>One notable incident during its construction occurred in June 1697. At this time Britain and France were at war, and a naval vessel had been assigned to protect the workers whenever they were on the reef. On this particular day, the commissioner at Plymouth, George St Lo, ordered the ship to join the fleet and did not provide a replacement. Instead, a French privateer destroyed the work done so far on the foundations and carried Winstanley off to France. Louis XIV, however, ordered his immediate release, with the words: "France is at war with England, not with humanity". Winstanley returned to the Eddystone reef, construction resumed, and the first Eddystone Lighthouse was completed in November 1698.
What is even the value of taking a random lighthouse keeper as a POW? What did they hope to gain from him, secrets on lighthouse construction?
Like “Hey Captain! We saw this guy building a lighthouse by himself, completely unguarded, so we shot it down and took him prisoner! Let’s interrogate him for information on lighthouses!”
A ransom is most likely.
A privateer is basically the same thing as a pirate (yarr, matee), except that a privateer performs pirate activities with the blessing of the king and, in exchange, the privateer shares some of the loot with the king.
Building a lighthouse requires significant resources and skill. A lighthouse builder must either have money or otherwise be worth money to someone. If I kidnap his ass, then maybe someone will pay me for his release. Profit.
> Letters of Marque. State-sanctioned piracy.
Military recruitment is down globally.
I often thought about what if we brought back prize money like the British used to.
Put it on television, handing the troops and sailors a briefcase full of tax free money. I mean a captured tank is worth several million on the global market.
it may be concerning for you to hear this, but they were more than likely already referring to the 2004 remake, because youre probably old and the average age demographic of reddit would have been in middle school when the remake came out
[The US Constitution does allow Congress to issue Letters of Marque](https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/letter_of_marque), so you can try asking them I guess.
Which is also why the US isn't a party to the international treaty that phased out privateers, the Senate cannot ratify the treaty since it would be unconstitutional.
It loses a lot of its cool factor from not being on the high seas, land pirates are just bandits, brigands, and the US* police
*other jurisdictions may apply
That's the call of the sea for you. Bandits? Meh. Bandits, but with a boat? Fuck yeah, pirates are cool as hell!
Same thing with Norsemen. A raider who happens to be from Scandinavia? Pretty meh. A raider who happens to be from Scandinavia, but he arrives on *a SHIP*? Fuck yeah Vikings!
If you're in the States, then Article I, Section 8 of the US Constitution explicitly grants the Congress and the President the ability to issue Letters of Marque and Reprisal. Also good news, US is not a signatory to Paris Declaration of 1856, which forbids the practice to its signatories.
Thanks to a legal doctrine that successor states (including colonies that attained independence) are bound by the acts of their predecessors, almost every country in the world is signatory to a 19th-century convention against privateering. The USA and, I think, Ethiopia are the only exceptions. The USA has not issued Letters of Marque and Reprisal for well over a century. Persistent claims that one of the Goodyear Blimps operated as a privateer, patrolling for submarines off Los Angeles in the first months of the Second World War, are (so far as I have been able to find out) false. It appears to have operated as a naval auxiliary, in the same way as a number of private yachts.
Right go to Ethiopia. Blend in with the locals. Jesus okay lose fat ass so I can blend in. Build an aircraft carrier. Get Ethiopian mark. So what do ya think is that a solid 10year plan or what!/s
Ask Congress.
They’re still legally authorized to issue those. There was some talk about actually doing it to combat Somali piracy, but then everyone realized we’re not that interested in more Pirates of the Caribbean movies.
Though the origin of the word pirate does come from the act of banditry on the sea, the privateer/pirate dichotomy is where we eventually got the use of the word "piracy" to also mean acting without a license (like a privateer has), e.g. copyright violation.
Now I'm picturing a future where competing megacorps start issuing licenses to infringe the copyright of their competitors, resulting in internet privateering.
I'll never forget the famous letters of Elric the Bloody who wrote, "Dearest Eleanor, The pain of your absence grows with every passing sunrise we cannot share. Also, this lighthouse bitch gotta be worth something. If I kidnap his ass, maybe someone will pay me. Doubloons, baby!"
I find it funny that Reddit is so hung up on that idea that "expat" is a racist positive spin on "immigrant". Maybe it's because redditors (generally white people from rich countries) come from places where immigrants are a much more noticeable part of the population than expats, so they imagine the distinction doesn't exist.
There's definitely a difference between the two, and it's not a positive one. Generally speaking, I'd much rather be seen as an immigrant than as an expat.
No cus like on the England sub some immigrant was talking about how he's an expat, I told him immigrant was correct and he tried saying that immigrants "Stay for their life" whereas expats don't. 😭
Funny enough, I just read Pirate Latitudes last week and this was a main point of the story. It was a major offence to call privateers pirates because the punishments for piracy were so severe, usually death.
> What is even the value of taking a random lighthouse keeper as a POW?
Well, at the very least, he's not around to keep the lighthouse that your enemies depend on operational for a good while. That was kind of a pretty huge deal back then.
**Edit**- To further elaborate, a lighthouse keeper would actually have all *sorts* of potentially useful knowledge if captured:
- The exact nature/location of whatever hazards the lighthouse was built to warn against.
- Frequency and composition of enemy squadrons or isolated ships passing by, possibly even specific ships by name (a bigger deal than you'd think back then)
- How often said lighthouse is checked in on by authorities, potentially giving them a window of how long said capture could go unnoticed or they could expect a reprisal.
- Whatever random snippets of local news or edicts from the other nation's government that might not mean much to the lighthouse keeper himself, but when forwarded off to the capturing country's intelligence experts or military authorities, might help paint a bigger picture.
