Bishop Rock Lighthouse - Isles of Scilly

William Tregarthen Douglass (1857–1913) was an engineer, from a lighthouse engineering family. He was a consulting engineer for lighthouse construction for several governments around the world. His father was Sir

James Nicholas Douglass Sir James Nicholas Douglass, (16 October 1826 – 19 June 1898) was an English civil engineer, a prolific lighthouse builder and designer, most famous for the design and construction of the fourth Eddystone Lighthouse, for which he was knig ...

, and his uncle

William William is a male given name of Germanic origin.Hanks, Hardcastle and Hodges, ''Oxford Dictionary of First Names'', Oxford University Press, 2nd edition, , p. 276. It became very popular in the English language after the Norman conquest of Engl ...

and his grandfather Nicholas were also famous in lighthouse construction.

Personal life

Douglas married Ada James of

Plymouth Plymouth () is a port city and unitary authority in South West England. It is located on the south coast of Devon, approximately south-west of Exeter and south-west of London. It is bordered by Cornwall to the west and south-west. Plymouth ...

at Charles Church, Plymouth on 27 December 1881.

Career

William T Douglass was Assistant Engineer to Thomas Edmond in the construction of the fourth

Eddystone Lighthouse The Eddystone Lighthouse is a lighthouse that is located on the dangerous Eddystone Rocks, south of Rame Head in Cornwall, England. The rocks are submerged below the surface of the sea and are composed of Precambrian gneiss. View at 1:50000 ...

and then superintendent of work after Edmond was called to other work. Douglass supervised the whole work of fitting up the internal arrangements of the new Eddystone LIghthouse, as well as dismantling and removing the upper portion of

Smeaton's Tower Smeaton's Tower is a memorial to civil engineer John Smeaton, designer of the third and most notable Eddystone Lighthouse. A major step forward in lighthouse design, Smeaton's structure was in use from 1759 to 1877, until erosion of the ledge it ...

, leaving the foundation intact. One of William Douglass's most impressive achievements was his supervision of the renovation and reinforcement of the

Bishop Rock Lighthouse The Bishop Rock ( kw, Men Epskop) is a skerry off the British coast in the northern Atlantic Ocean known for its lighthouse. It is in the westernmost part of the Isles of Scilly, an archipelago off the southwestern tip of the Cornish peninsu ...

. Consulting engineer to the Governments of Western Australia, New South Wales, and Victoria. Inspecting engineer to the

RNLI The Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) is the largest charity that saves lives at sea around the coasts of the United Kingdom, the Republic of Ireland, the Channel Islands, and the Isle of Man, as well as on some inland waterways. It i ...

. In 1899 he was selected by the Secretary of State for India to inspect and report on the whole of the lighthouses of India and Burma. Member of the Institution of Civil Engineers, and a Fellow of King's College, London. He died on 10 August 1913 following a boating accident at Dartmouth.

Works

1881–1887 *

Round Island Light, Isles of Scilly Round Island Lighthouse ( kw, Golowji an Voth "the hump lighthouse"), in the Isles of Scilly was designed by William Tregarthen Douglass for Trinity House and completed in 1887. At the time of building it was one of three lights in the Isles o ...

1887–1888 *

Dondra Head Lighthouse Dondra Head Lighthouse is a lighthouse located on Dondra Head, Dondra, the southernmost point in Sri Lanka and is Sri Lanka's tallest lighthouse, and also one of the tallest in South East Asia. Dondra Head lighthouse is operated and maintaine ...

1889–1890 * Cape Leeuwin Lighthouse 1896

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Douglass, William Tregarthen 1857 births 1913 deaths English civil engineers Lighthouse builders