The rocks lie about 9 miles (14 km) south of Rame Head, and four lighthouses have stood on them. Henry Winstanley's wooden tower of 1698 was destroyed in the Great Storm of 1703. John Rudyard's timber tower burned in 1755. John Smeaton built the third, lit October 16, 1759, in Cornish granite, and its upper part now stands on Plymouth Hoe as Smeaton's Tower.
The present tower was built under James Douglass, though the article marks that attribution as needing a source. It is granite, 161 feet (49 m) high, and tapers as a cylinder. The foundation stone was laid on August 19, 1879, and it was lit on May 18, 1882. A helipad was added around 1980, and it was automated in 1982.
Trinity House owns it, and monitors it from Harwich. The article does not describe visits to the current tower.
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