The Old Wharf, constructed in 1840-41 at Dixon's Landing, reflected the growth of Sackville's merchant community which was looking to import products and export staples such as lumber, grindstones and building stones to the world.

A new Wharf, which had been lobbied for over a period of thirty years, was completed in 1911. By the 1920s,however, the stretch of the Tantramar River, on which the old and new wharves were located, filled up with silt due to a break through at the neck leading to the Ram Pasture Marsh.

The wooden remains of the Sackville Wharf are now land-locked. They are located on the Old Shipyard Road, on the east side of the CN tracks, near Lorne Street in Sackville. The designation as a Historic Place also includes the landscape stretching 1600 feet upstream to the site of the Old Wharf. This landscape includes remains of Acadian dykes as well as the buried remains of other wharves and shipyards.