The Eddystone Lighthouse is a
lighthouse
A lighthouse is a tower, building, or other type of physical structure designed to emit light from a system of lamps and lens (optics), lenses and to serve as a beacon for navigational aid for maritime pilots at sea or on inland waterways.
Ligh ...
on the
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 ...
, south of
Rame Head in
Cornwall
Cornwall (; or ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South West England. It is also one of the Celtic nations and the homeland of the Cornish people. The county is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, ...
, England. The rocks are submerged below the surface of the sea and are composed of
Precambrian
The Precambrian ( ; or pre-Cambrian, sometimes abbreviated pC, or Cryptozoic) is the earliest part of Earth's history, set before the current Phanerozoic Eon. The Precambrian is so named because it preceded the Cambrian, the first period of t ...
gneiss.
[ View at 1:50000 scale]
The current structure is the fourth to be built on the site. The first lighthouse (Winstanley's) was swept away in a powerful storm, killing its architect and five other men in the process. The second (Rudyard's) stood for fifty years before it burned down. The third (Smeaton's) is renowned because of its influence on
lighthouse design and its importance in the development of concrete for building; its upper portions were re-erected in Plymouth as a monument.
The first lighthouse, completed in 1699, was the world's first open ocean lighthouse, although the
Cordouan Lighthouse off the western French coast preceded it as the first offshore lighthouse.
The need for a light
The Eddystone Rocks are an extensive reef approximately SSW off
Plymouth Sound, one of the most important naval harbours of England, and midway between
Lizard Point, Cornwall and
Start Point. They are submerged at high spring tides and were so feared by mariners entering the English Channel that they often hugged the coast of France to avoid the danger, which thus resulted not only in shipwrecks locally, but on the rocks of the north coast of France and the Channel Islands. Given the difficulty of gaining a foothold on the rocks particularly in the predominant swell it was a long time before anyone attempted to place any warning on them.
Winstanley's lighthouse

The first lighthouse on Eddystone Rocks was an octagonal wooden structure built by
Henry Winstanley
Henry Winstanley (31 March 1644 – 27 November 1703) was an English painter, engineer, and merchant who constructed the first Eddystone Lighthouse after losing two of his ships on the Eddystone rocks. He died while working on the project dur ...
. The lighthouse was also the first recorded instance of an offshore lighthouse.
Construction started in 1696 and the light was lit on 14 November 1698. During construction, a French
privateer took Winstanley prisoner and destroyed the work done so far on the foundations, causing
Louis XIV
LouisXIV (Louis-Dieudonné; 5 September 16381 September 1715), also known as Louis the Great () or the Sun King (), was King of France from 1643 until his death in 1715. His verified reign of 72 years and 110 days is the List of longest-reign ...
to order Winstanley's release with the words "France is at war with England, not with humanity".
The lighthouse survived its first winter but was in need of repair, and was subsequently changed to a dodecagonal (12 sided) stone clad exterior on a timber-framed construction with an octagonal top section as can be seen in the later drawings or paintings. The octagonal top section (or 'lantern') was high and in diameter, its eight windows each made up of 36 individual glass panes. It was lit by '60 candles at a time, besides a great hanging lamp'.
Winstanley's tower lasted until the
great storm of 1703 erased almost all trace on . Winstanley was on the lighthouse, completing additions to the structure. No trace was found of him, or of the other five men in the lighthouse.
The cost of construction and five years' maintenance totalled £7,814 7''s.''6''d'', during which time dues totalling £4,721 19''s.''3''d'' had been collected at one penny per ton from passing vessels.
Rudyard's lighthouse
Following the destruction of the first lighthouse, Captain John Lovett
[Later Colonel John Lovett (c. 1660–1710) of Liscombe Park Buckinghamshire and Corfe, (son and heir of former merchant in Turkey, Christopher Lovett, lord mayor of Dublin 1676–1677) and uncle of noted architect Edward Lovett Pearce 1699–1733.] acquired the lease of the rock, and by an
act of Parliament, the (
4 & 5 Ann. c. 7), was allowed to charge passing ships a
toll of one penny per ton. He commissioned
John Rudyard (or Rudyerd) to design the new lighthouse.

