Ocracoke Lighthouse’s modest height (seventy-five feet), subdued color scheme (solid white), and tranquil setting (a small island on the east side of Ocracoke Inlet) belie the dramatic history of its surrounding area. The calm waterway that today carries pleasure boats and small fishing craft witnessed its share of treachery, heroism, and adventure long before the lighthouse stood sentinel over the inlet. Ocracoke hardly had an auspicious beginning; it was put on the map after an English sailing ship was wrecked on the shoal-ridden inlet in 1585. But its eventual useful role as a waterway access to various inland ports pales in comparison to the high drama played out in its waters. True, the gifted and dashing Sir Walter Raleigh landed on Ocracoke at least once during his explorations of the new world, but the real excitement came from another reckless Englishman — Edward Teach, better known as Blackbeard, the most ruthless and dreaded of pirates. By 1718, Blackbeard had come to regard Ocracoke as his favorite anchorage. He even reportedly had a house on the island, which he intended to use as a sort of pirate haven. The coastal citizens, understandably unenthusiastic about the prospect, bypassed their useless Governor Eden and appealed instead to Governor Spotswood of Virginia. Help came in the doughty figure of Lieutenant Robert Maynard of the Royal Navy, who brought with him two small sloops. An intriguing, though probably unreliable, legend claims that Blackbeard, knowing the sloops were nearby and eager to engage them in battle, spent the night before the fight impatiently crying out “O crow, cock! O crow, cock!,” which is how the inlet got its name. Though accounts vary as to how the battle started, all agree on its outcome. One of Maynard’s sloops ran aground, and Blackbeard gained on the Ranger, the sloop Maynard was aboard. Under heavy fire and unable to either return fire or escape, Maynard ordered his troops below deck. Blackbeard personally led the charge aboard what appeared to be a foundering and deserted ship, only to meet Maynard and his pistol face to face. Blackbeard attacked, but not before being grazed by the pistol and suffering a deep wound to his neck. The fight raged, with Blackbeard suffering more than thirty major wounds. Finally, Maynard prevailed, and as Blackbeard fell dead at his feet, the Royal Navy Lieutenant cut off the pirate’s head and fixed it on the bowsprit. Blackbeard’s headless body was flung overboard, where it reportedly swam around the Ranger three times before sinking to its doom. After the pirating subsided, trade increased. As inland ports such as New Bern, Elizabeth City, and Edenton grew, the need for a lighthouse to help mariners navigate the passage between Ocracoke and Portsmouth Islands that led to these towns grew accordingly. In 1798, a wooden pyramid-shaped tower was completed on Shell Castle Island, situated in the middle of the passage. However, the light was inadequate, and the sand bars changed so much that by 1818 the lighthouse was a mile away from the inlet. In a rather dramatic ending, both the lighthouse and the keeper’s cottage were consumed in 1818 by a fire started by a lightning strike. On May 7, 1822, Congress set aside $20,000 for a lighthouse on Ocracoke Island, and the federal government shortly thereafter purchased two acres and commissioned Noah Porter of Massachusetts to build a tower and keeper’s cottage. The lighthouse was to be coated with an unlikely formula of lime, salt, ground rice, whiting, and clear glue, which was mixed with boiling water and applied to the bricks while hot. Porter completed the project the next year, for $11,359, considerably less than the sum the government had budgeted. Such happy efficiency turned out to be indicative of the useful, relatively uneventful life of Ocracoke Lighthouse. In 1849, the lighthouse was equipped with a new lantern room and lighting apparatus, which consisted of ten brass lamps and twenty-one-inch reflectors instead of the fifteen that had been used before. The apparatus revolved every two minutes to produce a flashing light. The characteristic of the light was changed to fixed white in 1854 through the installation of a fourth-order Fresnel lens. The lighthouse survived the Civil War with minimal damage; Confederate troops dismantled the fourth-order Fresnel lens in 1862, but Union forces re-installed it the following year. The light was electrified in the early 1900s and today casts a stationary beam visible for fourteen miles. Ocracoke Lighthouse was switched off in November 2009 and remained dark until March 3, 2010 while new glass was installed in the lantern room, metalwork was repaired, and lightning protection was installed. This was the first major work performed on the lighthouse after it had been transferred from the Coast Guard to the National Park Service in 1999.
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