It raises nowhere more than a few meters above sea level and is mostly given over to agriculture with the majority of the land used for grazing cattle or arable production of crops, including potatoes.

[5] St. John's Point and the surrounding Lecale peninsula have been inhabited since pre-historic times, as attested to by the numerous Souterrains and other ancient remains in the area.

It is one of the most dangerous Bays for Shipping in the Kingdom, by reason of Sand-banks, which shift their stations almost in every stormThe area was subject to considerable improvement in the 18th and 19th centuries as local coastal trade grew, and the need to protect passing vessels against local hazards become more acute, the lighthouse and coastguard station being built in this period, and both not long after the improvement of the harbour at Killough.

The area received international intention for the first time when, in 1846 and during her second season of service and not long after embarking for New York, the then largest vessel afloat, Great Britain made a series of navigational errors that resulted in her being run hard aground in Dundrum Bay just down the coast from St. John's point on 22 September.

After languishing in Prince's Dock, Liverpool for some time, she was sold to Gibbs, Bright & Co., former agents of the Great Western Steamship Company, for a mere £25,000.

[18] The improvement of the nearby harbour at Killough n the late 18th and early 19th centuries had hastened the need for a beacon at what had long been regarded as an exposed and treacherous part o the east-Ulster coast (see Harris above) Construction of the lighthouse was approved by the Ballast Board in 1839 (officially the Corporation for Preserving and Improving the Port of Dublin), with Capt.

Seemingly unsuited to the task, the lightkeeper, one Mr. Blakely complained to the Commissioners of Irish Lights that Behan was "the worst specimen" he had met in 30 years' service and someone "not amenable to any law and order".

[22] Following on from a consultation process in 2015, the lighthouse was selected as one of the Irish Landmark Trust's capital projects, with restoration and increased access works to be undertaken in the period 2021/2022 and encompassing a range of improvements including: The lighthouse remains in public ownership and has the Historic Building Number HB18/10/048[24] A pre-Romanesque church dating from as early as the 8th Century but more likely the 10th or 11th centuries, and now ruined, this is one of only a handful of examples in Ulster which survive from the Early Christian Period.

Further, an association with quartz pebbles in a number of graves was noted, reflecting an ancient tradition of burial with white stones and shells.

[28] The church is currently under the care of the Northern Ireland Environment Agency and has the Sites and Monuments Record reference DOW 045:013.

[25] A late-Georgian (early 1830s) country house of three-bays with canted ends, and accompanies by a series of later additions and out-building's, this substantial gentry residence opens onto the sea at its rear and, together with its large gate-screen, is listed as a class B1 Protected Structure.

Ms. Smyth married to Peter Rutledge Montagu Browne, of Westport, County Mayo and enlisted in the 9th Regiment of Foot in 1830, with the house being constructed for the couple at approximately the same time.

The house was later owned and used as a residence for a number of years by prominent Unionist MP, barrister, and founding chairman of the DUP, Desmond Boal.