The pillar or High Lighthouse was designed and built by Joseph Nelson for Trinity House, and was first lit on 1 December 1832. It was equipped with four oil lamps, which shone through a window set behind a half-gallery on the uppermost storey (at a focal height of above mean high water springs). The High lighthouse was designed to be used in conjunction with a new Low lighthouse, which was commissioned on the same date (and is still operating as of 2020). These new lights replaced the original Round Tower Lighthouse (which itself had been built to replace the light kept burning in the tower of St Andrews Church to guide fishing boats into the harbour); it was decommissioned on the same day that the new lights were brought into service.Notice to Mariners, Trinity House, London, 28 November 1832.
