[2] Fears of a French invasion, combined with the hope of retaining a valuable royal subsidy, led the town to develop Dartmouth Castle, on the west side of the estuary, into an artillery fort between 1486 and 1495.

[5] Its large, rectangular gun-ports with wooden shutters on the ground level matched those at Dartmouth Castle, and looked out close to the water at the entrance to the harbour, covering both the sea and the anchorage itself.

[7] The range of artillery guns soon increased, however, making it unnecessary to have armed forts on both sides of the river and, by the end of the 16th century, the castle's military utility had lessened and it was not normally manned.

[8] In 1855, the businessman Charles Seale Hayne restored Kingswear to form a summer house, using the local architect Thomas Lidstone; the ground floor was redesigned, a conical roof added and a detached round tower constructed on the north-west side.

Following his retirement from politics in 1987, Sir Frederic sold the castle to The Landmark Trust who converted it for use as a holiday let, restoring the ground floor of the main building to its original appearance and recreating the earlier flat, lead roof.