A brief history of lighthouses
The welcome flash of a lighthouse is something that mariners returning to port or navigating around the English coastline have long taken for granted as a safe and reliable guide to their destination. We’ve had lighthouses dotted around our coasts since Roman times – the pharos at Dover Castle is regarded as Britain’s first proper, and earliest, lighthouse.
As the centuries passed, the benefits of “lighting the way” to mark a jagged reef or towering cliffs for Britain’s increasing maritime trade became obvious. In those times any individual or collective body could erect a lighthouse provided they applied to the Crown for a patent detailing the need for such a structure from local seamen and merchants, who also had to pledge their willingness to pay a “light due” when the lighthouse was operational. If granted, applicants could erect their lighthouses and collect dues for a specified number of years from shipping when it reached port. The patentee, in return, had to pay an annual rent to the Crown.
In 1514 King Henry VIII granted a Royal Charter to the Trinity Guild based on the River Thames. This was one of several guilds based in various ports around the coast. They were charitable organisations that took responsibility for retired seamen, as well as providing pilots and recommending suitable sites for buoys and beacons in their area.
For the next three centuries the construction of lighthouses around the English coastline was done both by Trinity House (as it then became known) and private individuals. This was the era when the majority of our coastal lights were erected. In 1836 Parliament gave Trinity House the authority to purchase the patents of all the remaining private lighthouses of England and Wales. There were only ten, yet their purchase cost a staggering £1,182,546. The sale of the last one was completed by 1841.
Trinity House was now the sole body responsible for the erection and maintenance of English (and Welsh) lighthouses, although a few of our larger ports have what are known as Harbour Boards who look after the smaller minor lights in, and leading to, them. Scotland, in the meantime, had evolved its own lighthouse body – the Commissioners of Northern Lighthouses – who still look after Scottish and Isle of Man lights.
Trinity House today still upholds its ancient tradition, although it’s a very different organisation. Technology such as the silicon chip, radar and LED light sources have revolutionised the service which is regarded as the world’s leading lighthouse authority.