Screwpiles: The Forgotten Lighthouses

Old Dominion Steamship line also ran daily boats for passengers and freight between Norfolk and Suffolk, calling at all the landings on the Nansemond River. 51 Nansemond River Lighthouse, Thimble Shoal Light, and Middle Ground Light In 1872, a screwpile lighthouse, erected northeast of Willoughby Spit to mark Thimble Shoal, replaced the light vessel anchored off Willoughby Spit. Increasing river traffic prompted the addition of the Nansemond River Lighthouse, built in 1878, and Middle Ground Light, built in 1891. Steamboats and river traffic peaked around 1910, with a hundred steamboats operating on the James River between 1813 and the 1930s. Busy Nansemond after the Civil War After the Civil War, commerce increased on the Nansemond River, with steamboats making regular stops in Suffolk. In April 1868, a group of businessmen sent a petition to Fifth District Inspector J. M. Berrin requesting the placement of buoys in the Nansemond to aid navigation.

Berrin issued a report discussing the need for improved buoyage but also expressing uncertainty about the requirement for a lighthouse at the river’s mouth. The State Legislature, not waiting for

1861. He served in the Confederate House of Representatives from 1862 to 1865 and, after his election to the Virginia House of Delegates in 1867, went on to serve in the U.S. House of Representatives for Virginia’s Second District from 1875 to 1881. He served as the U.S. solicitor general from 1885 to 1886.

final approval from the Lighthouse Board, passed an act dated April 16, 1874, ceding the necessary land, pending further surveys by the district engineer. The argument for the lighthouse finally won out, and the appropriation passed on July 31, 1876—but not without some legislative handstands, particularly by Second District U.S. House Representative John Goode. John Goode, an interesting character, was born in Bedford County in 1829. He graduated from Washington & Lee Law School and was admitted to the bar in 1851. He participated in the Virginia State Convention that passed the articles of secession in

On September 1, 1876, the National Republican detailed Goode’s sleight of hand in gaining appropriations for the lighthouses.

A very funny story is told of Goode’s effort in fixing up the economical appropriations for his district. Goode conceived the idea of obtaining an appropriation for a marine light at the mouth of the Nansemond River for the benefit of some of his Democratic constituents. He called upon the proper departmental authority for an estimate for the cost of a light at that point. He was informed that there was no commerce there that would authorize a light, and no

John Goode, Jr., U.S. House of Representatives, Second District, 1875–1881

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