 There was some debate about whether the lighthouse is New York or Connecticut.It was originally the state of New York, not Connecticut, which ceded the area on which the lighthouse is located to the federal government, but most modern official maps place it within Connecticut's side of Long Island Sound by about .The lighthouse is located on Stratford (or Middleground) Shoal which is a little over a mile in diameter and as little as nine feet below mean lower low water.