Lighthouses in Cornwall, England

The nine lighthouses round the coast of Cornwall are shown on the map above.

Dangers to ships around the coast of Cornwall

• winter gales with high winds
• circular tides between Lands End and Scilly Isles changed direction every 2 or 3 hours
• hidden rocks off shore
• the first landfall for ships that may have been at sea for many months
• poor charts in days of sailing ships

History of Cornish lighthouses

• the earliest record of lights to help shipping is the payment of "beaconage" from fishermen to the chapel of Carn Brea in 1396
• St Michaels Mount has a stone lantern on top of its church dating from the 15th century
• a record of a beacon shown by the chapel of St Nicholas at St Ives is dated in 1538
• Henry VIII's disolution of the monastries meant that these, and other, church beacons could no longer function
• however Henry founded Trinity House in 1514  which then became responsible for supplying pilots round the coast, and later for the building and maintenance of lighthouses
• the chart below shows that the building of lighthouses took place from the 17th century right through till 1965 when the last light was put up at Tater Du

Technical Details

If you want to know about how lighthouses were made, how the lights worked and how they were manned, then follow the links below

• construction
• manning
• lighting
•  

Cornwall Tourist Information Cornwall Calling front page

The hotel to stay at when visiting Cornwall is Corisande Manor Hotel, Cornwall find out more about it