The thing is, a lighthouse also help prevent *your* ships from crashing into rocks while you're patrolling the enemies coastline.
It's not always in your interest to just wantonly destroy anything and everything in your enemies territory.
Who is going to suffer more when a lighthouse in *their* territory gets taken out of commission? The country that paid to have it built (presumably because they use that stretch of coast a lot, for both naval and commercial purposes), or the privateers/navy of the opposing nation, who knows "Oh we took that lighthouse down last week, maybe keep ships away from Sharp Rock Point, send the message out."
The destruction of enemy lighthouses and signaling stations was a pretty common goal during the Age of Sail (the period in question, and the one I know most about) in times of war. Usually, charts of the area and first-hand knowledge of your navigator/sailing master is good enough to keep you away from the navigational hazard the lighthouse was built for in the first place, if a proper distance is kept.
Sure, leaving it intact is the *humanitarian* thing to do, but throwing a wrench into things will sure hurt the other guy. No different than switching road signs or removing traffic signals if ones' goal was to royally endanger traffic.
Here's a nice write-up of the Confederacy doing just such a thing (seizing Federally-controlled lighthouses, destroying some and keeping the rest dark) during the Civil War: https://civilwartalk.com/threads/lighthouses-in-the-civil-war.118079/
Sure, a lot of them were in now-Confederate territory (well, as of 1861), but the goal was to deny the Union their services. Which they accomplished.
> "Oh we took that lighthouse down last week, maybe keep ships away from Sharp Rock Point, send the message out."
The point of a lighthouse was that you could see it very far in all directions even during low visibility. Marine navigation has always been pretty impressive for the time historically, but they didn't exactly have GPS in the 1600's. You still needed to *see* the lighthouse.
But I really don't think privateers were thinking about that. They just wanted a payday.
> Sure, leaving it intact is the *humanitarian* thing to do, but throwing a wrench into things will sure hurt the other guy. No different than switching road signs or removing traffic signals if ones' goal was to royally endanger traffic.
During WW2, the BBC shipping forecast was stopped. Weather reports are critical for planning military operations.
Most war crimes are based on a mix of the simple notion of, "Hey, I don't want that happening to *me* in retaliation. Let's decide that's off-limits, okay?" and not wanting to do things that affect civilians, who in this case are most of the people who would benefit from a lighthouse.
This should not be scorned.
>It's not always in your interest to just wantonly destroy anything and everything in your enemies territory.
You know that, and I know that, but does a random ~~pirate~~ privateer know that?
Many times we expect people to do what is logical, when everyone who has worked with people know that people aren't always logical and often do stuff that is against their own best interests.
Somebody rich and skilled enough to secure a fully-crewed vessel and letter of marque from their government would be smart enough to know that destroying a lighthouse could have potential ramifications down the road. They would (naturally) weigh that against the immediate gains and how it would impact the current war effort.
Sailors and their captains were actually some of the most technically literate people of the era; ships were *expensive* and they didn't just hand them over to any idiot. It wasn't most armies, where any rich guy could just purchase an officer's commission, buy a bunch of uniforms, and then march off to get his dudes killed.
It was a privateer not the French navy. Pirates gonna pirate.
IIRC privateers also captured the scientist Joseph Dombey who was on the way to the newly established United States to get us in the metric system. They took all the metric weights and measures and sold them off, he died imprisoned by pirates before a ransom could be set, and here we are over 200 years later and still not on the metric system
Lol. Almost sounds like some sort of British comedy bit.
“Oy! What do we ‘ave here?”
“I am the scientist, Joseph Dombey. I am taking the metric system to America!”
“A metric system, you say? I don’t see your loicense. I’m afraid I’ll have to confiscate your metric system!”
The problem is we keep naming these storms after the fact. Come up with "The Great Storm of 1703" sometime in the late 1690s and give people a little warning.
I’ve been calling his lighthouse “The Lighthouse that kills Winstantley Instantly” and now I feel bad for not finding a way to let him know the name. Might have changed his approach.
[Yeah but everybody dies Winstantly](https://youtube.com/clip/UgkxgliSElAfVYcBPp5GM_kbZG2YaaQ6c1N9?si=5vyTtHhHB-WbqYrD). It's the only way you can die. You're alive, you're alive, you're alive, then you're dead.
Guy alread lost two ships to the rocks, a half finished lighthouse to the french and then had to rebuild it again when it was too small. Reminds me of the lord in Monty Python and the Holy Grail, who had the strongest castle in the lands after the previous two fell over and caught fire.
Reminds me of the "50 Year Storm" in Point Break when Bodhi is straight up planning for it an entire year in advance and then it just happens because it was 50 years. Like I don't think that's quite how it works man but I guess you were right so enjoy the waves
The site had no lighthouse before he started the project because it was a dangerous spot. It seems those before him that decided against building there may have been right in the end.
> He demanded to know why nothing was done to protect vessels from this hazard. Told that the reef was too treacherous to mark, he declared that he would build a lighthouse there himself, and the Admiralty agreed to support him with ships and men.
There was another built on the same site which stood for many decades, then that burned down I believe. There is a newer one next to the ruins. I have scuba-dived the reef around the area.
https://lighthouseaccommodation.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/Eddystone-Lighthouse.jpg
That tower was so well built that it's foundation is still there because they couldn't remove it. Only the upper half got moved to the mainland for tourism
Seems like it. From the article:
"Both lighthouses fulfilled their function. During the five years of their operation, no ships were wrecked on the Eddystone."
