The Leading Lights (looking towards Harwich)
These two lighthouses, were commissioned by Trinity House in 1862 and completed in 1863, served to guide ships towards Harwich harbour (some 1.5km to the north) their different heights enabling the two lights to be aligned on approach. They replaced two late 18th century lighthouses at Harwich (the `Low' and `High' lighthouses) which had become unreliable due to shifting sand bars around the mouth of the Stour estuary. A comprehensive pattern of marker buoys in the harbour approach rendered the new lights obsolete in 1917. The lights escaped demolition, but gradually deteriorated through lack of routine maintenance. A major programme of restoration took place between 1983 and 1988 with the help of William Bleakley's "High Steward Lighthouse Appeal" along with generous donations from the local community that ensured these local icons were not lost to future generations.The Dovercourt Lighthouses are unique examples of early use of screw pile foundations, by which helix or screw bladed iron sections were driven deep into the soft ground in order to provide solid footings for the attached legs.
The inner lighthouse is divided into two storeys: the light keeper’s chamber and the lamp room above. Both are hexagonal in plan to match the pattern of the legs; the lower room is faced with flat iron panels (today these have been painted black to match the frame, but not so in the Victorian era) whilst the upper room clad in corrugated metal and painted white. The light keeper’s chamber has rectangular, iron framed windows facing the shoreline to the south east and north east and a single glazed porthole facing to landward on the south west side. The lamp room is reached via an internal stair, and an external door in the south wall leads out to an encircling iron balcony. The lamp aperture takes up the entire seaward elevation. The windows are modern replacements, although they retain the angles of the three original frames (which are replicated in the roof line above). The roof itself is of a canopy design: lead covered with a central chimney pipe for the oil or gas lantern (long since removed) and a separate vent pipe for the heater in the light keeper’s chamber. The chimney is surmounted by a weather vane which bears the date `1862' in stencil-cut numbers.
The outer lighthouse is similar in overall appearance, but shorter by about 4m and designed with four massive tubular legs (arranged in `V' shaped pairs) to support an octagonal superstructure. The access stairs also terminate with a gate some 2m from the base, but are less elaborate than those of the inner light, reaching the doorway on the southern side in a single flight. The construction of the two storey superstructure is comparable to the inner lighthouse, with matching internal stairs, balcony, window casements and lamp aperture. A single short chimney pipe protrudes from the centre of the leaded canopy roof.
The causeway between the two lighthouses begins with a short section of high wall (or groyne) composed of stone blocks, raised with concrete and set around iron piles. Steps at the seaward end of the wall lead down to the causeway proper which remains accessible for varying intervals during the intertidal period. The causeway measures some 150m in length and 4m in width, with a central avenue of stone flags set over a rubble core and retained to either side by sloping stone facings. The seaward end of the causeway terminates in a square platform (similarly constructed) beneath the outer light.
01 Dovercourt Sands S No 1 (1907) H&D FW
#6019 Dovercourt Sands (1903) The Wyndham Series Front H&D FW
#64021 West End Beach, Dovercourt (1960) H&D FW
03 The Beach, Dovercourt (1962)
#7233 The Two Lights, Dovercourt, The Wyndham Series (1914) H&D F
#2578 The Sands, Dovercourt 2578 (1906) H&D FW
#1829 The Lighthouses, Dovercourt (1911) H&D FW
The Lighthouse, Dovercourt (1911) H&D FW
The Lighthouses, Dovercourt (1919) H&D FW
Dovercourt, Essex (2000) H&D FW
J&S 6469 The Lighthouse, Dovercourt (1911) J.Valentines H&D
The Lighthouse, Dovercourt (1911) H&D FW
The Sands, Dovercourt (1904) H&D FW
#25557 The Lighthouse, Dovercourt Bay (1902) Valentines H&D
Dovercourt Lighthouses (Today)
The Inner Lighthouse
The Lighthouse Dovercourt (1906) H&D FW
A rare early "Kodak" card of the “Inner Light” of the Dovercourt Range Lights (@ 1906)
An early postcard from 1906 from the Kodak company that had formed 18 years earlier in 1888, this photograph show a less conventional view of the lighthouses taken from the beach, as no promenade had been built. The lighthouses commissioned by "Trinity House" in 1862 and completed in 1863, served to guide ships towards Harwich harbour (some 1.5km to the north) their different heights enabling the two lights to be aligned on approach. They replaced two late 18th century lighthouses at Harwich (the `Low' and `High' lighthouses) which had become unreliable due to shifting sand bars around the mouth of the Stour estuary.
