Spurn

Spurn Head was known to classical authors, such as Ptolemy as Ocelum Promontorium (). In the Middle Ages, Spurn Head was home to the port of Ravenspurn (a.k.a. Ravenspur or Ravensburgh), where Henry of Bolingbroke landed in 1399 on his return to dethrone Richard II. It was also where Sir Martin de la See led the local resistance against Edward IV's landing on 14 March 1471, as he was returning from his six months' exile in the Netherlands. An earlier village, closer to the point of Spurn Head, was Ravenser Odd. Along with many other villages on the Holderness coast, Ravenspurn and Ravenser Odd were lost to the encroachments of the sea, as Spurn Head, due to erosion and deposition of its sand, migrated westward. The lifeboat station at Spurn Head was built in 1810. Owing to the remote location, houses for the lifeboat crew and their families were added a few years later. By the 1870s a room in the high lighthouse was being used as a chapel for the small residential community on Spurn Head, serving 'the keepers, coast-guardsmen and fishermen who live at the Point'. During the First World War two coastal artillery batteries were added at either end of Spurn Head, with quick-firing guns in between. The emplacements can be clearly seen, and the northern ones are particularly interesting as coastal erosion has partly toppled them onto the beach, revealing the size of the concrete foundations very well. As well as a road, the peninsula also used to have a railway, parts of which can still be seen. Unusual 'sail bogies' were used as well as more conventional light railway equipment. Following a tidal surge in December 2013 the roadway became unsafe, and access to Spurn Point is on foot only, with a warning not to attempt this when exceptionally high tides are due. Spurn has now become a tidal island, as the narrowest part of the sandbank connection to the mainland is flooded with each high tide. Plans to build a new visitor centre for the reserve were unveiled in September 2014 by Yorkshire Wildlife Trust (YWT). ==Geography==

The spit is made up from sand, shingle and boulder clay eroded from the Holderness coastline washed down the coastline from Flamborough Head. Material is washed down the coast by longshore drift and accumulates to form the long, narrow embankment in the sheltered waters inside the mouth of the Humber Estuary. It is maintained by plants, especially marram grass (Ammophila arenaria). Waves carry material along the peninsula to the tip, continually extending it; as this action stretches the peninsula it also narrows it to the extent that the sea can cut across it in severe weather. When the sea cuts across it permanently, everything beyond the breach is swept away, only to eventually reform as a new spit pointing further south. This cycle of destruction and reconstruction occurs approximately every 250 years. More recently, Dr. John Pethick of Hull University put forward a different theory to explain the formation of Spurn Head. He suggests that the spit head has been a permanent feature since the end of the last ice age, having developed on an underwater glacial moraine. As the ice sheets melted, sea level gradually rose and longshore drift caused a spit to form between this and other islands along the moraine. Under normal circumstances, the sea washes over the neck of the spit taking sand from the seaward side and redepositing it on the landward side. Over time, the whole spit, length intact, slips back – with the spit-head remaining on its glacial foundation. This process has now been affected by the protection of the spit put in place during the Victorian era. This protection halted the wash-over process and resulted in the spit being even more exposed due to the rest of the coast moving back since the 'protection' was constructed. The now crumbling defences will not be replaced and the spit will continue to move westwards at a rate of per year, keeping pace with the coastal erosion further north. The second of the Six Studies in English Folk Song composed in 1926 by Ralph Vaughan Williams, the Andante sostenuto in E flat "Spurn Point" celebrates this peninsula. It was featured on the television programme Seven Natural Wonders as one of the wonders of Yorkshire. ==Ecology==

The landward-side mud flats are an important feeding ground for wading birds, and the area has a bird observatory, for monitoring migrating birds and providing accommodation to visiting birdwatchers. Their migration is assisted by east winds in autumn, resulting in drift migration of Scandinavian migrants, sometimes leading to a spectacular "fall" of thousands of birds. Many uncommon species have been sighted there, including a cliff swallow from North America, a lanceolated warbler from Siberia and a black-browed albatross from the Southern Ocean. More commonly, birds such as northern wheatears, whinchats, common redstarts and flycatchers alight at Spurn on their way between breeding and wintering grounds elsewhere. When the wind is in the right direction migrants are funnelled down Spurn Point and are counted at the Narrows Watchpoint, more than 15,000 birds can fly past on a good morning in autumn with 3,000 quite normal. ==Lighthouses==

