The lighthouse, first lit in 1869, stood at the entrance to the Port River. Prefabricated in England and shipped to South Australia in pieces, it replaced the lightship Fitzjames which had been moored at the mouth of the Port River. It was intended that the light keepers and their families would live at the base of the structure in these iron rooms, but the heat of South Australian summers made that impossible. Living quarters were built between the decks of the timber staging but, after several further modifications to the structure, the lighthouse was deemed unstable and dismantled. In 1901 it was relocated to South Neptune Island at the entrance to Spencer Gulf. It remained in operation there, crewed by three light keepers at a time, until it was decommissioned in 1985.