An early postcard from 1906 from the Kodak company that had formed 18 years earlier in 1888, this photograph show a less conventional view of the lighthouses taken from the beach, as no promenade had been built. The lighthouses commissioned by "Trinity House" in 1862 and completed in 1863, served to guide ships towards Harwich harbour (some 1.5km to the north) their different heights enabling the two lights to be aligned on approach. They replaced two late 18th century lighthouses at Harwich (the `Low' and `High' lighthouses) which had become unreliable due to shifting sand bars around the mouth of the Stour estuary.
E.3519 The Lighthouse, Dovercourt (1904) H&D FW
E.3519 The Lighthouse, Dovercourt (1904) A. & G. Taylor "Photographers to the Queen"
This high quality, real photographic series of Dovercourt cards was produced around 1904 by "A & G. Taylor" who were a British photographic business & manufacturer of cabinet cards, cartes de visite, & later picture postcards.
In 1866, the photographers Andrew Taylor (1832–1909) and George Taylor opened their first studio in London's Cannon Street. They expanded to have 30 outlets in major British cities and some in the USA.
In 1886, they received a Royal Warrant, and became self-proclaimed "Photographers to Queen Victoria".
By 1901, they were producing picture postcards, using four different series, “The Reality Series” as seen here, of greetings, children, actresses, and military themes, as real photo postcards, "The Carbontone Series" of black and white printed views and greetings, "The Orthochrome Series" of views and greetings, printed in tinted halftone, and a "Comic Series". After 1914, they moved their main studio to Hastings, but closed by 1918.
The Lighthouse, Dovercourt Bay (1970) H&D FW
The Sands & Lighthouse, Dovercourt S&SC (1913) H&D FW
Dovercourt Lighthouse (1904) Valentines H&D FW
#40867 The Lighthouse, Dovercourt (1907) Bell's H&D FW
Lighthouse, Dovercourt Bay H&D FW
V5925 Dovercourt, The Beacon (1960) H&D FW
17 The Lighthouse, Dovercourt Bay (1930) H&D FW
#29530 The Lighthouse, Dovercourt (1905) Bell's H&D FW
The “Inner Light” of the Dovercourt Range Lights (@ 1905) Bell's Photography
These two early "Bell's" photographs shown here, give a less conventional view of the lighthouses, which were commissioned by Trinity House in 1862 and completed in 1863 and served to guide ships towards Harwich harbour (some 1.5km to the north) their different heights enabling the two lights to be aligned on approach. They replaced two late 18th century lighthouses at Harwich (the `Low' and `High' lighthouses) which had become unreliable due to shifting sand bars around the mouth of the Stour estuary.
These two early "Bell's" photographs shown here, give a less conventional view of the lighthouses, which were commissioned by Trinity House in 1862 and completed in 1863 and served to guide ships towards Harwich harbour (some 1.5km to the north) their different heights enabling the two lights to be aligned on approach. They replaced two late 18th century lighthouses at Harwich (the `Low' and `High' lighthouses) which had become unreliable due to shifting sand bars around the mouth of the Stour estuary.
Lighthouse, Dovercourt (1922) Wallis H&D
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The Lighthouse, Dovercourt (1904) H&D FW
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