This lighthouse is a prefabricated, cylindrical cast iron tower, painted white with red horizontal bands.

[3] The keeper originally lived in the lighthouse but found it difficult to heat, and so separate housing was built in 1851.

[4] In the decades before 1850, the Admiralty in the UK had become increasingly concerned about loss of shipping and loss of life near Cape Pine, which is located at the southern tip of Avalon Peninsula, at the eastern point of St. Mary's Bay.

Fishermen as well as ships bound for Europe had to cope with dense fog and strong currents.

At the end of the War of 1812, the British troop ship HMS Harpooner was on its way to England and ran aground in a dense fog near Cape Pine, with over 350 fatalities.