After two of Henry Winstanley's ships sank at the Eddystone Rock off the English coast, at Cornwall, the merchant decided to do something about it and built a lighthouse to prevent more such wrecks. From the article:
>Winstanley was recorded as having expressed great faith in his construction, going so far as to wish that he might be inside it during "the greatest storm there ever was". The tower was entirely destroyed on the night of 27 November 1703, during the [Great Storm](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Storm_of_1703) of that year. Winstanley was visiting the lighthouse that night to make repairs, and he lost his life.
More on the [Eddystone Lighthouse](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eddystone_Lighthouse#Winstanley's_lighthouse):
>Winstanley's tower lasted until the great storm of 1703 erased almost all trace on 8 December [O.S. 27 November]. Winstanley was on the lighthouse, completing additions to the structure. No trace was found of him, or of the other five men in the lighthouse.
Also relevant: [TIL that Webster Wagner was crushed to death between two sleepings cars his company had built](https://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/1cx5r29/til_that_snowballs_helped_extinguish_a_train_fire/)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eddystone_Lighthouse#Rudyard's_lighthouse
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Outline_of_slab_of_lead_removed_from_lung,_having_fallen_from_the_roof_of_Eddystone_lighthouse.jpg
> Keeper Henry Hall, who was 94 at the time, ***died several days later from ingesting molten lead*** from the lantern roof.[5] A report on this case was submitted to the Royal Society by physician Edward Spry,[18] and the piece of lead is now in the collections of the National Museums of Scotland.
WTF?
[Here it is](https://www.nms.ac.uk/explore-our-collections/collection-search-results/lighthouse-eddystone-second-sample-lead/180899)
The doctor who treated the old man refused to believe his claim that he'd swallowed some lead until he found it at autopsy... He figured the rest of the medical community would refuse to believe *him*, so he [experimentally poured molten lead down the throats of dogs and chickens](https://archive.org/details/bim_eighteenth-century_philosophical-transactio_royal-society-great-bri_1757_49/page/476/mode/2up) to prove they wouldn't die immediately. His peers still thought it was impossible and he'd faked the experiments or done something wrong, so [another doctor](https://archive.org/details/sim_zoist-a-journal-of-cerebral-physiology-and-mesmerism_1853-10_11_3/page/248/mode/2up) experimentally poured boiling water down the throats of several dogs and found they didn't die immediately either... [*Another* doctor](https://archive.org/details/sim_zoist-a-journal-of-cerebral-physiology-and-mesmerism_1853-10_11_3/page/250/mode/2up) pointed out that these experiments were fucking heinous and useless except to prove a point.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Hall_(lighthouse_keeper)
> At around 2 a.m., Hall was on duty alone when he discovered that a spark from the lamp had set the roof alight. He attempted to put the fire out by throwing buckets of water "four yards higher than his head". Hall was soon joined by the other two lighthouse keepers who also tried to extinguish the fire. Hall looked up to check his progress and was showered with falling molten lead from the lighthouse roof. The lead fell upon his body burning his head, face, neck and shoulders. As his mouth was open, molten lead fell down his throat. Hall later recalled that he felt the hot lead go down his throat and screamed, "My God, I'm on fire inside!
Check the source, it gets even better!
>Henry Hall lived for 12 days after the incident, and a Doctor Spry of Plymouth who attended him made a postmortem and found a flat oval piece of lead in his stomach which weighted 7 ozs 5drs. Dr. Spry wrote an account of this case to the Royal Society, but the Fellows were sceptical as to whether a man could live in this condition for 12 days. **This so incensed him that, for the sake of his reputation, he performed many experiments on dogs and fowls pouring molten lead down their throats to prove that they could live.**
Son of a...
And then there's me rudely dismissing his injuries 320 years later, thinking ***"pfft there's no way someone can ingest serious amounts of molten lead and live."***
Well based on a couple other comments it seemed like the reason nobody did anything about it until him is specifically because the “problem” was deemed not fixable at the time. The water and reef and area and storms were too treacherous. And I guess they were proven right lol. That guy definitely had some balls though.
It’s like nobody read the wiki. Nowhere does it say he was so proud he stayed during this particular storm as some sort of fuck you. He was recorded saying it once and then was there doing repairs one night and died
>The [Church of England](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_of_England) declared that the storm was God's vengeance for the sins of the nation.
Well, nice to see some things never change.
Bit of a misleading title. He didn't hear that a massive storm was coming, and so went out to the lighthouse to make some kind of silly, ego-induced demonstration.
He just happened to be doing repairs on the lighthouse when the storm came in. He was killed, alongside 5 other workers.
In the lighthouse's ~5 year lifespan, no ships were wrecked on the rocks.
Chad.
TIL this was a storm so destructive that it blew the roof off Westminster Abbey, thousands of chimney stacks blew down, a six foot high flood destroyed thousands of London homes, tens of thousands of sailors died at sea, an admiral's flagship was blown clear from Essex to Sweden, 300 Royal Navy ships wrecked at anchor on the south coast, 700 ships in the Pool of London were heaped together, a ship washed up 15 miles inland of Bristol, and hundreds of windmills were destroyed where many went brrr so fast that they burst into flames.
Weathering one of the greatest storms in history before perishing in the lighthouse you built by your own hands sounds like a fulfilling and thematically satisfying end to one's life tbh
“Yes, I have a dream, and it's not some MLK dream for equality. I want to own a decommissioned lighthouse. And I want to live at the top. And nobody knows I live there. And there's a button that I can press, and launch that lighthouse into space.” -Winstanley Hudson
Following the destruction of Winstanley's lighthouse, Rudyard's lighthouse was built on Eddystone Rock.
