Portland Bill
Portland Bill is a narrow promontory (or bill) at the southern end of Portland and the southernmost point of Dorset. Traditionally one of the Portland's most isolated areas, Portland Bill is now one of the island's most popular destinations, with the operational Portland Bill Lighthouse being a key attraction.
For centuries, Portland's position in the English Channel, with its treacherous coastline, has made it a major shipping hazard. The narrow promontory of Portland Bill is notably dangerous because of its shallow reefs and ledges such as the Portland Ledge, the Shambles sandbank to the south-east, and the Portland Race - a tidal race caused by the clashing of tides, and further exacerbated by the reduced depths over the Portland Ledge.
The Bill is still an important way-point for coastal traffic, and three lighthouses have been built to protect shipping. The original two, now known as the Old Higher and Old Lower Lighthouses, began operating in 1716. They were replaced in 1906 by the current lighthouse. The Bill's three lighthouses are not the only lighthouses on the island, as the Breakwater Lighthouse is situated at Portland Harbour.
On early maps, Portland Bill was named "The Beel", which derived from its beak shape. From 1588 onwards, when the area was part of a crucial Armada invasion-warning network, it was often named "The Beacon". In 1588, the second battle between the English Fleet and the Spanish Armada was fought off Portland Bill.
Navigational aids
Portland Bill's dangerous coastline has been recognised as far back as Roman times, when beacons were lit on Branscombe Hill, overlooking the Bill, in attempt to warn passing ships of its dangers. In 1669, Sir John Clayton was successful in obtaining a patent for the erection of a lighthouse with two lights at Portland Bill, but the scheme never came to fruition. During the early 18th century, Captain William Holman began a petition for a lighthouse, but Trinity House opposed the idea, claiming that lights at the Bill would be "needless" considering the height of the land and the water being deep "to the very shore".
Regardless, local seafarers and others continued to show support for the idea, until Trinity House accepted that a lighthouse at the Bill was necessary. King George I granted the patent on 26 May 1716 after Trinity House had already issued a 61-year lease to William Barrett, Francis Browne and Charles Langrishe at a price of £100, to build and maintain "one or more convenient lighthouses with good and visible lights to be kept continually there in the night season, so as ships might the better come to their ports without peril." One lighthouse was built at the top of Branscombe Hill, while the other was placed a short distance to the south on lower land.
The two lighthouses shone out for the first time on 29 September 1716 and proved to be valuable navigational aids. However, over time, Trinity House were made aware that the lights were being poorly maintained and sometimes failed to be lit altogether. They decided to carry out an inspection in 1752, where they discovered "it was nigh two hours after sunset before any light appeared in either of the lighthouses" and that both lanterns were in a poor state of maintenance. Although the leaseholders soon carried out necessary repairs and changes, their application to renew the original lease in 1777 was denied and responsibility for the lighthouses reverted to Trinity House. The corporation had the lower lighthouse demolished and rebuilt on a new site nearer the eastern side of Portland Bill in 1789, with the work carried out by Weymouth builder William Johns.
The mid-19th century saw additional navigational aids arrive in the area. A stone obelisk was erected at the southern tip of the Bill in 1844, primarily to provide warning of the low shelf of rock extending 30 metres southwards into the sea. Although two buoys had been in place to mark the Shambles Sandbank since 1824, the transformation of Portland Roads into a harbour of refuge in the mid-19th century prompted Trinity House to establish the Shambles Lightship in 1859. Finally, the corporation had both of Portland Bill's lighthouses demolished and rebuilt in 1865-67.
In 1901, Trinity House made the decision to replace the existing lighthouses with a single one at Bill Point. Work commenced in October 1903 by builders Wakeham Bros. of Plymouth, and the lighthouse was first lit on 11 January 1906. The Higher and Lower Lighthouses were then decommissioned and put up for auction in early 1907. After various changes in ownership, the Old Lower Lighthouse was restored and transformed into the Portland Bird Observatory and Field Centre, which opened in 1961, while the Old Higher Lighthouse was the summer residence of Marie Stopes from 1923 to 1958, and now a private residence with holiday lets. In 1976, the Shambles Lightship was permanently withdrawn and replaced by automatic buoys, while in 1996, the lighthouse was demanned, with all monitoring and control being transferred to the Trinity House Operations & Planning Centre in Harwich.