Rudyard's lighthouse, in contrast to its predecessor, was a smooth conical tower, shaped 'so as to offer the least possible resistance to wind and wave'.
It was built on a base of solid wood, formed from layers of timber beams, laid horizontally on seven flat steps which had been cut into the upper face of the sloping rock. On top of this base rose several courses of stone, interspersed with further layers of wood, which was designed to serve as
ballast for the tower. This substructure rose to a height of , on top of which were raised four storeys of timber. The entire structure was sheathed in vertical wooden planks and anchored to the reef using 36 wrought iron bolts, forged to fit deep
dovetailed holes which had been cut in the reef. The vertical planks were installed by two master-shipwrights from
Woolwich Dockyard
Woolwich Dockyard (formally H.M. Dockyard, Woolwich, also known as The King's Yard, Woolwich) was an English Royal Navy Dockyard, naval dockyard along the river Thames at Woolwich - originally in north-west Kent, now in southeast London - whe ...
and were
caulked like those of a ship.
The tower was topped with an octagonal lantern, which brought it to a total height of .
A light was first shone from the tower on and the work was completed in 1709. The light was provided by 24 candles.
Rudyard's lighthouse proved more durable than its predecessor, surviving and serving its purpose on the reef for nearly 50 years.
In 1715 Captain Lovett died and his lease was purchased by Robert Weston, Esq., in company with two others (one of whom was Rudyard).
On the night of 2 December 1755, the top of the lantern caught fire, probably through a spark from one of the candles used to illuminate the light, or else through a fracture in the chimney which passed through the lantern from the stove in the kitchen below.
The three keepers threw water upwards from a bucket but were driven onto the rock and were rescued by boat as the tower burnt down. Keeper
Henry Hall, who was 94 at the time, died several days later from ingesting molten lead from the lantern roof.
A report on this case was submitted to the
Royal Society
The Royal Society, formally The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, is a learned society and the United Kingdom's national academy of sciences. The society fulfils a number of roles: promoting science and its benefits, re ...
by physician Edward Spry,
and the piece of lead is now in the collections of the
National Museums of Scotland.
Smeaton's lighthouse
The third lighthouse to be built on the Eddystone marked a major step forward in the design of such structures.
Design and building
Following the destruction of Rudyard's tower, Robert Weston sought advice on rebuilding the lighthouse from the
Earl of Macclesfield, then President of the
Royal Society
The Royal Society, formally The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, is a learned society and the United Kingdom's national academy of sciences. The society fulfils a number of roles: promoting science and its benefits, re ...
.
He recommended
mathematical instrument maker and aspiring
civil engineer
A civil engineer is a person who practices civil engineering – the application of planning, designing, constructing, maintaining, and operating infrastructure while protecting the public and environmental health, as well as improving existing i ...
,
John Smeaton
John Smeaton (8 June 1724 – 28 October 1792) was an English civil engineer responsible for the design of bridges, canals, harbours and lighthouses. He was also a capable mechanical engineer and an eminent scholar, who introduced various ...
, who was introduced to Weston in February 1756. In May, following a series of visits to the rock, Smeaton proposed that the new lighthouse should be built of stone and modelled on the shape of an
oak tree
An oak is a hardwood tree or shrub in the genus ''Quercus'' of the Fagaceae, beech family. They have spirally arranged leaves, often with lobed edges, and a nut called an acorn, borne within a cup. The genus is widely distributed in the Northe ...
.
He appointed Josias Jessop to serve as his general assistant, and established a shore base for the construction works at
Millbay.
