Shell Keys

The Shell Keys Light Station was a rather short-lived one. Taking the place of the Vermilion Bay Lighthouse and the Atchafalaya Lightship, Shell Keys was established in 1859 as an iron skeleton tower that held a third-order Fresnel lens 81 feet above sea level. The red hexagonal tower was built on the highest land available in the keys, at 10 feet above high water. 

In 1861, Confederate authorities extinguished the light to deprive Union blockaders of aid. The lens, lantern glass, and lamps were removed to a storage facility in St. Martinsville, where Federal sailors seized them in 1865. The lighthouse engineer Max Bonzano reestablished the light in September of 1865.

Two years later, in 1867, a hurricane rushed through the keys and sheared the legs off of the tower. The ironwork toppled into the water, and hardly any remnants could be found in the days after. A lighthouse tender was able to locate twisted pieces of the roof and a few braces, but the body of the keeper on board at the time was never found. The site of the tower was now under four feet of water.

In 1869, the Lighthouse Board requested $60,000 from Congress for a new tower at Shell Keys. The appropriation was obtained, but other, more important reconstruction took precedence and the Board allowed the money to lapse into surplus. 10 years later, salt mines were discovered on a nearby island, and plans were once again made to rebuild. However, no lighthouse was built in this area again.