Bill Quarries
Quarrying at Portland Bill began in the mid-19th century and ceased by the mid-20th century. As the quarries were remote and isolated from proper road links and existing shipping piers around the island's coast, stone had to be shipped directly from the Bill, which saw the creation of a shipping quay, accessed by a short horse-drawn tramway, and now the site of Red Crane. In the late 19th century, Pulpit Rock was formed after a natural arch collapsed and is now one of Portland Bill's key attractions. Once quarrying ceased in the area, Red Crane was used to lower fishermen and their boats into the sea. The shallow tramway cutting leading from Bill Point to the crane can still be traced today, while a surviving stone building, now a fisherman's hut, is believed to have been used as a blacksmith's workshop in association with the quarries.
In 1855, Walter White recorded his visit to Portland in his book A Londoner's Walk to the Land's End. Speaking of the quarries, he wrote: "At this end of the island the cliff is not more than from ten to twenty feet high; and here, where I looked for solitude, I found life and industry; a long range of quarries, and horses, trucks, and men, in full employment; and the noise of picks and hammers mingling with the universal roar of the surge. At one place, where vessels may lie in deep water close to the shore, stands a powerful crane; but only in calm weather can such an exposed shipping-wharf be made available. The quarries are so near the sea that the spray dashes into them, there being nothing between but the level shelf of rock from which the upper strata have been removed, and left it resembling a natural quay with myriads of imbedded fossils everywhere visible on its surface."
Tourist attraction
Portland Bill began to develop as a popular tourist destination in the early 20th century, with the three lighthouses, Pulpit Rock, Trinity House Obelisk and Cave Hole being the area's key attractions. In a 1908 guide to the island, the Portland Urban District Council (PUDC) stated that "no visitor to Portland should fail to spend a day at the Bill".
The Bill's popularity continued to grow after the PUDC replaced the original rough track running between Southwell and the Bill with a tarred road in 1922, which was laid as part of an unemployment relief scheme. During the 1930s, a car park was also established and beach huts and cafes began to appear. The Lobster Pot Restaurant, which is located close to the lighthouse, was trading as early as 1947. It suffered a serious fire in 1992 and was subsequently rebuilt. The Pulpit Inn, originally named the Devenish Arms, was built in 1953-54 and opened in 1955. It had been an ambition of Major J. H. C. Devenish to build a hotel/pub at Portland Bill since before World War II. Devenish died in 1953 before construction began and so the inn was named in his memory.
Since its early operational days, the lighthouse would welcome visitors, with the keepers providing tours of the inside. After it was automated, part of the original keepers' quarters was transformed into a tourist information and visitor centre which opened in 1997. Separate to the centre, tours of the lighthouse were organised by the Crown Estate under licence of Trinity House. The centre closed in 2013, but a new one was opened in its place in 2015. A licensee operates the centre on behalf of Trinity House, with AMH Support Services providing tours of the lighthouse.
Grade listed features
Other features
Surrounding fields
The surrounding fields between Portland Bill and Southwell village are an example of a strip field farming system, dating from Saxon times, and once common across Tophill before quarrying and housing destroyed them. These particular fields, which have escaped modern development, make up the open landscape surrounding the single road to Portland Bill. Each field has an ancient name, such as Harplands, Shoals Meadow and Sturt Corner, and some are still bordered by drystone walls and earth lynchets.
The nearby Culverwell Mesolithic Site is an active archaeological site and former Mesolithic settlement, located along Portland Bill Road. The site, which is approximately 8,000-8,500 years old, has become a scheduled monument under the Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Areas Act 1979. This scheduled status includes open fields to the south, spanning from Cave Hole area to the Lower Lighthouse. Another two areas of open fields have become scheduled under a separate entry too; one spans east from the Higher Lighthouse, while the other runs north-east of the Culverwell site, alongside Portland Bill Road.
References
The following is an A-Z list of references for this page.
1) Ancestry.com - Genealogy - Portland Year Book 1905 - Chronology of the Island of Portland 700 - 1905 AD - Paul Benyon - website page
2) Ancestry.com - Genealogy - Portland Year Book 1905 - Light-Houses - Paul Benyon - website page
3) Dorset Magazine - Portland – Three Lighthouses Walk - Teresa Ridout - March 2014 - website page
4) Exploring Portland - Around the Old Lower Lighthouse - Geoff Kirby - website page
5) Exploring Portland - North of Portland Bill - website page
6) Exploring Portland - Portland Bill - Geoff Kirby - website page
7) Exploring Portland - The Higher Lighthouse - Geoff Kirby - website page
8) GB4IMD – Cornish Radio Amateur Club - The Marconi Station at Portland Bill - website page
9) Historic England - The National Heritage List for England - various entries for Portland - website page
10) Old Higher Lighthouse - Official Website - History of the Old Higher Lighthouse - website page
11) Ordnance Survey - various maps, from 1864 to 1988
12) Pastscape - various entries - website page
13) Photographers Resource - Portland Bill Lighthouse - website page
14) Portland: A Topographical and Historical Gazetteer - Roy Mackenzie - 1999 - page 23 - book
15) Portland Bird Observatory and Field Centre - Official Website - Home - website page
16) Portland Encyclopaedia - Rodney Legg - Dorset Publishing Company - 1999 - ISBN: 978-0948699566 - pages 68, 85 - book
17) The British Newspaper Archive - various contemporary newspaper articles - website page
18) Trinity House - Portland Bill Lighthouse - website page
For centuries, Portland's position in the English Channel, with its treacherous coastline, has made it a major shipping hazard. The narrow promontory of Portland Bill is notably dangerous because of its shallow reefs and ledges such as the Portland Ledge, the Shambles sandbank to the south-east, and the Portland Race - a tidal race caused by the clashing of tides, and further exacerbated by the reduced depths over the Portland Ledge.