Work began on the reef in August 1756, with the gradual cutting away of recesses in the rock which were designed to dovetail in due course with the foundations of the tower. During the winter, the workers stayed ashore and were employed in
dressing the stone for the lighthouse; work then resumed on the rock the following June, with the laying of the first
courses of stone.
The foundations and outside structure were built of local Cornish granite, while lighter Portland limestone masonry was used on the inside. As part of the construction process, Smeaton pioneered '
hydraulic lime
Hydraulic lime (HL) is a general term for a variety of lime different from calcium oxide (quicklime), that sets by hydration and consists of calcium silicate and calcium aluminate, compounds that can harden in contact with water. This contras ...
', a concrete that cured under water, and developed a technique of securing the blocks using
dovetail joints and
marble
Marble is a metamorphic rock consisting of carbonate minerals (most commonly calcite (CaCO3) or Dolomite (mineral), dolomite (CaMg(CO3)2) that have recrystallized under the influence of heat and pressure. It has a crystalline texture, and is ty ...
dowels. Work continued over the course of the following two years, and the light was first lit on 16 October 1759.
Smeaton's lighthouse was high and had a diameter at the base of and at the top of . It was lit by a chandelier of 24 large tallow candles.
Later modifications
In 1807 the 100-year lease on the lighthouse expired, whereupon ownership and management devolved to
Trinity House. In 1810 they replaced the chandelier and candles with 24
Argand lamps and
parabolic reflectors.
In 1841 major renovations were made, under the direction of engineer
Henry Norris of Messrs.
Walker &
Burges, including complete repointing, replacement water tanks and filling of a large cavity in the rock close to the foundations. In 1845 the lighthouse was equipped with a new
second-order fixed
catadioptric optic, manufactured by Henry Lepaute of Paris, with a single multi-wick oil lamp, replacing the old lamps and reflectors.
This was the first time that a fully
catadioptric large optic (using prisms rather than mirrors above and below the lens) had been constructed,
and the first such installation in any lighthouse. A new lantern was constructed and fitted to the top of the tower in 1848, as the original had proved unsatisfactory for housing the new optic.
From 1858 the tower's exterior was painted with broad red and white horizontal bands, so as to render it 'more distinctly visible during the day time'. In 1872 a 5
cwt fog bell was provided for the lighthouse; it was sounded 'five times in quick succession every half minute' in foggy weather. That same year an improved lamp was installed, which more than doubled the intensity of the light.
In 1877 it was resolved to build a replacement lighthouse, following reports that erosion to the rocks under Smeaton's tower was causing it to shake from side to side whenever large waves hit. During construction of the new lighthouse, the Town Council of
Plymouth
Plymouth ( ) is a port city status in the United Kingdom, city and unitary authority in Devon, South West England. It is located on Devon's south coast between the rivers River Plym, Plym and River Tamar, Tamar, about southwest of Exeter and ...
petitioned for Smeaton's tower to be dismantled and rebuilt on
Plymouth Hoe
Plymouth Hoe, referred to locally as the Hoe, is a large south-facing open public space in the English coastal city of Plymouth, Devon.
The Hoe is adjacent to and above the low limestone cliffs that form the seafront and commands views of Pl ...
, in lieu of a Trinity House
daymark which stood there. Trinity House consented to the removal and delivery of the lantern and the upper four rooms of the tower, the cost of labour to be borne by Plymouth Council.
While the new tower was being built the old lighthouse remained operational, up until 3 February 1882 (after which a temporary fixed light was shown from the top of the new tower). When the latter was complete, Smeaton's lighthouse was decommissioned and the crane which had been used to build the new lighthouse was transferred to the task of dismantling the old.
William Tregarthen Douglass supervised the operation.
Present day

The upper part of Smeaton's lighthouse was subsequently rebuilt, as planned, on top of a replica granite
frustum on Plymouth Hoe: preserved 'as a monument to Smeaton's genius, and in commemoration of one of the most successful, useful and instructive works ever accomplished in civil engineering'.