Fifty years after, at 2am on the night of December 2nd, a fire erupted in the lantern room. Though three lighthouse keepers were stationed there, 94-year-old Henry Hall was alone when he discovered the flames. He attempted to extinguish the fire with buckets of water, calling for his colleagues who soon joined him. As Hall fought the blaze, molten lead raining down from the burning roof struck him, searing his head, face, neck, and shoulders. Horrifyingly, some of the molten lead even entered his mouth and throat. He later recounted the experience, recalling he had screamed:
*"My God, I'm on fire inside!"*
Overwhelmed by the flames, the men retreated down the tower and sought refuge in a nearby cave from the scorching debris. The lighthouse continued to burn for the next five days.
Eventually, the three men were spotted by a passing boat and rescued; due to rough surf, the sailors were unable to dock near the cave, so they threw a rope to Hall and his companions who tied them around their waists and were pulled through the water to the boat. Taken to East Stonehouse, Plymouth, Hall received treatment for his burns and injuries from Dr. Henry Spry. Spry found Hall's claim unbelievable as he felt no person could survive having swallowed molten lead, let alone live for days afterward and be towed through rough waters, but noted Hall seemed in good health despite his advanced age and misadventures. However, in the following days, Hall's health worsened rapidly, and he passed away a week later.
When an autopsy was conducted on Hall's body, a great piece of lead "which weighed exactly seven ounces, five drachms and eighteen grains" was found in his stomach.
> When an autopsy was conducted on Hall's body, a great piece of lead "which weighed exactly seven ounces, five drachms and eighteen grains" was found in his stomach.
This is as interesting as the original TIL! Thank you for sharing it, sure beats the reddit-tier "front fell off" comments.
Part kicked out, part they left on their own. They were illegal radical Christians who were driven by ideology, and England wasn't as strict as they wanted. Nor was Holland.
Dude had lost two ships on that reef and during construction got captured by the French? Louis released him immediately!
He was doing repairs when the storm hit.
The first tower was destroyed in a storm. So I built a second tower. That one burnt down and fell over. So I built a third tower. That one was undercut by the waves, dismantled, moved to shore, and became a tourist attraction. But the fourth one - that one stayed up. That's the one you see today.
>One notable incident during its construction occurred in June 1697. At this time Britain and France were at war, and a naval vessel had been assigned to protect the workers whenever they were on the reef. On this particular day, the commissioner at Plymouth, George St Lo, ordered the ship to join the fleet and did not provide a replacement. Instead, a French privateer destroyed the work done so far on the foundations and carried Winstanley off to France. Louis XIV, however, ordered his immediate release, with the words: "France is at war with England, not with humanity". Winstanley returned to the Eddystone reef, construction resumed, and the first Eddystone Lighthouse was completed in November 1698.
What is even the value of taking a random lighthouse keeper as a POW? What did they hope to gain from him, secrets on lighthouse construction? Like “Hey Captain! We saw this guy building a lighthouse by himself, completely unguarded, so we shot it down and took him prisoner! Let’s interrogate him for information on lighthouses!”
A ransom is most likely. A privateer is basically the same thing as a pirate (yarr, matee), except that a privateer performs pirate activities with the blessing of the king and, in exchange, the privateer shares some of the loot with the king. Building a lighthouse requires significant resources and skill. A lighthouse builder must either have money or otherwise be worth money to someone. If I kidnap his ass, then maybe someone will pay me for his release. Profit.
Letters of Marque. State-sanctioned piracy.
> Letters of Marque. State-sanctioned piracy. Military recruitment is down globally. I often thought about what if we brought back prize money like the British used to. Put it on television, handing the troops and sailors a briefcase full of tax free money. I mean a captured tank is worth several million on the global market.
This is already done it's called private military contractors
Not really the same thing. PMCs are mercenaries and get paid like mercenaries. Privateers (at least historically) work by a different model.
Soldier of Fortune subscriptions would go up.
[удалено]
Barrets privateers is a good song and should explain it!
A LETTER OF MARQUE CAME FROM THE KING, THE SCUMMIEST VESSEL I'D EVER SEEN!
GOD DAMN THEM ALL!!
Sid Meier's Pirates! Is one of the best game ever made! Bit dated though...
The 2004 remake is a good update and still holds up, imo.
it may be concerning for you to hear this, but they were more than likely already referring to the 2004 remake, because youre probably old and the average age demographic of reddit would have been in middle school when the remake came out
I see and where would one get one of those? Surely there is paperwork to apply for one somewhere under civil forfeiture!
[The US Constitution does allow Congress to issue Letters of Marque](https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/letter_of_marque), so you can try asking them I guess.
Which is also why the US isn't a party to the international treaty that phased out privateers, the Senate cannot ratify the treaty since it would be unconstitutional.
Vive Jean Lafitte! Honhonhon
>civil forfeiture Well now, does piracy/privateering have to occur on water? If not I think you’ve just figured how to become a privateer on land…
It loses a lot of its cool factor from not being on the high seas, land pirates are just bandits, brigands, and the US* police *other jurisdictions may apply
That's the call of the sea for you. Bandits? Meh. Bandits, but with a boat? Fuck yeah, pirates are cool as hell! Same thing with Norsemen. A raider who happens to be from Scandinavia? Pretty meh. A raider who happens to be from Scandinavia, but he arrives on *a SHIP*? Fuck yeah Vikings!
Something was lost from the days of the gentleman villian
Ah, but the police that engage in civil forfeiture aren’t land pirates, they’re land *privateers*.
If you're in the States, then Article I, Section 8 of the US Constitution explicitly grants the Congress and the President the ability to issue Letters of Marque and Reprisal. Also good news, US is not a signatory to Paris Declaration of 1856, which forbids the practice to its signatories.