The Bill is still an important way-point for coastal traffic, and three lighthouses have been built to protect shipping. The original two, now known as the Old Higher and Old Lower Lighthouses, began operating in 1716. They were replaced in 1906 by the current lighthouse. The Bill's three lighthouses are not the only lighthouses on the island, as the Breakwater Lighthouse is situated at Portland Harbour.
On early maps, Portland Bill was named "The Beel", which derived from its beak shape. From 1588 onwards, when the area was part of a crucial Armada invasion-warning network, it was often named "The Beacon". In 1588, the second battle between the English Fleet and the Spanish Armada was fought off Portland Bill.
Navigational aids
Portland Bill's dangerous coastline has been recognised as far back as Roman times, when beacons were lit on Branscombe Hill, overlooking the Bill, in attempt to warn passing ships of its dangers. In 1669, Sir John Clayton was successful in obtaining a patent for the erection of a lighthouse with two lights at Portland Bill, but the scheme never came to fruition. During the early 18th century, Captain William Holman began a petition for a lighthouse, but Trinity House opposed the idea, claiming that lights at the Bill would be "needless" considering the height of the land and the water being deep "to the very shore".
Regardless, local seafarers and others continued to show support for the idea, until Trinity House accepted that a lighthouse at the Bill was necessary. King George I granted the patent on 26 May 1716 after Trinity House had already issued a 61-year lease to William Barrett, Francis Browne and Charles Langrishe at a price of £100, to build and maintain "one or more convenient lighthouses with good and visible lights to be kept continually there in the night season, so as ships might the better come to their ports without peril." One lighthouse was built at the top of Branscombe Hill, while the other was placed a short distance to the south on lower land.
The two lighthouses shone out for the first time on 29 September 1716 and proved to be valuable navigational aids. However, over time, Trinity House were made aware that the lights were being poorly maintained and sometimes failed to be lit altogether. They decided to carry out an inspection in 1752, where they discovered "it was nigh two hours after sunset before any light appeared in either of the lighthouses" and that both lanterns were in a poor state of maintenance. Although the leaseholders soon carried out necessary repairs and changes, their application to renew the original lease in 1777 was denied and responsibility for the lighthouses reverted to Trinity House. The corporation had the lower lighthouse demolished and rebuilt on a new site nearer the eastern side of Portland Bill in 1789, with the work carried out by Weymouth builder William Johns.
The mid-19th century saw additional navigational aids arrive in the area. A stone obelisk was erected at the southern tip of the Bill in 1844, primarily to provide warning of the low shelf of rock extending 30 metres southwards into the sea. Although two buoys had been in place to mark the Shambles Sandbank since 1824, the transformation of Portland Roads into a harbour of refuge in the mid-19th century prompted Trinity House to establish the Shambles Lightship in 1859. Finally, the corporation had both of Portland Bill's lighthouses demolished and rebuilt in 1865-67.
In 1901, Trinity House made the decision to replace the existing lighthouses with a single one at Bill Point. Work commenced in October 1903 by builders Wakeham Bros. of Plymouth, and the lighthouse was first lit on 11 January 1906. The Higher and Lower Lighthouses were then decommissioned and put up for auction in early 1907. After various changes in ownership, the Old Lower Lighthouse was restored and transformed into the Portland Bird Observatory and Field Centre, which opened in 1961, while the Old Higher Lighthouse was the summer residence of Marie Stopes from 1923 to 1958, and now a private residence with holiday lets. In 1976, the Shambles Lightship was permanently withdrawn and replaced by automatic buoys, while in 1996, the lighthouse was demanned, with all monitoring and control being transferred to the Trinity House Operations & Planning Centre in Harwich.
