obert Johnson, ran ashore on the island of Anholt during heavy weather and was wrecked. Most of the people on her were saved.
An ecological consequence of the introduction of the bascule light was the denuding of Anholt for firewood and the resulting creation of Anholt's "desert" (see below). By the time of the switch after 1600 to imported pit coal considerable damage had been done.
British occupation
Early in the Gunboat War the Danes closed the lighthouse on Anholt. On 5 December 1808 the bomb vessel HMS Proselyte was wrecked on Anholt Reef while caught in the ice; all her crew was saved. She had stationed herself off the island on 9 November 1808 to carry a light for the safety of passing convoys.
Following the loss of Proselyte, on 18 May 1809 the 64-gun third rate HMS Standard, under Captain Askew Paffard Hollis, and the 18-pounder 36-gun frigate Owen Glendower captured the island. A party of seamen and marines under the command of Captain William Selby of Owen Glendower, with the assistance of Captain Edward Nicolls of the Standard's marines, landed. The Danish garrison of 170 men put up a sharp but ineffectual resistance that killed one British marine and wounded two; the garrison then surrendered. The British took immediate possession of the island. The principal objective of the mission was to restore the lighthouse on the island to its pre-war state to facilitate the movement of British men of war and merchantmen navigating the dangerous seas there.
The Danes attempted to retake the island. However, the Battle of Anholt (27 March 1811) resulted in many Danish casualties and proved a decisive British victory. There is a monument commemorating the battle in Anholt village.
While captain of HMS Elephant, Francis Austen visited Anholt in 1812 and wrote about it to his sister, the famed novelist Jane Austen. He described the lighthouse in some detail and also gave some impressions of the island:
"The
