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Great Lakes Lighthouse Keepers Association, GLLKA, honored Keeper Charles Marshall, St. Helena’s third lighthouse keeper, and William Barnum, an assistant keeper serving at St. Helena. The ceremony took place at Lakeview Cemetery in Mackinaw City in 2023 at the burial sites of both men. The remembrance was part of the 150-year celebration of Michigan’s St. Helena Island Lighthouse. The St. Helena Lighthouse and the 3-acre parcel on which it sits, is owned by GLLKA. The rest of the 266-acre uninhabited island is a nature preserve, owned by Little Traverse Conservancy.
St. Helena Island lays in Lake Michigan, just two miles offshore of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula and about eight miles west of the Mackinac Bridge. Featuring a natural harbor, St. Helena Island provided refuge to early native Americans and voyageurs seeking shelter.
When brothers Archibald, Wilson, and Obadia Newton visited the island in 1850, they recognized the island’s commercial value, and bought the 266-acre island from William Belote in 1853. On the shore of the natural harbor, the Newtons quickly established a fish station, trading center, and lumbering and cooperage operation, drawing together a community of more than 200 to support it. Fish stations were necessary at the time for professional fishermen, before the development of powerboats and refrigeration. Freshly caught fish were taken to the fish station for preservation in salt so they could be stored and transported in barrels commercially.
Anchorage in the St. Helena harbor was deep and clear, but dangerous shoals protruded from both the eastern and western ends of the island. Congress appropriated $14,000 for a lighthouse on the southeastern point of the island on June 10, 1872. The fixed white third-and-a-half order Fresnel lens was lit by St. Helena Island’s first keeper, Thomas P. Dunn, on September 20, 1873. The commercial fish station business thrived through the end of the 1800s.
Keeper Charles Marshall was the third lighthouse keeper at St. Helena Lighthouse, serving there from 1888 to 1900. Previously he had served at Waugoshance Lighthouse 1884-1886 as 2nd Assistant Lighthouse Keeper, and 1886-1888 as 1st Assistant Lighthouse Keeper, until he was promoted to St. Helena.
The Marshall family is well known in the lighthouse community, as six brothers had all served as lighthouse keepers in the upper Great Lakes.
Emigrating from England and settling on Mackinac Island, the father, William Marshall, was Fort Mackinac’s oldest and longest serving soldier, serving from 1848 until his death in 1884. Everyone on the island knew him as “The Old Sergeant.” William and Fanny Marshall had 10 children, 6 boys and 4 girls. All 6 boys (William D., Thomas, George, Samuel, Walter, and Charles) became lighthouse keepers on the upper Great Lakes. Charles was the youngest of the 10 children and was born March 18, 1858, on Mackinac Island.
Lighthouse duty was tough and came with difficult times. William D. Marshall’s son, James Marshall, tragically drowned in 1883 after helping his father close Spectacle Reef Lighthouse for the winter. Three years later, on May 28, William D.’s and Charles’s brother, Thomas Marshall, also drowned while serving as a lighthouse keeper at Waugoshance Light.
Charles Marshall started his lighthouse career at Waugoshance Light on September 22, 1884, two years prior to the drowning of his brother Thomas. After 4 years at Waugoshance, Charles was promoted to St. Helena Island Light Station on July 6, 1888.
In November of 1893, while on duty at St. Helena, Charles’s young child died at the age of 2 and is buried in St. Ignace. There are several letters in which Charles describes his wife, Rose, as being very sick and wishing to get off the island. Sometime around 1895, Charles built a home in Mackinaw City for his wife; and he commuted to their home by sailboat several times a week to check on her.
In late July 1895, Charles began whitewashing the St. Helena Lighthouse tower. He was about 45 feet off the ground and 15 feet from the top. The rope he used to raise and lower himself on the scaffold fell out of his reach. The late July sun beat down on him. He tried to flag down passing boats by waving his arms. The boats waved back, not realizing his emergency. All day the sun beat down on him and reflected off the hot tower walls. As daylight turned to dusk, he started to shiver and was afraid he would fall from the scaffold and tied himself to it. During the night, a passing tug noticed the lighthouse was not lit, and sent a crew to investigate. The tug crew found him and took him to St. Ignace for medical treatment.
An article on August 3, 1895, in The Mackinaw Witness newspaper noted, “Charles Marshall, keeper of the St. Helena light, received a sun stroke last week, and was taken to Saint Ignace and treated by Dr Young, who injected morphine. He began to get worse, and was brought here for his brother George to take care of. Dr. Brown was called, and pulled him through all right. Mr. Marshall went back to his lighthouse entirely recovered.”
Following the accident, things appeared to return to normal. Letters from Charles to the District Inspector Licking in Chicago include routine reporting from a lighthouse keeper, except for reports about his wife’s health. In November and December 1895, Charles references the poor health of his wife and daughter, and he requests a move to Mackinaw City.
On November 23, 1900, Charles took a demotion and went to work as an assistant lighthouse keeper at Old Mackinac Point, working under his brother, George Marshall. In turn, the Assistant Lighthouse Keeper at Old Mackinac Point, George Leggatt, was promoted to be keeper at St. Helena.
The following spring, on June 1, 1901, as George Leggatt returned to Mackinaw City to get supplies, a sudden storm capsized his boat less than 100 yards from the dock in Mackinaw City and he drowned. Neither Mr. Leggatt’s body, nor the boat were ever recovered.
Charles Marshall’s health continued to deteriorate and in April 1902, George Marshall writes in the Old Mackinac Point logbook that his brother Charles was “adjudged insane and taken away to Traverse City,” where he was confined to the state mental hospital for the rest of his life. Charles died in the state hospital on August 12, 1926, at age 68. Charles’s wife Rose died in 1907. Their children, Chester, Ethel, and Nora went to live at Old Mackinac Point Lighthouse with their Uncle George and Aunt Maggie.
St. Helena Island Lighthouse Assistant Keeper William Barnum was born July 21, 1869, in Marshalltown, Iowa. During the fall of 1893, he was married to Sarah Marshall, a sister of both Charles (keeper at St. Helena Island) and George Marshall, (the Old Mackinaw lighthouse keeper).
Barnum began his lighthouse service career in 1902 at Waugoshance, where he worked as a laborer. From there he served at Seul Choix from 1904-1906 as a 2nd assistant keeper, Skillagalee 1906-1910 as a 1st assistant keeper, St. Helena 1910-1911, and Old Mackinac Point 1911-1919 also as 1st assistant keeper, and head keeper at White Shoal 1919-1929. Barnum retired from the lighthouse service July 1, 1934, and lived in Mackinaw City with his wife Sarah. He was a member of the Mackinaw City Masonic Lodge.
Barnum passed away at the Marine Hospital in Detroit on March 26, 1944, at age 75. He was survived by his widow, one son, Ivan Barnum, two nieces, two sisters, one brother and a half-brother.
More than 30 GLLKA members gathered at Lakeview Cemetery in Mackinaw City to honor the keepers as Jim Tamlyn, GLLKA’s Executive Director, told the stories of each man. He also affixed Lighthouse Service medallions to American flags at each grave. A bagpiper played “Amazing Grace” at the ceremony.
This story appeared in the
Jul/Aug 2024 edition of Lighthouse Digest Magazine. The print edition contains more stories than our internet edition, and each story generally contains more photographs - often many more - in the print edition. For subscription information about the print edition, click here.
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