The Lighthouse Keepers of Varne Island

For almost 140 years, a lighthouse on the small rocky island of Varne stood guard over the shipping lane between the ports of Castlemere and Oldhaven. Built in 1842 from granite brought by barge from the mainland, the tower was 31 metres tall and its light could be seen from around twenty nautical miles away on a clear night. Until 1981, when the light was converted to automatic operation, it was run by a team of three keepers who lived on the island in shifts.

The keepers' main duty was to keep the lamp burning from sunset to sunrise. In the early decades, the light came from a set of oil lamps placed in front of polished brass reflectors, and the glass had to be cleaned of soot several times each night. A large clockwork mechanism turned the lens, and one keeper had to wind it by hand roughly every two hours. Logbooks kept at the county archive in Castlemere show that in 1867 the light failed only twice, both times because of glass broken during storms.

Life on Varne was far from easy. The island had no natural source of fresh water, so rain was collected from the roof of the keepers' cottage and stored in an underground tank. Supplies of food, fuel and letters arrived by boat once a fortnight, but in winter the crossing was often impossible for weeks at a time. One keeper's diary from 1903 records that the men survived for 38 days on salted fish, hard biscuits and potatoes they had grown in a small walled garden.

Despite this isolation, many keepers stayed in the service for decades. The pay was modest, but it was regular, and the job came with free housing for their families on the mainland. Historians who have studied the service suggest that the keepers valued the independence of the work and the sense of responsibility for the safety of passing ships. Some also used their long hours productively: Thomas Aldworth, who served on Varne from 1911 to 1937, kept daily weather records that are still used by climate researchers today.

The arrival of electric power in 1954 changed daily routines considerably. A diesel generator replaced the oil lamps, and the lens was turned by an electric motor, so the hand-winding came to an end. However, the keepers now had to maintain the engine, which one of them described in a letter home as "a noisy and demanding new companion".

After automation, the cottage stood empty for many years. In 2015 a local heritage trust restored the building, and it now opens to visitors on summer weekends, when a boat runs from Oldhaven harbour.