Two brick lighthouses are situated in the old town of Harwich: the taller alongside the main street and the shorter on the edge of the foreshore, 220yds away.

The taller of these two lighthouses rises to a height of 90ft. The nine-sided tower tapers from a 20ft 6in-wide base to a 13ft-wide top, which is capped in stone and decorated with an urn.

It contains seven floor levels. The shorter lighthouse imitates the design of the taller, but it is ten-sided and only half as high.

Both towers have stone architraves over windows and doors and periodic stone bands punctuating the brickwork.

The lights replaced a 150 year old, rudimentary navigation light for guiding sea traffic into Harwich Harbour.

They ceased to operate in 1863 when navigation bearing was transferred to new lights at Dovercourt.

The two "lighthouses" were not ligthouses in the obvious sense. They were "leading lights", in that sailors would line up the two lights in order to navigate their way into Harwich harbour.

Soon, silting up of the shore meant that the two lights became ineffectual - leading to the lights being called "misleading lights".

Martin Wakley (copyright)