BIOGRAPHY

Robert Stevenson, FRSE, MWS, FGSL, MICE, ETC

Robert Stevenson was born on 8 June 1772 in Glasgow and died on 12 July 1850. The first mention of Robert Stevenson in connection with the Northern Lighthouse Board was when Thomas Smith, the Engineer, in 1794, entrusted Robert Stevenson with the Superintendence of the erection of Pentland Skerries Lighthouse. Prior to this in 1791 Stevenson had held a similar position in the erection of a Lighthouse on Little Cumbrae in the River Clyde (Clyde Lighthouse). This connection soon led to his adoption as Smith's partner, Stevenson states that he became Engineer to the Northern Lighthouse Board on Smith's retirement about 1799. Smith was in fact Stevenson's stepfather as his own father Alan, had died in 1774, and his mother had remarried to Thomas Smith.

During his term in office as Sole Engineer to the Board from 1808 until 1843, he was responsible for the erection of at least 15 major Lighthouses. Of these was one which transpired to be the most important work of his life and one which undoubtedly is of notable engineering achievement, namely the Bell Rock Lighthouse.

Many Irish Lighthouses and Lighthouses in the colonies were fitted with apparatus prepared under the superintendence of Robert Stevenson. He was also an inventor of intermittent and flashing lights, for the latter of which he received from the King of the Netherlands, a gold medal as a mark of his Majesty's approbation.

Robert Stevenson's fame was not confined only to Lighthouses, as among other things he was responsible for the design of London and Regent Roads in Edinburgh, the Hutcheson Bridge in Glasgow, railway lines etc, etc.