The rebuilding was funded by
public subscription. It remains in place today and, as '
Smeaton's Tower
Smeaton's Tower is a redundant lighthouse, now a memorial to civil engineer John Smeaton, designer of the third and most notable Eddystone Lighthouse#Smeaton.27s lighthouse, Eddystone Lighthouse. A major step forward in lighthouse design, Smeat ...
', is open to the public as a tourist attraction.
The original frustum or base of the tower also survives, standing where it was built on the Eddystone rocks, from the current lighthouse. Having dismantled the upper part of the structure, Douglass infilled the old entrance way and stairwell within the frustum and fixed an iron mast to the top of the stub tower. He expressed the hope that 'the rock below will for ages endure to support this portion of Smeaton's lighthouse, which, in its thus diminished form, is still rendering important service to the mariner, in giving a distinctive character to the Eddystone by day'.
Douglass's lighthouse
The current, fourth lighthouse was designed by
James Douglass (using
Robert Stevenson's developments of Smeaton's techniques). This lighthouse is still in use.
Design and building
By July 1878 the new site, on the South Rock was being prepared during the 3½ hours between
ebb and
flood tide; the
foundation stone was laid on 19 August the following year by
The Duke of Edinburgh, Master of Trinity House.
The supply ship ''Hercules'' was based at
Oreston, now a suburb of
Plymouth
Plymouth ( ) is a port city status in the United Kingdom, city and unitary authority in Devon, South West England. It is located on Devon's south coast between the rivers River Plym, Plym and River Tamar, Tamar, about southwest of Exeter and ...
; stone was prepared at the Oreston yard and supplied from the works of Messrs Shearer, Smith and Co of
Wadebridge. The tower, which is high, contains a total of 62,133 cubic feet of granite, weighing 4,668 tons.
The last stone was laid on 1 June 1881 and the light was first lit on 18 May 1882.
The lighthouse was topped by a larger than usual lantern storey, high and wide;
the lantern was painted red.
It contained a six-sided biform (i.e. two-tier) rotating optic of the
first-order, high and weighing over seven tons.
Each of the six sides of the optic was divided into two
Fresnel lens
A Fresnel lens ( ; ; or ) is a type of composite compact lens (optics), lens which reduces the amount of material required compared to a conventional lens by dividing the lens into a set of concentric annular sections.
The simpler Dioptrics, d ...
panels, which provided the light's characteristic of two flashes every thirty seconds.
[ Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1911 edition, vol. 16, p. 650.] The optic was manufactured by
Chance Brothers
Chance Brothers and Company was an English glassworks originally based in Spon Lane, Smethwick, West Midlands (county), West Midlands (formerly in Staffordshire), in England. It was a leading glass manufacturer and a pioneer of British glassma ...
of
Smethwick and designed by their chief engineer
John Hopkinson FRS. At the time the Eddystone's extra-tall () lenses were the largest in existence;
their superior height was achieved through the use of extra-dense
flint glass in the upper and lower portions of each panel.
The light had a range of .
Illumination was provided by a pair of Douglass-designed six-wick concentric
oil burners (one for each tier of the optic). This was said to represent 'the first practical application of superposed lenses of the first order with oil as the illuminating material'.
[There were in fact several optics with two or more tiers of first-order lenses already in use in lighthouses around the coast of Ireland (engineered by Douglass's great rival John Richardson Wigham), but these were lit by gas.] On clear nights, only the lamp in the lower tier of lenses was lit (producing a light of 37,000 candlepower); in poor visibility, however (judged by whether the
Plymouth Breakwater light was visible), both lamps were used at full power, to provide a 159,600 candlepower light.
Eighteen cisterns in the lower part of the tower were used to store up to 2,660 tons (nine months' worth) of
colza oil to fuel the lamps.
