and the massive portcullis at either end of the gatehouse are later insertions started by Hugh de Lacey who died in 1248 and did not live to see its completion in around 1250. It was finished by King Henry III. After the collapse of the Earldom of Ulster in 1333, the castle remained the Crown's principal residential and administrative centre in the north of Ireland. During the early stages of the Nine Years War (1595–1603), when English influence in the north became tenuous, crown forces were supplied and maintained through the town's port. And in 1597, the surrounding country was the scene for the Battle of Carrickfergus. During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries improvements were made to accommodate artillery, including externally splayed gunports and embrasures for cannon, though these improvements did not prevent the castle from being attacked and captured on many occasions during this time. Marshal Schomberg besieged and took the castle in the week-long Siege of Carrickfergus in 1689. This is also the place where Schomberg's leader, King William III first set foot in Ireland on 14 June 1690. In 1760, after fierce fighting in the town, it was surrendered to French invaders under the command of Francois Thurot. They looted the castle and town and then left, only to be caught by the Royal Navy. Later use In 1778, a small but significant event in the American War of Independence began at Carrickfergus, when John Paul Jones, in the face of reluctance by his crew to approach too close to the Castle, lured a Royal Navy vessel from its moorings into the North Channel, and won an hour-long battle. In 1797 the Castle, which had on various occasions been used to house prisoners of war, became a prison and it was heavily defended during the Napoleonic Wars; six guns on the east battery remain of the twenty-two that were used in 1811. For a century it remained a magazine and armoury. During the First World War it was used as a garrison and ordnance store and during the Second World War as an air raid shelter. It was garrisoned continuously for about 750 years until 1928, when its ownership was transferred from the British Army to the new Government of Northern Ireland for preservation as an ancient monument. Many of its post-Norman and Victorian additions were then removed to restore the castle's original Norman appearance. It remains