Screwpiles: The Forgotten Lighthouses

The lighthouse first displayed its light there in 1881, but a schooner struck and damaged the structure three years later. In 1928, an automated light, placed on the original foundation, replaced the screwpile lighthouse. Wolf Trap Light – 1821 Wolf Trap Shoal was located in the Chesapeake Bay to the south of the entrance to the Rappahannock River, three miles offshore and at a point roughly midway between the Piankatank River and Mobjack Bay. The shoal got its name after a British vessel, H.M.S. Wolfe , ran aground there in 1691. In 1821, a brand new, 180-ton lightship, carrying two fixed lights visible for ten miles, anchored on the shoal. The lightship, restored in 1852 but destroyed in 1861 at the outbreak of the Civil War, gave way to a third lightship, placed on the station three years later. In 1870, the Lighthouse Board replaced the lightship with a hexagonal lighthouse structure that stood in 16 feet of water. On January 22, 1893, heavy ice floes sliced the lighthouse from its foundation. A few days later, the lighthouse was found afloat several miles to the south near Thimble Shoal, with only its roof and lantern still peeking out above the water. The lantern room and lens from the lighthouse were salvaged, but the structure—by then a navigational hazard—was towed to Portsmouth.

Shovelful Shoal lightship. National Archives

From 1870 to 1893, Wolf Trap screwpile lighthouse replaced lightships in 1879 at the entrance to the Rappahannock River.

In the 1890s, a caisson lighthouse replaced the Wolf Trap screwpile lighthouse. Courtesy of the U.S. Coast Guard

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