In addition to the main light a fixed white light was shone from a room on the eighth storey of the tower (using a pair of
Argand lamps and
reflectors) in the direction of the hazardous
Hand Deeps. The lighthouse was also provided with a pair of large bells, each weighing two tons, by
Gillett, Bland & Co., which were suspended from either side of the lantern gallery to serve as a
fog signal; they sounded (to match the
light characteristic of the lighthouse) twice every thirty seconds in foggy weather, and were struck by the same clockwork mechanism that drove the rotation of the lenses. The mechanism required winding every hour (or every forty minutes, when the bells were in use), 'the weight to be lifted being equal to one ton';
shortly after opening, the lighthouse was equipped with a 0.5 h.p.
caloric engine,
designed 'for relieving the keepers of the excessive strain of driving the machine when both illuminating apparatus and fog bell are in use'.
Later modifications
In 1894 an explosive fog signal device was installed on the gallery of lighthouse; the fog bells were briefly retained as a standby provision, but then removed.
In 1904 the lamps were replaced with incandescent oil vapour burners.
Following the invention of the mercury bath system (allowing a lighthouse optic to revolve in a trough of mercury rather than on rollers) the Eddystone lens pedestal was duly upgraded and the drive mechanism replaced.
Later, beginning in 1959, the light was electrified: the new light source was a 1,250W
incandescent lamp
An incandescent light bulb, also known as an incandescent lamp or incandescent light globe, is an electric light that produces illumination by Joule heating a filament until it glows. The filament is enclosed in a glass bulb that is eith ...
, powered by a diesel generator (three of which were installed in a lower store room).
In place of the old lenses a new, smaller (fourth-order)
AGA 'bi-valve' optic was installed, which flashed at the faster rate of twice every ten seconds. The old optic was removed and donated to
Southampton Maritime Museum (it was exhibited on the
Royal Pier in the 1970s, but later removed to a council yard where it was destroyed by vandals).
As part of the programme of modernisation, the lighthouse was given a '
SuperTyfon' fog signal, with compressors powered from the diesel generators.

The lighthouse was automated in 1982, the first
Trinity House 'Rock' (or offshore) lighthouse to be converted. Two years earlier the tower had been changed by construction of a
helipad
A helipad is the landing area of a heliport, in use by helicopters, powered lift, and vertical lift aircraft to land on surface.
While helicopters and powered lift aircraft are able to operate on a variety of relatively flat surfaces, a fa ...
above the lantern, to allow maintenance crews access;
the helipad has a weight limit of 3600 kg (3½ tons). As part of the automation of the lighthouse a new electric fog signal was installed and a metal halide
discharge lamp replaced the incandescent light bulb formerly in use. The light and other systems were monitored remotely, initially by Trinity House staff at the nearby
Penlee Point fog signal station.
Since 1999 the lighthouse has run on solar power.
Present day
The tower is high, and
its white light flashes twice every 10 seconds. The light is visible to , and is supplemented by a
foghorn of 3 blasts every 62 seconds.
A subsidiary red
sector light shines from a window in the tower to highlight the
Hand Deeps hazard to the west-northwest. The lighthouse is now monitored and controlled from the Trinity House Operations Control Centre at Harwich in Essex.
References in media
*The lighthouse inspired a
sea shanty
A sea shanty, shanty, chantey, or chanty () is a genre of traditional Folk music, folk song that was once commonly sung as a work song to accompany rhythmical labor aboard large Merchant vessel, merchant Sailing ship, sailing vessels. The term ...
, frequently recorded, that begins "My father was the keeper of the Eddystone light / He courted a
mermaid one fine night / From this union there came three / A
porpoise and a
porgy and the other was me!".
There are several verses.
*The lighthouse has been used as a metaphor for stability.
[ Thomas D'Arcy McGee commented that Canada's foundations were as "strong as the foundations of Eddystone" in ''The Globe'', 31 October 1864, 4.]
*In the ''
Goon Show'' episode ''Ten Snowballs that shook the World'' (1958),
Neddie Seagoon is sent to Eddystone Lighthouse to warn the inhabitants that
Sterling has dropped from F-sharp to E-flat.
