The second Cockspur Lighthouse was built of brick and exhibited a light from a fourth-order Fresnel lens. The forty-six-foot tower has a unique feature - it's eastern side is shaped like the prow of a ship to better withstand the force of high seas. A twin tower was built nearby on Oyster Bed Island to mark the river's north channel, but the structure fell victim to the storms that buffet the area.

Cockspur Island Lighthouse Photograph courtesy U.S. Coast Guard

The first keeper of the Cockspur Island Lighthouse was appropriately named John Lightburn. The keeper lived on Cockspur Island, near Fort Pulaski, and would make daily trips to the tower to service the light. The lighthouse's second keeper, Cornelius Maher, drowned near the tower when his boat capsized while he was trying to help someone in distress. Maher's wife, Mary, replaced her husband as keeper and remained at the light for three more years.

When Union forces entered the area in 1861, they took control of Tybee Island and constructed batteries on the island's western shore. The confederates had retreated to Fort Pulaski, thinking that they would be safe within the fort's seven-foot-thick walls that were constructed using twenty-five million bricks. On April 11, 1862, the Union soldiers opened fire on the fort using a new weapon, rifled Parrot guns. These powerfule guns were reportedly able to drive their thirty-six-pound shot roughly a mile to the fort and then nearly two feet into the fort's walls. After more than 5,000 such shots had been fired, the fort was severely damaged, and the occupants decided it was wise to surrender before a shot penetrated their powder magazine. The battle lasted just thirty hours, and amazingly, the Cockspur Island Lighthouse, which stood in the direct line of fire between Tybee Island and the fort, suffered no damage.

The lighthouse resumed operation in 1866, after the end of the war. The keeper's dwelling was struck by lightning in 1880, and was destroyed the following year by a hurricane that temporarily raised the water level twenty-three feet above normal. To avoid the surge that accompanied the occasional hurricane, a new home for the keeper was eventually built on top of the walls of Fort Pulaski, which by this time was abandoned.

George Washington Martus was one of the keepers who served during the postbellum period, accepting an assignment to the station in 1881 at the age of eighteen. Martus served until 1886, when he transferred upstream to the Elba Island Lighthouse. Martus' sister Florence lived with him on Elba Island, and for over forty-years, she greeted all the vessels entering and leaving the port of Savannah with the wave of a handkerchief by day or a lantern by night. She became somewhat of a legend and was known as the "Waving Girl."

It is not really known what started her tradition of waving at the passing ships, though several legends suggest a reason. The most popular story is that her sweetheart left on a ship from Savannah and promised to come back for her one day. She vowed to wave at every ship until his return - but he never came back. Her friendliness is memorialized by a statue located near the waterfront in Savannah. The statue was sculpted by Felix de Weldon, creator of “Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima," and shows Florence waving a handkerchief with a lantern and her pet collie by her feet. A celebration was held at Fort Pulaski in 1938 to honor Florence on her seventieth birthday, and a historical sign telling her story has since been placed at Fort Pulaski near the visitors center. Florence passed away in 1943, and a Liberty ship, completed in Savannah that year, was christened with her name.

Carrying on Florence's tradition at Elba Island was not an easy assignment. Billie Burn's husband Lance was assigned relief duty on Elba Island for one month in 1939. Billie would wave a white towel by day, and a lantern by night, but after a few nights of getting up to greet each ship, she grew tired and just left the lantern in the window. To acknowledge the lantern's greeting, the ships would sound three blasts of their horns, which Billie says about blew them out of bed. After thirty miserable days, Billie was eager to wave goodbye to Elba Island.

In 1909, the deep draft ships calling at Savannah started to used the north channel, and the Cockspur Lighthouse was deactivated. The Coast Guard abandoned the lighthouse in 1949, but fortunately the Park Service assumed control of the light in 1958 by presidential proclamation. The tower was repaired in a two-stage restoration effort that lasted from 1995 to 2000. A new lantern room was put in place atop the tower, brickwork was repaired and repointed, and the lighthouse received two coats of whitewash during the project. The Cockspur Lighthouse, which was relit in March of 2007 using a solar-powered beacon, is now part of the Fort Pulaski National Monument.

In 2007, it was discovered that shipworms had bored into the lighthouse's wooden support timbers now exposed due to erosion. Now, shipworms, wave action, and tidal erosion combine to threaten the tower's stability. Recognizing the tenuous state of the tower, the Georgia Trust for Historic Preservation put the Cockspur Lighthouse on its 2008 list of 10 'Places in Peril.' The Park Service has requested $1.4 million for a thorough restoration, but the money will not likely be provided for several years.

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References

1. "The Lighthouses of Georgia," Buddy Sullivan, The Keeper's Log, Spring 1988.
2. Georgia's Lighthouses and Historic Coastal Sites, Kevin McCarthy, 1998.
3. Southeastern Lighthouses, Bruce Roberts and Ray Jones, 1998.

To get really close to the lighthouse a wade through marshes or a trip in a boat or kayak is required. I took a trip with Captain Mike's Dolphin Tours, which departs from Lazaretto Creek Marina, and they obligingly made sure I got some good shots of the lighthouse. Another option for visiting the lighthouse is with Captain Harvey Ferrelle, who was president of Friends of Cockspur Island Lighthouse in 2008 and operates Sweet Lowland Tybee Tours.