Bill Quarries
Quarrying at Portland Bill began in the mid-19th century and ceased by the mid-20th century. As the quarries were remote and isolated from proper road links and existing shipping piers around the island's coast, stone had to be shipped directly from the Bill, which saw the creation of a shipping quay, accessed by a short horse-drawn tramway, and now the site of Red Crane. In the late 19th century, Pulpit Rock was formed after a natural arch collapsed and is now one of Portland Bill's key attractions. Once quarrying ceased in the area, Red Crane was used to lower fishermen and their boats into the sea. The shallow tramway cutting leading from Bill Point to the crane can still be traced today, while a surviving stone building, now a fisherman's hut, is believed to have been used as a blacksmith's workshop in association with the quarries.
In 1855, Walter White recorded his visit to Portland in his book A Londoner's Walk to the Land's End. Speaking of the quarries, he wrote: "At this end of the island the cliff is not more than from ten to twenty feet high; and here, where I looked for solitude, I found life and industry; a long range of quarries, and horses, trucks, and men, in full employment; and the noise of picks and hammers mingling with the universal roar of the surge. At one place, where vessels may lie in deep water close to the shore, stands a powerful crane; but only in calm weather can such an exposed shipping-wharf be made available. The quarries are so near the sea that the spray dashes into them, there being nothing between but the level shelf of rock from which the upper strata have been removed, and left it resembling a natural quay with myriads of imbedded fossils everywhere visible on its surface."
Tourist attraction
Portland Bill began to develop as a popular tourist destination in the early 20th century, with the three lighthouses, Pulpit Rock, Trinity House Obelisk and Cave Hole being the area's key attractions. In a 1908 guide to the island, the Portland Urban District Council (PUDC) stated that "no visitor to Portland should fail to spend a day at the Bill".
The Bill's popularity continued to grow after the PUDC replaced the original rough track running between Southwell and the Bill with a tarred road in 1922, which was laid as part of an unemployment relief scheme. During the 1930s, a car park was also established and beach huts and cafes began to appear. The Lobster Pot Restaurant, which is located close to the lighthouse, was trading as early as 1947. It suffered a serious fire in 1992 and was subsequently rebuilt. The Pulpit Inn, originally named the Devenish Arms, was built in 1953-54 and opened in 1955. It had been an ambition of Major J. H. C. Devenish to build a hotel/pub at Portland Bill since before World War II. Devenish died in 1953 before construction began and so the inn was named in his memory.
Since its early operational days, the lighthouse would welcome visitors, with the keepers providing tours of the inside. After it was automated, part of the original keepers' quarters was transformed into a tourist information and visitor centre which opened in 1997. Separate to the centre, tours of the lighthouse were organised by the Crown Estate under licence of Trinity House. The centre closed in 2013, but a new one was opened in its place in 2015. A licensee operates the centre on behalf of Trinity House, with AMH Support Services providing tours of the lighthouse.
Grade listed features
- The Old Lower Lighthouse, now the Bird Observatory and Field Centre, including its boundary walls and coastguard house, became Grade II listed in September 1978.
- The Old Higher Lighthouse, its four cottages and boundary walls have been Grade II listed since September 1978.
- Portland Bill Lighthouse, along with its boundary walls, has been Grade II listed since May 1993.
- Trinity House Obelisk has been Grade II listed since September 1978.
- Fisherman's hut - a building with at least mid-19th century origins, believed to have been used as a blacksmith's workshop as part of the Bill Quarries. It is now in use as a fisherman's store and has been Grade II listed since May 1993. It is considered a rare survival of its kind on the island. In 2004, the hut's felt roofing was replaced with a slate one, while remedial work was carried out on the stonework.
- Red Crane is part of the mid-19th century Portland Bill stone loading quay, which has become a scheduled monument under the Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Areas Act 1979.
Other features
- Portland Bill's coastguard station and its cottages (now known as Old Coastguard Cottages), were built in c. 1898-99. An additional four cottages were erected to the west by 1926 and the station ceased use in the mid-20th century. The cottages are built of brick but were rendered later in the 20th century. In 1985, planning permission was obtained to erect four new houses in the area, while in 1986, the construction of an "undersea world, lobster hatchery and maritime museum centre" was approved. It opened as Lobster World in 1987, but closed soon after due to poor visitor numbers and the dissolution of the partnership behind the centre. It later became a guesthouse.
- A coastguard lookout was built on Branscombe Hill, near the Old Higher Lighthouse, during the early 20th century. After its closure by the government in the 1990s, it was re-opened in 1997 by the National Coastwatch Institution. The station was later rebuilt in 2004 and continues to operate as NCI Portland Bill.