*The lighthouse is celebrated in the opening and closing movements of
Ron Goodwin's ''Drake 400 Suite.'' The movement's main theme was directly inspired by the lighthouse's unique
light characteristic.
[CD insert, "British Light Music: Ron Goodwin. 633 Squadron, Drake 400 Suite, and others. New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, Ron Goodwin, conductor." Marco Polo CD 8.223518]
*A novel based on the building of Smeaton's lighthouse, containing many details of the construction, was published in 2005.
*The lighthouse is referenced twice in
Herman Melville
Herman Melville (Name change, born Melvill; August 1, 1819 – September 28, 1891) was an American novelist, short story writer, and poet of the American Renaissance (literature), American Renaissance period. Among his best-known works ar ...
's epic novel ''
Moby-Dick
''Moby-Dick; or, The Whale'' is an 1851 Epic (genre), epic novel by American writer Herman Melville. The book is centered on the sailor Ishmael (Moby-Dick), Ishmael's narrative of the maniacal quest of Captain Ahab, Ahab, captain of the whaler ...
''; at the beginning of Chapter 14, "Nantucket": "How it stands there, away off shore, more lonely than the Eddystone lighthouse.", and in Chapter 133, "The Chase – First Day": "So, in a gale, the but half baffled Channel billows only recoil from the base of the Eddystone, triumphantly to overleap its summit with their scud."
*The lighthouse is referred to in "Daddy was a Ballplayer" by the Canadian band Stringband, and follows a similar line to the sea shanty.
*"The Most Famous of All Lighthouses," the third chapter of ''The Story of Lighthouses'' (Norton 1965) by
Mary Ellen Chase, is devoted to the Eddystone Lighthouse.
*Eddystone Lighthouse was used for many of the exterior shots in ''
The Phantom Light'', a 1935 film directed by
Michael Powell
Michael Latham Powell (30 September 1905 – 19 February 1990) was an English filmmaker, celebrated for his partnership with Emeric Pressburger. Through their production company Powell and Pressburger, The Archers, they together wrote, produced ...
.
*The English pop group
Edison Lighthouse took its name from it. Later, 'Lighthouse' was discarded, and they renamed themselves 'Edison'.
*An 1850 replica of Smeaton's lighthouse,
Hoad Monument, stands above the town of
Ulverston
Ulverston is a market town and civil parish in Westmorland and Furness, Cumbria, England. Historic counties of England, Historically in Lancashire, it lies a few miles south of the Lake District Lake District National Park, National Park and j ...
,
Cumbria
Cumbria ( ) is a ceremonial county in North West England. It borders the Scottish council areas of Dumfries and Galloway and Scottish Borders to the north, Northumberland and County Durham to the east, North Yorkshire to the south-east, Lancash ...
as a memorial to naval administrator
Sir John Barrow.
See also
*
List of lighthouses in England
*
Eddystone, the Google
Bluetooth Low Energy beacon
*
Hook Lighthouse, second oldest lighthouse in the world and oldest in the
British Isles
The British Isles are an archipelago in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean off the north-western coast of continental Europe, consisting of the islands of Great Britain, Ireland, the Isle of Man, the Inner Hebrides, Inner and Outer Hebr ...
Notes
References
Further reading
*
* John Smeaton (1793). ''A Narrative of the Building and Description of the Eddystone Lighthouse with Stone''. London
* Palmer, Mike; Eddystone, ''The Finger of Light''. Palmridge Publishing, 1998 – Revised edition, 2005 by Seafarer Books & Globe Pequot Press / Sheridan House
** Eddystone (2016). ''The Finger of Light'', revised Kindle ebook edition
External links
Trinity House*
{{Authority control
1698 establishments in England
1703 disasters
1755 disasters
Historic Civil Engineering Landmarks
Industrial archaeological sites in Devon
Lighthouses completed in 1882
Lighthouses in Devon
Lighthouses of the English Channel
Plymouth, Devon