|
The Potomac River has always been busy, but in the 19th century, it got considerably busier with the coming of steamships, and more hazardous. It was also full of dangerous shoals and narrow turns, so it became necessary to install some aids to navigation, including light stations. By the start of the American Civil War, there were six aids of various types on the Potomac between Alexandria, Virginia and Piney Point, Maryland.
Built in 1836, the Piney Point Lighthouse was the first lighthouse erected on the Potomac River. A light vessel had been stationed in the area since 1821 to mark hazardous shoals at Piney Point and Ragged Point. In 1835, the United States Congress set aside $5,000 for construction of a land-based beacon to replace the lightship, and the contract was awarded to lighthouse builder John Donahoo. Piney Point’s original lighting apparatus was visible for 10 miles. A more efficient fifth order Fresnel lens was installed in 1855, which increased the visibility to eleven miles.
A second light vessel was authorized in 1821, for Upper Cedar Point, to mark the channel off the mouth of the Tobacco River. Congress authorized the stationing of an additional light vessel in the narrows, off Lower Cedar Point, in 1825.
Early in the war, these two ships were burned by Confederate forces and both stations remained vacant until 1864. The newspaper reported that “Navigation is now more dangerous [with] most of the buoys taken up and the light boats burnt. The light houses remain. [H]ow utterly exposed is the dear and unoffending people.”
The U.S. Navy Potomac Flotilla knew the culprits and had a list of the names of the men who burned these lightships. They included men who lived on both the Maryland and Virginia side of the Potomac. In addition to burning the ships, they had also carried goods from Maryland to Virginia, and it was while rowing across with a fully laden vessel that they were captured.
Blackistone Island Light Station was built in 1851, although funds had been appropriated in 1848. A fifth order Fresnel lens was installed in 1857. In 1860, Keeper Jerome McWilliams was reprimanded for excessive use of his oil supply and had his pay withheld. His problems continued when a complaint was filed against him by a Master Pilot named Robert Watter in 1862, because the light was not lit. The Commander of the Potomac Flotilla also reported that it was dark at this time. The excuse given by the keeper was that his oil had all been used up by the vessels in the Flotilla, but he produced no receipts.
The Blackistone Island Light went dark again in 1864, when it was set upon by rebels who destroyed the lens and lantern and took all the oil. An official report of the raid was submitted by the Commander of the Potomac Flotilla to the Secretary of the Navy. In it he said: “on the night of the 19th 12 rebels, headed by a man named Goldsmith, landed in a small boat at Blackistone Island, and destroyed the lens and lamp and carried off 15 gallons of oil belonging to the lighthouse, without doing further injury. I have requested Colonel Draper, commanding at Point Lookout, to station a guard at Blackistone Island, at Piney Point, and on board the light-ship off Smith’s Point. I am of the opinion that while there are so many rebel sympathizers in Maryland and on the eastern shore of Virginia, none of the lighthouses there located are safe without a guard on shore to protect them.”
Colonel A.G. Draper replied from his headquarters at Point Lookout that he would send a sergeant with 22 men to Piney Point but that the cavalry could not be spared from Leonardtown for Blackistone Lighthouse.
Captain Goldsmith published an account of the raid titled On the Potomac in 1864 in the St. Mary’s Beacon newspaper. In it he stated that he was accompanied by only four men, on their boat The Swan which was 30 feet long. Goldsmith said they slipped past a federal gunboat anchored near the island, wrecked the lamp and all the fixtures, carried off about 200 gallons of oil, “which was very acceptable to the government at Richmond,” and also took away the light tender. They had planned to dynamite the lighthouse, but the keeper, Jerome McWilliams, pleaded that his wife, who was expecting a baby and was near her time, would be endangered if moved, so they abandoned this part of the plan. He also wrote that the officers of the Flotilla had been promised “a handsome premium for the capture of the Swan as she was considered so troublesome to the Federal forces.” Near the end of the war, Captain Goldsmith was arrested and held as a P.O.W. at Point Lookout Prisoner of War Camp.
Many vessels were stopped while passing in the vicinity of Blackistone Island Light and taken by the Potomac Flotilla for lack of passes, improper paperwork, questionable cargo, etc. And while the Flotilla had a vessel stationed there, someone from the island hailed it, a boat was sent ashore, and 7 men were captured as refugees, with one being kept as a prisoner of war.
In December 1864, a notice was sent out stating that in view of the danger caused by ice, the Light House Board was ordering the immediate removal of the two light vessels at Upper and Lower Cedar Point for the winter. No lights would be shown until further notice from either of those stations. The last time the light vessels were pulled, the Quartermaster Department stationed vessels of its own as temporary light boats at those spots since many vessels had refused to travel at night, unless under special military orders, for fear of running aground, which was causing delays in the transport of goods and troops. The necessity to remove the lightships during the winter was in great part responsible for their replacement with permanent structures not long after the end of the war.
At the heyday of the lighthouses, in the early 20th century, the Potomac River had 10 lighthouses between Alexandria and Piney Point, plus two additional bay lights at its mouth. Each light station emitted a strong enough light to be seen by the next one, making the river safe no matter the weather or the time of day. In the years between the placing of the first light in 1821 and the early 20th century, only the Civil War interrupted their work. Today, all the ships and most of the lights are gone, but those that remain are wonderful reminders of the days gone by, when the river was both a source of food and the main highway for moving goods and people, as well as, for four long years, the dividing line between the North and the South.
This story appeared in the
Mar/Apr 2024 edition of Lighthouse Digest Magazine. The print edition contains more stories than our internet edition, and each story generally contains more photographs - often many more - in the print edition. For subscription information about the print edition, click here.
All contents copyright © 1995-2024 by Lighthouse Digest®, Inc. No story, photograph, or any other item on this website may be reprinted or reproduced without the express permission of Lighthouse Digest. For contact information, click here.
|