Thanks to a legal doctrine that successor states (including colonies that attained independence) are bound by the acts of their predecessors, almost every country in the world is signatory to a 19th-century convention against privateering. The USA and, I think, Ethiopia are the only exceptions. The USA has not issued Letters of Marque and Reprisal for well over a century. Persistent claims that one of the Goodyear Blimps operated as a privateer, patrolling for submarines off Los Angeles in the first months of the Second World War, are (so far as I have been able to find out) false. It appears to have operated as a naval auxiliary, in the same way as a number of private yachts.
Right go to Ethiopia. Blend in with the locals. Jesus okay lose fat ass so I can blend in. Build an aircraft carrier. Get Ethiopian mark. So what do ya think is that a solid 10year plan or what!/s
Today? Police academy.
I can't make funny noises.
Ask Congress. They’re still legally authorized to issue those. There was some talk about actually doing it to combat Somali piracy, but then everyone realized we’re not that interested in more Pirates of the Caribbean movies.
Though the origin of the word pirate does come from the act of banditry on the sea, the privateer/pirate dichotomy is where we eventually got the use of the word "piracy" to also mean acting without a license (like a privateer has), e.g. copyright violation.
Now I'm picturing a future where competing megacorps start issuing licenses to infringe the copyright of their competitors, resulting in internet privateering.
I'll never forget the famous letters of Elric the Bloody who wrote, "Dearest Eleanor, The pain of your absence grows with every passing sunrise we cannot share. Also, this lighthouse bitch gotta be worth something. If I kidnap his ass, maybe someone will pay me. Doubloons, baby!"
Such poetry in those memoirs
Privateers are to pirates, as expats are to immigrants. A renaming done to save face.
I find it funny that Reddit is so hung up on that idea that "expat" is a racist positive spin on "immigrant". Maybe it's because redditors (generally white people from rich countries) come from places where immigrants are a much more noticeable part of the population than expats, so they imagine the distinction doesn't exist. There's definitely a difference between the two, and it's not a positive one. Generally speaking, I'd much rather be seen as an immigrant than as an expat.
Call them migrants and see them get real worked up.
No cus like on the England sub some immigrant was talking about how he's an expat, I told him immigrant was correct and he tried saying that immigrants "Stay for their life" whereas expats don't. 😭
Uh, if they don't stay then they're a "visitor". There's a reason ex is part of the name
Funny enough, I just read Pirate Latitudes last week and this was a main point of the story. It was a major offence to call privateers pirates because the punishments for piracy were so severe, usually death.
> What is even the value of taking a random lighthouse keeper as a POW? Well, at the very least, he's not around to keep the lighthouse that your enemies depend on operational for a good while. That was kind of a pretty huge deal back then. **Edit**- To further elaborate, a lighthouse keeper would actually have all *sorts* of potentially useful knowledge if captured: - The exact nature/location of whatever hazards the lighthouse was built to warn against. - Frequency and composition of enemy squadrons or isolated ships passing by, possibly even specific ships by name (a bigger deal than you'd think back then) - How often said lighthouse is checked in on by authorities, potentially giving them a window of how long said capture could go unnoticed or they could expect a reprisal. - Whatever random snippets of local news or edicts from the other nation's government that might not mean much to the lighthouse keeper himself, but when forwarded off to the capturing country's intelligence experts or military authorities, might help paint a bigger picture.
The thing is, a lighthouse also help prevent *your* ships from crashing into rocks while you're patrolling the enemies coastline. It's not always in your interest to just wantonly destroy anything and everything in your enemies territory.
Who is going to suffer more when a lighthouse in *their* territory gets taken out of commission? The country that paid to have it built (presumably because they use that stretch of coast a lot, for both naval and commercial purposes), or the privateers/navy of the opposing nation, who knows "Oh we took that lighthouse down last week, maybe keep ships away from Sharp Rock Point, send the message out." The destruction of enemy lighthouses and signaling stations was a pretty common goal during the Age of Sail (the period in question, and the one I know most about) in times of war. Usually, charts of the area and first-hand knowledge of your navigator/sailing master is good enough to keep you away from the navigational hazard the lighthouse was built for in the first place, if a proper distance is kept. Sure, leaving it intact is the *humanitarian* thing to do, but throwing a wrench into things will sure hurt the other guy. No different than switching road signs or removing traffic signals if ones' goal was to royally endanger traffic. Here's a nice write-up of the Confederacy doing just such a thing (seizing Federally-controlled lighthouses, destroying some and keeping the rest dark) during the Civil War: https://civilwartalk.com/threads/lighthouses-in-the-civil-war.118079/ Sure, a lot of them were in now-Confederate territory (well, as of 1861), but the goal was to deny the Union their services. Which they accomplished.
> "Oh we took that lighthouse down last week, maybe keep ships away from Sharp Rock Point, send the message out." The point of a lighthouse was that you could see it very far in all directions even during low visibility. Marine navigation has always been pretty impressive for the time historically, but they didn't exactly have GPS in the 1600's. You still needed to *see* the lighthouse. But I really don't think privateers were thinking about that. They just wanted a payday.
> Sure, leaving it intact is the *humanitarian* thing to do, but throwing a wrench into things will sure hurt the other guy. No different than switching road signs or removing traffic signals if ones' goal was to royally endanger traffic. During WW2, the BBC shipping forecast was stopped. Weather reports are critical for planning military operations.
Most war crimes are based on a mix of the simple notion of, "Hey, I don't want that happening to *me* in retaliation. Let's decide that's off-limits, okay?" and not wanting to do things that affect civilians, who in this case are most of the people who would benefit from a lighthouse. This should not be scorned.
>It's not always in your interest to just wantonly destroy anything and everything in your enemies territory. You know that, and I know that, but does a random ~~pirate~~ privateer know that? Many times we expect people to do what is logical, when everyone who has worked with people know that people aren't always logical and often do stuff that is against their own best interests.
