14 February 1779) was a British explorer, navigator, cartographer, and captain in the British Royal Navy, famous for his three voyages between 1768 and 1779 in the Pacific Ocean and ...

's second Pacific voyage, which took place during the period of intense Anglo-French rivalry that filled the twelve years between the

Seven Years' War The Seven Years' War (1756–1763) was a global conflict that involved most of the European Great Powers, and was fought primarily in Europe, the Americas, and Asia-Pacific. Other concurrent conflicts include the French and Indian War (1754 ...

and the

American Revolutionary War The American Revolutionary War (April 19, 1775 – September 3, 1783), also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence, was a major war of the American Revolution. Widely considered as the war that secured the independence of t ...

. In March 1773, Furneaux retraced Tasman's course up the east coast of the island to discover whether or not it was joined to New Holland. At 2 a.m. on 19 March, his ship was suddenly tossed 40 miles out to sea and lost its sails. Furneaux named the headland Eddystone Point, after the notorious

Eddystone Rocks The Eddystone or Eddystone Rocks are a seaswept and eroded group of rocks ranging southwest of Rame Head in Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. Although the nearest point on the mainland to the Eddystone is in Cornwall, the rocks fall within the ...

in the

English Channel The English Channel, "The Sleeve"; nrf, la Maunche, "The Sleeve" ( Cotentinais) or ( Jèrriais), ( Guernésiais), "The Channel"; br, Mor Breizh, "Sea of Brittany"; cy, Môr Udd, "Lord's Sea"; kw, Mor Bretannek, "British Sea"; nl, Het Ka ...

. Seal hunting took place here from at least 1827. Six applications were made to the colonial government to lease land for whaling stations at Eddystone Point in 1841. It is uncertain how many of these leases were taken up.

Eddystone Point Lighthouse

In 1884, the adjacent colonies of Tasmania and Victoria were discussing the erection of a

lighthouse A lighthouse is a tower, building, or other type of physical structure designed to emit light from a system of lamps and lenses and to serve as a beacon for navigational aid, for maritime pilots at sea or on inland waterways. Lighthouses m ...

at Eddystone Point, which was eventually built in 1889. The lighthouse and keepers' cottages are made of

granite Granite () is a coarse-grained ( phaneritic) intrusive igneous rock composed mostly of quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase. It forms from magma with a high content of silica and alkali metal oxides that slowly cools and solidifies un ...

, quarried from nearby. Head of works and head mason was James Galloway from

Glasgow Glasgow ( ; sco, Glesca or ; gd, Glaschu ) is the most populous city in Scotland and the fourth-most populous city in the United Kingdom, as well as being the 27th largest city by population in Europe. In 2020, it had an estimated popu ...

, Scotland, who migrated to Tasmania to oversee the building program. His brother, Alexander Galloway, also migrated from Glasgow to work on the building of the lighthouse and cottages. In the early 1920s, heavy storms damaged the buildings, jetties and equipment, and flooded the tower. In 1935,

wireless communication Wireless communication (or just wireless, when the context allows) is the transfer of information between two or more points without the use of an electrical conductor, optical fiber or other continuous guided medium for the transfer. The most ...

was installed. In 1960, the First Order

Chance Brothers Chance Brothers and Company was a glassworks originally based in Spon Lane, Smethwick, West Midlands (formerly in Staffordshire), in England. It was a leading glass manufacturer and a pioneer of British glassmaking technology. The Chance fam ...

lens that had been removed from the Cape du Couedic Lighthouse on

Kangaroo Island Kangaroo Island, also known as Karta Pintingga (literally 'Island of the Dead' in the language of the Kaurna people), is Australia's third-largest island, after Tasmania and Melville Island. It lies in the state of South Australia, southwest ...

South Australia South Australia (commonly abbreviated as SA) is a States and territories of Australia, state in the southern central part of Australia. It covers some of the most arid parts of the country. With a total land area of , it is the fourth-largest o ...

was shipped to

Melbourne Melbourne ( ; Boonwurrung/ Woiwurrung: ''Narrm'' or ''Naarm'') is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Victoria, and the second-most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Its name generally refers to a metro ...

for installation at Eddystone Point Lighthouse. CC-BY icon

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References

External links

* {{Commons category-inline, Eddystone Point Lighthouse *John Smeato
''A narrative of the building and a description of the construction of the Edystone Lighthouse''
(1791 and 1793 editions) –

Linda Hall Library The Linda Hall Library is a privately endowed American library of science, engineering and technology located in Kansas City, Missouri, sitting "majestically on a urban arboretum." It is the "largest independently funded public library of scien ...

North East Tasmania Lighthouses in Tasmania Seal hunting Whaling stations in Australia