The Cockspur Island Lighthouse is situated on a small islet a little to the east of Cockspur Island. The lighthouse can be viewed from Cockspur Island, accessible by a bridge off US Highway 80 and then by footpath.
The lighthouse is technically open to visitors, but direct access to the structure itself is only possible by boat.
Cockspur Island is one of a chain of islands – the others being Bird and Elba, traveling upstream – dividing the two channels of the Savannah River. It is the site of the Fort Pulaski National Monument. Both lighthouse and fort are managed by the National Park Service.
The Cockspur Island Lighthouse, though no longer operational (it has not been in active use since 1909), is one of Georgia’s oldest surviving lighthouses. It was constructed in 1856, on the site of an earlier beacon in the same spot, constructed in the 1830s.
The earlier beacon, used to assist ships in their journey up the Savannah River, was upgraded to a lighthouse, with adjoining keeper’s house, in the late 1840s, the repair of the lighthouse and construction of the new residence supervised by one of Savannah’s most noted architects, John S. Norris.
This first lighthouse was short-lived. It was destroyed by a hurricane only five years after its completion in 1849.
The new lighthouse building was constructed soon after at a cost of $6000 (almost $170,000 today), according to plans provided by the Lighthouse Board. The Board managed the lighthouse for almost a century, authority transferred to the Coast Guard Service in 1939.
In 1958, Cockspur Island Lighthouse became a part of the Fort Pulaski National Monument, under the management of the National Park Service.
As part of its mission to renovate and preserve America’s heritage sites, the National Park Service has undertaken various repairs of the lighthouse, including cleaning and repainting of the structure and its fixtures.
In the longer term, however, the lighthouse is under threat from the continued action of water and weather upon the aging structure.
More expensive long term repairs are necessary to replace the decaying timbers upon which the stability of the structure depends. Without this renovation, the historic lighthouse will eventually collapse or crumble away.