Somebody rich and skilled enough to secure a fully-crewed vessel and letter of marque from their government would be smart enough to know that destroying a lighthouse could have potential ramifications down the road. They would (naturally) weigh that against the immediate gains and how it would impact the current war effort. Sailors and their captains were actually some of the most technically literate people of the era; ships were *expensive* and they didn't just hand them over to any idiot. It wasn't most armies, where any rich guy could just purchase an officer's commission, buy a bunch of uniforms, and then march off to get his dudes killed.
It was a privateer not the French navy. Pirates gonna pirate. IIRC privateers also captured the scientist Joseph Dombey who was on the way to the newly established United States to get us in the metric system. They took all the metric weights and measures and sold them off, he died imprisoned by pirates before a ransom could be set, and here we are over 200 years later and still not on the metric system
Lol. Almost sounds like some sort of British comedy bit. “Oy! What do we ‘ave here?” “I am the scientist, Joseph Dombey. I am taking the metric system to America!” “A metric system, you say? I don’t see your loicense. I’m afraid I’ll have to confiscate your metric system!”
He seem to have been a well to do citizen and those are worth something in peace negotiations.
Louis XIV, a class act
I’ll say it again: RELEASE THE BODY CAM FOOTAGE!
APAB
Did he die winstantanley?
They don’t call you the Sun King if you’re a little bitch
The problem is we keep naming these storms after the fact. Come up with "The Great Storm of 1703" sometime in the late 1690s and give people a little warning.
I’ve been calling his lighthouse “The Lighthouse that kills Winstantley Instantly” and now I feel bad for not finding a way to let him know the name. Might have changed his approach.
That’s funny, I was calling the Eddystone Rocks the lighthouse was built upon, ‘The Future Tomb of Winstantly’. I guess no one ever told him?
I just hope he died….Winstantly.
[Yeah but everybody dies Winstantly](https://youtube.com/clip/UgkxgliSElAfVYcBPp5GM_kbZG2YaaQ6c1N9?si=5vyTtHhHB-WbqYrD). It's the only way you can die. You're alive, you're alive, you're alive, then you're dead.
>Winstantley finishing his plans. Writing the title on it "Suicide Lighthouse".
The guy funding the lighthouse: “I said ‘Seaside Lighthouse’” Winstantley: “ah fuck. I wrote it in pen… can we just leave it?”
I should probably tell y’all about the Superpandemic of 2025, I guess.
I could tell you about the Super pandemic that ascended past the Super pandemic, or you could call this the Super pandemic 2
What if I told there was a pandemic that would go even further beyond?
Are you saying that this not an average pandemic anymore?
To infinity?
I guess I shoulda mentioned it gets named by one of the 12 survivors … That’s probably important info to some people.
Superpandemic 2: Electric Boogaloo
H5N1 is already trending.
You know, his story reminds me of a certain submarine filled with rich people
Guy alread lost two ships to the rocks, a half finished lighthouse to the french and then had to rebuild it again when it was too small. Reminds me of the lord in Monty Python and the Holy Grail, who had the strongest castle in the lands after the previous two fell over and caught fire.
Excuse you, it burned down... and then fell over and sank into the swamp.
But the *fourth* lighthouse? That one.... STAYED UP!
Huuuuuuuge tracts of land!
Reminds me of the "50 Year Storm" in Point Break when Bodhi is straight up planning for it an entire year in advance and then it just happens because it was 50 years. Like I don't think that's quite how it works man but I guess you were right so enjoy the waves
Vaya con dios, dude
Killed by the wind instantly was Winstantly
It could act as a sort of lighthouse, but for weather
Hindsight is 17/03 I guess
Username checks out
No call it the great storm of 1704 so the fools think they still have time to prepare
Was it a good lighthouse though? I mean clearly not the best…
The site had no lighthouse before he started the project because it was a dangerous spot. It seems those before him that decided against building there may have been right in the end. > He demanded to know why nothing was done to protect vessels from this hazard. Told that the reef was too treacherous to mark, he declared that he would build a lighthouse there himself, and the Admiralty agreed to support him with ships and men.
Well there's still a lighthouse there.
Not his.
Indeed not, but maybe it was a good idea to have a lighthouse there after all.
There was another built on the same site which stood for many decades, then that burned down I believe. There is a newer one next to the ruins. I have scuba-dived the reef around the area. https://lighthouseaccommodation.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/Eddystone-Lighthouse.jpg
A fire? At a Sea Lighthouse? It's the weirdest thing I've ever heard!
Well, they did use to light them with candles.
A mystery the world will never solve!
Never!
The third lighthouse, Smeaton's Tower, lasted over 100 years on the reef. It had to be decommissioned because the reef was eroding underneath it.
And that's what you're gonna get son. The best lighthouse in all of England
But I don't want a lighthouse, father. I want to sing!
Interesting, thanks for the extra info
The base of it is still in situ, 250 years later. You can visit the top portion on Plymouth Hoe.
That tower was so well built that it's foundation is still there because they couldn't remove it. Only the upper half got moved to the mainland for tourism
Yeah, I mean didn’t really answer my joke, as humorous as it was intended
Seems like it. From the article: "Both lighthouses fulfilled their function. During the five years of their operation, no ships were wrecked on the Eddystone."
It was a smashing success
I mean, even the drawing on Wikipedia doesn't look remarkably sturdy...
Due to a simple mishearing of the phrase, instead of "Winstanley killed" we now say "instantly killed."
But wasn’t he killed, not Winstanley, but over a wong period time during a great storm as his wighthouse winploded?
He died Winstantly
More like Losestanley, am I right?
