1698 - A Lighthouse on Eddystone Rocks

Henry Winstantley, 54 years old, an engineer and a painter, lights the lighthouse he has built at his own expense on the peak of the Eddystone rocks, 13 miles Southwest of Plymouth. He previously lost two in five ships he owned on these reefs. This portion of coast near Plymouth is especially treacherous from all records. Having heard from the Admiralty that a lighthouse was considered as necessary but not feasible, Winstantley decided to build it.

He is famous for his boundless creativity that he has expressed through a collection of ingenious mechanisms1 he has exposed. This is a very intriguing character, rather eccentric with ample touches of whimsy, who succeeds in everything he tries.

¤ After a ‘House of Wonders’ at Littlebury, South of Cambridge, he opened in 1690 the ‘Wistantley’s Water-Works’ in Piccadilly, an attraction with fireworks, fountains and automata.

Once more, he has achieved his goal. His last artwork is an octagonal construction made of stone and wood, 59-foot high, lit by candles. He started construction two years ago. Last year, in the ultimate days of the Nine Years War, a French privateer came to the site that he destroyed to the foundation and he captured Winstantley who was there. King Louis XIV ordered his immediate release with the words that :

It is a shame that construction of lighthouse has been of so little interest for any government until lately. Left to private initiative after the Romans, installation of lighthouses on the most risky coastlines is progressing quite slowly. In the middle of the century, there were only five lighthouses active in England, one in Scotland, one in Ireland, two in Spain, one in Italy, one in Sweden, three in the United Provinces and one in France. A pity.

There were also signposts which have also multiplied.

Lately, situation has been changing in England, in the United Provinces and especially in France for the purpose of meeting the needs of high seas ships. There are around thirty lighthouses.

British Isles

The first two to be built cleared the waters around Roman harbour of Dubris, Dover today, main port in Britannia for Roman navy during the first two centuries of Christian era. Another at St-Catherine Oratory was built in 1328 on the Isle of Wight but was active for two centuries only.

In 1566, Queen Elizabeth entitled Trinity House, the maritime charity already famous for the almshouses for retired sailers, to...

Two lighthouses were first erected by Trinity House at Lowestoft in 1609. They were originally lit by candles. Rebuilt in 1628 then in 1676, they are lit by a coal brazier by now. A single lighthouse was afterwards built in 1619 at Lizard Point in Cornwall but for eleven years only, for lack of money to sustain it despite the toll on users. Chalk Tower has been lit in 1674 at Flamborough Head in the Yorkshire, and St-Agnes in 1680 to clear landing on the Scilly islands. It is noteworthy that the governor of the Scilly protested against its construction : he argued that he would lose revenue from the shipwrecks... It seems that six others have been built lately, including Eddystone. Several others are planned

In Scotland, a coal-lit lighthouse was built in 1635 or 36 on the Isle of May, five miles off the coast and clearing the Firth of Forth. The Irish lighthouse was built around 1220 at Hook Head in Wexford and partially rebuilt in 1671. It is lit by a coal brazier.

Spain

A large lighthouse, the Tower of Hercules, was erected around 110 by the Romans at the Portus Magnus Artabrorum, Corunna or A Coruña or The Groyne today, which was the harbour of the tribal of Artabrians. It is still active. A second lighthouse, Porto Pi, was built in 1617 at Palma on the island of Majorca. A third was lately built in Barcelona.

Republic of Genoa

A first lighthouse was built in Genoa as early as the 12th century, in 1128 or in 1161. It was badly damaged in 1528 when the city was re-taken from the French by Andrea Doria and replaced in 1543 by the current tower named La Lanterna, the highest lighthouse with its 249-foot building.  Damaged by the French bombardment in 1684, as we already told in another chronicle, King Louis XIV paid for repairing it in 1692 – a gesture typical of the French monarch. 

Sweden

A lighthouse was built in 1531 at Kõpu, Övre Dagerort for the Swedes, by the federation of Livonia, independent then, now a county of Sweden.

The United Provinces

The first Dutch lighthouse has been erected in 1323 on the island of Terschelling in Friesland to clear the way to Zuiderzee, so to Amsterdam. Destroyed by a flood in 1570, it was rebuilt in 1594. The second was built at Goedereede in 1512 as a tower then lit as a lighthouse in 1552. The third was built South of Holland at Stenen Baak in 1630.

France

A lighthouse, the ‘Tour d’Ordre’, was built in 39 by the Romans at Gesoriacum, Boulogne today, their main harbour in Northern Europe. It fell in 1644.

The second French lighthouse was built at Cordouan, four miles off Gironde estuary. Everybody will concur that it is useful, and excellent for English morale, to secure transport of wine casks from Bordeaux to England. Edward the Black Prince ordered a prototype of lighthouse built around 1360 for this highly critical purpose. It last two centuries. It was replaced in 1611. It is lit by burning wood.

To meet the needs of the navy, Sébastien Le Prestre de Vauban, 65 years old now, master of the Royal engineers, has added several lighthouses along the coastlines, at Ré island (1682), Dunkirk (1683), Sète (1684), Oléron island (1685), Fréhel Cape (1687), Saint-Matthieu Point (1692). Two others are under construction at Ushant island and at Port-Vendres. Ten others are planned.

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IN RETROSPECT FROM TODAY

NOTE - On Eddystone lighthouse fate.

The lighthouse will be completely destroyed in 1703 by a storm. Winstantley was there to examine new improvements with a team of five workers. Everybody disappeared in the same giant wave as the structure.

There has been no shipwreck during its five years of existence. A lighthouse there is so useful that it will be rebuilt as early as 1709 under a larger form.

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SUGGESTED BIBLIOGRAPHY

William Tregarthen Douglass & Nicholas George Gedye – Lighthouse – in Encyclopaedia Britannica, volume 16 – London 1911

René Faille - Les phares et la Signalisation au XVIIe Siècle - Paris, 1970 - Not read, deemed to be commendable from the following item.

René Faille - Les Phares, Tours à Feu de la Sécurité in La Mer - Paris, 2022