Lewes * Maritime History Trail

Two massive breakwaters shield Lewes Harbor from the punishing seas where Delaware Bay and the Atlantic Ocean meet. They create an 800-acre anchorage that is nearly empty now, but in the early 1900s it was capable of sheltering 1,000 vessels from violent storms and hull-crushing ice.

Master Architect William F. Strickland designed the inner breakwater and was its chief engineer. Construction began in 1823, and laborers worked at the project - mostly by hand - for nearly 70 years. Measuring one mile long, it was the first public works project of the new U.S. government and the second-largest breakwater in the world. But even before it was completed, it was too small and its harbor too shallow for newer ships. Between 1897 and 1901 a new mile-and-a-half-long breakwater was built farther out.

Both breakwaters are piles of rubble and huge stone blocks weighting up to 13 tons each. Together, the breakwaters, lighthouses, harbor waters, and the old Coast Guard Station west of the ferry terminal constitute a National Historic District.

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Show me all markers in:  Lewes, DE  |  Sussex County  |  19958  |  Delaware  |  United States of America

Delaware Breakwater East End Lighthouse
Delaware Pilots
Harbor of Refuge Lighthouse
The Legacy of Ted Freeman
Unknown Sailors' Cemetery
Menhaden Fisheries
Lighthouses
German Submarine at Cape Henlopen
Quarantine Station
Delaware Breakwater Quarantine Station

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