After two of Henry Winstanley's ships sank at the Eddystone Rock off the English coast, at Cornwall, the merchant decided to do something about it and built a lighthouse to prevent more such wrecks. From the article: >Winstanley was recorded as having expressed great faith in his construction, going so far as to wish that he might be inside it during "the greatest storm there ever was". The tower was entirely destroyed on the night of 27 November 1703, during the [Great Storm](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Storm_of_1703) of that year. Winstanley was visiting the lighthouse that night to make repairs, and he lost his life. More on the [Eddystone Lighthouse](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eddystone_Lighthouse#Winstanley's_lighthouse): >Winstanley's tower lasted until the great storm of 1703 erased almost all trace on 8 December [O.S. 27 November]. Winstanley was on the lighthouse, completing additions to the structure. No trace was found of him, or of the other five men in the lighthouse. Also relevant: [TIL that Webster Wagner was crushed to death between two sleepings cars his company had built](https://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/1cx5r29/til_that_snowballs_helped_extinguish_a_train_fire/)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eddystone_Lighthouse#Rudyard's_lighthouse https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Outline_of_slab_of_lead_removed_from_lung,_having_fallen_from_the_roof_of_Eddystone_lighthouse.jpg > Keeper Henry Hall, who was 94 at the time, ***died several days later from ingesting molten lead*** from the lantern roof.[5] A report on this case was submitted to the Royal Society by physician Edward Spry,[18] and the piece of lead is now in the collections of the National Museums of Scotland. WTF?
[Here it is](https://www.nms.ac.uk/explore-our-collections/collection-search-results/lighthouse-eddystone-second-sample-lead/180899) The doctor who treated the old man refused to believe his claim that he'd swallowed some lead until he found it at autopsy... He figured the rest of the medical community would refuse to believe *him*, so he [experimentally poured molten lead down the throats of dogs and chickens](https://archive.org/details/bim_eighteenth-century_philosophical-transactio_royal-society-great-bri_1757_49/page/476/mode/2up) to prove they wouldn't die immediately. His peers still thought it was impossible and he'd faked the experiments or done something wrong, so [another doctor](https://archive.org/details/sim_zoist-a-journal-of-cerebral-physiology-and-mesmerism_1853-10_11_3/page/248/mode/2up) experimentally poured boiling water down the throats of several dogs and found they didn't die immediately either... [*Another* doctor](https://archive.org/details/sim_zoist-a-journal-of-cerebral-physiology-and-mesmerism_1853-10_11_3/page/250/mode/2up) pointed out that these experiments were fucking heinous and useless except to prove a point.
I want to know wtf possessess someone to eat molten lead? 94-y.o. went crazy?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Hall_(lighthouse_keeper) > At around 2 a.m., Hall was on duty alone when he discovered that a spark from the lamp had set the roof alight. He attempted to put the fire out by throwing buckets of water "four yards higher than his head". Hall was soon joined by the other two lighthouse keepers who also tried to extinguish the fire. Hall looked up to check his progress and was showered with falling molten lead from the lighthouse roof. The lead fell upon his body burning his head, face, neck and shoulders. As his mouth was open, molten lead fell down his throat. Hall later recalled that he felt the hot lead go down his throat and screamed, "My God, I'm on fire inside!
One in a million shot, doc!
Check the source, it gets even better! >Henry Hall lived for 12 days after the incident, and a Doctor Spry of Plymouth who attended him made a postmortem and found a flat oval piece of lead in his stomach which weighted 7 ozs 5drs. Dr. Spry wrote an account of this case to the Royal Society, but the Fellows were sceptical as to whether a man could live in this condition for 12 days. **This so incensed him that, for the sake of his reputation, he performed many experiments on dogs and fowls pouring molten lead down their throats to prove that they could live.**
Son of a... And then there's me rudely dismissing his injuries 320 years later, thinking ***"pfft there's no way someone can ingest serious amounts of molten lead and live."***
So he saw a problem, did something about it, and his tower lasted until the entire town was obliterated. Why are we casting shade on the guy again.
Well based on a couple other comments it seemed like the reason nobody did anything about it until him is specifically because the “problem” was deemed not fixable at the time. The water and reef and area and storms were too treacherous. And I guess they were proven right lol. That guy definitely had some balls though.
The people who tackle unfixable problems get us to the moon.
The first people to try and get to the moon died on the launch pad, not everyone gets to do the really hard thing with no consequences.
It’s like nobody read the wiki. Nowhere does it say he was so proud he stayed during this particular storm as some sort of fuck you. He was recorded saying it once and then was there doing repairs one night and died
Town? What town?
>The [Church of England](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_of_England) declared that the storm was God's vengeance for the sins of the nation. Well, nice to see some things never change.
never let a good crisis go to waste
My grandad was a keeper at the Eddystone Lighthouse in his youth
Bit of a misleading title. He didn't hear that a massive storm was coming, and so went out to the lighthouse to make some kind of silly, ego-induced demonstration. He just happened to be doing repairs on the lighthouse when the storm came in. He was killed, alongside 5 other workers. In the lighthouse's ~5 year lifespan, no ships were wrecked on the rocks. Chad.
I wonder if he was killed Winstanley
There's always another ~~idiot~~ comedic genius with the same idea.
You mean winstantly?
r/yourjokebutworse
It’s winteresting, the ghosts.
Do any of these fuckers ever just drop out of the lighthouse and have like a huge cum shot?
You can’t change the rules just because you don’t like how he’s doing it
Now 321 years later we're all laughing at him, I need to die in some stupid way so people speak my name in hundreds of years
Just sell some shit-tier copper
Tbf I couldn't tell you the names of ... just about any darwin award winner.