- A naval signal station was built on Branscombe Hill in 1794 during the French Revolutionary Wars. It formed part of a wider chain of stations along the south coast, which were used to monitor shipping and report commerce raiding in the English Channel. The stations were later used to warn of any invasion attempt during the Napoleonic Wars. The same station was recorded with the name "Lowes" in Samuel Lewis' A Topographical Dictionary of England, first published in 1831.
- A Lloyd's Signal Station, now known as Lloyd's Cottage, was established at Branscombe Hill in c. 1892, which allowed shore to ship communications between the station and passing commercial vessels. During World War II, Lloyd's Cottage was used to accommodate personnel of the Women's Royal Naval Service (Wrens) attached to the adjacent wireless station. The cottage was greatly extended in the late 20th century.
- A wireless station, later known as Portland Bill W/T Station, was established in the early 20th century by the Admiralty. It originally operated at the Coastguard Cottages, but was relocated to Branscombe Hill in 1904. It remained actively used for wireless communications until the mid-1990s.
- Two pre-Victorian fortifications are known to have existed at Portland Bill, although little is known about their age and use. One at Bill Point is depicted on a map of 1800 and labelled as a fort. The other, labelled as a battery, appears on the 1842 Tithe map, and was positioned at the cliff edge near the Old Lower Lighthouse.
- The sloping land between the NCI station and the Bill's car park was laid out with anti-landing trenches and obstacles in 1940. The area was seen as a vulnerable spot where German aircraft, including gliders, could land during an invasion. Five trenches were excavated, two of which intersected at the land's central region, and a large number of small and large mounds of stone and earth were formed. Similar anti-invasion measures were formed in the fields to the east of the Old Lower Lighthouse. Traces of these features survive at both sites, particularly the trenchwork.
- During the 1950s, an Admiralty trials range was constructed at the Bill. The establishment, now known as MOD Portland Bill, is operated by Qinetiq and allows sensitive equipment to be tested in an area free of electric and magnetic interference.
- West Pleistocene Raised Beach, located within the area of MOD Portland Bill, was created during a warm inter-glacial period 200,000 years ago when sea levels were about 15 metres above present levels.
Surrounding fields
The surrounding fields between Portland Bill and Southwell village are an example of a strip field farming system, dating from Saxon times, and once common across Tophill before quarrying and housing destroyed them. These particular fields, which have escaped modern development, make up the open landscape surrounding the single road to Portland Bill. Each field has an ancient name, such as Harplands, Shoals Meadow and Sturt Corner, and some are still bordered by drystone walls and earth lynchets.
The nearby Culverwell Mesolithic Site is an active archaeological site and former Mesolithic settlement, located along Portland Bill Road. The site, which is approximately 8,000-8,500 years old, has become a scheduled monument under the Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Areas Act 1979. This scheduled status includes open fields to the south, spanning from Cave Hole area to the Lower Lighthouse. Another two areas of open fields have become scheduled under a separate entry too; one spans east from the Higher Lighthouse, while the other runs north-east of the Culverwell site, alongside Portland Bill Road.
References
The following is an A-Z list of references for this page.
1) Ancestry.com - Genealogy - Portland Year Book 1905 - Chronology of the Island of Portland 700 - 1905 AD - Paul Benyon - website page
2) Ancestry.com - Genealogy - Portland Year Book 1905 - Light-Houses - Paul Benyon - website page
3) Dorset Magazine - Portland – Three Lighthouses Walk - Teresa Ridout - March 2014 - website page
4) Exploring Portland - Around the Old Lower Lighthouse - Geoff Kirby - website page
5) Exploring Portland - North of Portland Bill - website page
6) Exploring Portland - Portland Bill - Geoff Kirby - website page
7) Exploring Portland - The Higher Lighthouse - Geoff Kirby - website page
8) GB4IMD – Cornish Radio Amateur Club - The Marconi Station at Portland Bill - website page
9) Historic England - The National Heritage List for England - various entries for Portland - website page
10) Old Higher Lighthouse - Official Website - History of the Old Higher Lighthouse - website page
11) Ordnance Survey - various maps, from 1864 to 1988
12) Pastscape - various entries - website page
13) Photographers Resource - Portland Bill Lighthouse - website page
14) Portland: A Topographical and Historical Gazetteer - Roy Mackenzie - 1999 - page 23 - book
15) Portland Bird Observatory and Field Centre - Official Website - Home - website page
16) Portland Encyclopaedia - Rodney Legg - Dorset Publishing Company - 1999 - ISBN: 978-0948699566 - pages 68, 85 - book
17) The British Newspaper Archive - various contemporary newspaper articles - website page
18) Trinity House - Portland Bill Lighthouse - website page
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