The earliest reference to a lighthouse on Spurn Point is 1427, when a certain Richard Reedbarrow ('Hermit of the Chapel of Our Lady and St Anne at Ravenspurn') petitioned Parliament for permission to levy dues on ships entering the Humber from the sea, in recognition of his having built a tower (to serve as a beacon by day and a light by night), 'that should teach the people to hold in the right channel'. In its place, a moveable wooden swape-style light was used for a number of years. By 1815 the swape was much decayed and the light had become unreliable, so the following year a new Low Lighthouse was built (a brick tower, designed by John Shaw); it was first lit on 25 November 1816. Unlike its predecessors, this low light was built on the estuary side (i.e. to the west) of the high light, rather than on the seaward side. Lighting arrangements Initially both lighthouses were coal-fired. When the low light was rebuilt in 1816, it was equipped with Argand lamps and reflectors. As a result, it outshone the high light; so in 1819 Smeaton's high tower was likewise fitted with Argand lamps and reflectors (24 in number). In 1867 a red sector was added, which warned ships of hazards to the south ranging from Clee Ness to Sand Haile Flats; (initially applied to the low light, it was moved to the high light in 1871). The high light was made occulting (once every half minute) in 1883. Decommissioning of the High and Low Lights In 1895 both Walker's low light and Smeaton's high light were decommissioned; they were replaced by a single lighthouse, which still stands on the grass of Spurn Head. The 1852 low light also still stands on the sandy shore of the island, though its lantern has been replaced by a large water tank; the tower served for a number of years as an explosives store. Of the old Smeaton high light only the foundations remain Keepers' cottages had been constructed within the circular compound of the old High Lighthouse, and these remained in use after its demolition up until the 1950s. Its white light had a range of and displayed a flash once every 20 seconds. In addition there were separate sector lights, two of which marked particular shoals or sandbanks, while another indicated the main channel along the Humber. Initially oil-lit, the lighthouse was converted to electricity in 1941 to enable the light to be lit briefly (as and when requested by allied ships and convoys) and then extinguished; power was drawn from nearby generators maintained by the military garrison. A new, smaller, gas-driven revolving optic was installed, which flashed once every fifteen seconds; and the subsidiary lights were provided with occulting mechanisms, also gas-driven. The new systems were automated; the keepers therefore moved out and their cottages were demolished. After 1986 the lighthouse remained empty; but in 2013, Yorkshire Wildlife Trust was awarded a £470,500 grant to restore the lighthouse with a view to its being reopened as a visitor centre. Work began in 2015; it was completed in March the following year, and opened to the public for the Easter weekend. ==Gallery==

Spurn Point File:Spurn Head RNLI Launch Platform.jpg|The pier and launching platform for the RNLI at Spurn File:Spurn Lighthouse in the sea mist.JPG|Sea mist File:HumberVTS.JPG|Humber Vessel traffic service File:SpurnPoint1.JPG|Spurn Point from the mainland File:Spurn 3.jpg|Humber Vessel traffic service File:Spurn 4.jpg|RNLI Platform Spurn Lighthouses File:Spurn 8.jpg|The lighthouse at Spurn Point File:Lighthouses at Spurn Head - geograph.org.uk - 200519.jpg|The old Low Light (1852) seen alongside the new (1895) lighthouse File:National Maritime Museum Cornwall (8817).jpg|The 1957 optic in the National Maritime Museum, Cornwall File:Spurn Point High Lighthouse.jpg|The lighthouse seen from the beach File:Spurn Point view.jpg|Spurn Point seen from the lighthouse File:We made it! (29306714183).jpg|The newly-restored lighthouse in April 2016 ==See also==