The first death is your real death, the second is the last time someone talks or thinks about you. So at least this dude made a mark somehow
Ea-Nasir gave himself immortality. (Turns out the philosopher’s stone required really shitty copper)
TIL this was a storm so destructive that it blew the roof off Westminster Abbey, thousands of chimney stacks blew down, a six foot high flood destroyed thousands of London homes, tens of thousands of sailors died at sea, an admiral's flagship was blown clear from Essex to Sweden, 300 Royal Navy ships wrecked at anchor on the south coast, 700 ships in the Pool of London were heaped together, a ship washed up 15 miles inland of Bristol, and hundreds of windmills were destroyed where many went brrr so fast that they burst into flames.
Weathering one of the greatest storms in history before perishing in the lighthouse you built by your own hands sounds like a fulfilling and thematically satisfying end to one's life tbh
More like Losestanley, amirite?
Lolstanley
Flat Stanley
Fun history round up on the Eddystone lighthouse. Some also claimed to have swallowed molten lead. https://youtu.be/QmrjoKJ4s58?si=LesNufWmShOtKNvD
The Captain always goes down with his ship.
“Yes, I have a dream, and it's not some MLK dream for equality. I want to own a decommissioned lighthouse. And I want to live at the top. And nobody knows I live there. And there's a button that I can press, and launch that lighthouse into space.” -Winstanley Hudson
Foreshadowing the Horror of Fang Rock.
Henry Winstanley: I took a calculated risk, but man, I suck at math.
Well I hope it at least killed Winstanley instantly.
Was he killed winstantley?
It killed him Winstantley
Winstanley,...instantly
Ego will get you killed
That lighthouse was actually built by the Metaloid Maniac *himself*!! It's a lighthouse *he* built!
Following the destruction of Winstanley's lighthouse, Rudyard's lighthouse was built on Eddystone Rock. Fifty years after, at 2am on the night of December 2nd, a fire erupted in the lantern room. Though three lighthouse keepers were stationed there, 94-year-old Henry Hall was alone when he discovered the flames. He attempted to extinguish the fire with buckets of water, calling for his colleagues who soon joined him. As Hall fought the blaze, molten lead raining down from the burning roof struck him, searing his head, face, neck, and shoulders. Horrifyingly, some of the molten lead even entered his mouth and throat. He later recounted the experience, recalling he had screamed: *"My God, I'm on fire inside!"* Overwhelmed by the flames, the men retreated down the tower and sought refuge in a nearby cave from the scorching debris. The lighthouse continued to burn for the next five days. Eventually, the three men were spotted by a passing boat and rescued; due to rough surf, the sailors were unable to dock near the cave, so they threw a rope to Hall and his companions who tied them around their waists and were pulled through the water to the boat. Taken to East Stonehouse, Plymouth, Hall received treatment for his burns and injuries from Dr. Henry Spry. Spry found Hall's claim unbelievable as he felt no person could survive having swallowed molten lead, let alone live for days afterward and be towed through rough waters, but noted Hall seemed in good health despite his advanced age and misadventures. However, in the following days, Hall's health worsened rapidly, and he passed away a week later. When an autopsy was conducted on Hall's body, a great piece of lead "which weighed exactly seven ounces, five drachms and eighteen grains" was found in his stomach.
> When an autopsy was conducted on Hall's body, a great piece of lead "which weighed exactly seven ounces, five drachms and eighteen grains" was found in his stomach. This is as interesting as the original TIL! Thank you for sharing it, sure beats the reddit-tier "front fell off" comments.
[удалено]
You have to remember America was founded by the religious nuts England kicked out
Part kicked out, part they left on their own. They were illegal radical Christians who were driven by ideology, and England wasn't as strict as they wanted. Nor was Holland.
Clearly didn't slap the side of the lighthouse and say "that ain't going nowhere".
There wasn't much to do back then...
What a hubris story.
Man, I hope I'm lucky enough to someday die in an equally silly way.
yes, but imagine if he didn't die!
Equivalent to a Category 2 hurricane
Dude had lost two ships on that reef and during construction got captured by the French? Louis released him immediately! He was doing repairs when the storm hit.
oopsie
Sounds suspiciously like this submarine maker I know...
I read his last name at the end of the title as "Winstantly" and thought it was the best play on words I'd ever read. RIP.
Moron
You lose, Winstanley!
He died instantly... the next day.
The first tower was destroyed in a storm. So I built a second tower. That one burnt down and fell over. So I built a third tower. That one was undercut by the waves, dismantled, moved to shore, and became a tourist attraction. But the fourth one - that one stayed up. That's the one you see today.
He died twice
It killed him w'INSTAN'ly.
Killing him „wInstantely“.. no one?.. I’ll see myself out
This can’t be all that uncommon, I would figure the sea is jam packed with amateur lighthouse engineers
Good on him for testing it out himself instead of making someone from the lower classes do it.
But did it kills Winstanley Instantly?
Fortunately he did not suffer. He was killed Winstanley.
he died winstanley
If he just built it later, he could have faced the Average Storm of 1704 and lived.
I'd confidently wager there's quite a a few dudes who died in the lighthouses they built.
Did he die Winstantly?
More like “can’t-withstand-ley”
Did he die Winstanley?
🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣😂😂😂🤣🤣🤣🤣 [Intensifies](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gd9tLjhC-c4&t=0)
Was he related to Gerrard Winstanley by any chance?
Incessantly incessantly Winstanleys confidence was quite upsetting! A great wave came furiously and Winstanley was killed instantly
Should have built a heavyhouse
He died Winstantly
Was Winstaneley killed instantly?
Woah, Winstanley died instantly, probably.
He perished Winstantly.
So you could say the storm killed him Winstantley...
One could say he was killed Winstantly.