Wars, work was carried out to alter the design of the parapet. The Crimean War sparked a fresh invasion scare and in 1855 the south coast of England was refortified. Yarmouth Castle underwent considerable repairs that year; four naval guns and traversing rails were installed on the castle platform, and a regular county army unit was put in place to garrison the fort. In 1881 a proposal was put forward to modernise the entire fortification, but this was rejected and in 1885 the garrison and the guns were withdrawn. The coastguard began using the castle as a signalling station in 1898. In 1901, the War Department passed the castle to the Commissioners of Woods and Forests and in 1912 parts of the castle were leased to the Pier Hotel, which incorporated Robert Holmes's former mansion; the Pier Hotel eventually became the George Hotel and still occupies part of the old castle moat. The Office of Works took control of the castle in 1913, carrying out a programme of repairs, and it was used by the military in both the First and Second World Wars. It was finally retired from military use in the 1950s. In the 21st century, Yarmouth Castle is run by the heritage organisation English Heritage as a tourist attraction, receiving 9,007 visitors in 2010. It is protected under UK law as a Grade I listed building and as a scheduled monument. Architecture Yarmouth Castle is a square fortification, nearly across, with an arrow-head bastion protecting the landward side. The north and west walls face the sea, protected by angular buttresses, and a wide moat originally protected the south and east side, although this has since been filled in. The castle's 16th-century bulwark, which originally covered the area to the west of Pier Street and the north of Quay Street, and its quay battery have also been destroyed. The walls of the castle are mainly built from ashlar stone, with some red brick used on the south side. The walls are pierced by a small number of gunloops, including in the "ears" of the bastion, which would have overlooked the moat. When first built the interior of the castle formed a sequence of buildings around a courtyard, but the southern half of the castle was filled in shortly afterwards to produce a solid gun platform able to support heavy guns. It was later raised again in the 17th