Wigmore Castle Wigmore Castle is a ruined castle which is barely visible from the village of Wigmore in the northwest region of Herefordshire , England . History . Wigmore Castle was founded after the Norman Conquest , probably c . 1070 , by William fitzOsbern , 1st Earl of Hereford and a close associate of William the Conqueror . It was built on waste ground at a place called " Merestun " , the settlement by the mere or lake . The land was held at the time of the Conquest by Gunnfrothr or Gunnvarthr , who also held land at Lingen and Brampton Bryan . The associated town of Wigmore below the castle was probably also founded by fitzOsbern , perhaps around the earlier settlement . There is no evidence for any earlier fortification on the site of the castle , but despite this , Wigmore in Herefordshire has sometimes been mistaken for " Wigingamere " , a place in East Anglia ( near Newport , Essex ) where Edward the Elder built a fortification against the Danes in 921 . The form of fitzOsbern ' s early castle at Wigmore is unknown , but given the scale of his fortifications at Chepstow , Monmouth and elsewhere , it is likely to have been substantial and probably covered much the same area as the present castle . In particular , he probably had a natural ravine reshaped to create a deep ditch behind the motte . No evidence of early stone defences has yet been discovered , leading to the conclusion that fitzOsbern ' s castle was built of timber , but it is just possible that the dense vegetation and thick deposits of debris conceal the foundations of an early stone keep . FitzOsbern was killed in Flanders in 1071 , and his son Roger de Breteuil took part in the Revolt of the Earls in 1075 ; after the Earl ' s subsequent defeat , William I seized the castle and gave it to another of his supporters , Ranulph de Mortimer ( or Ralph de Mortimer ) . From this time on Wigmore became the head of the barony of the Mortimer s , later from 1328 Earls of March . In 1155 the castle was besieged by Henry II because Hugh de Mortimer refused to return the Bridgnorth Castle to the crown . Two small earthworks to the east and west of the castle have survived to the present day , and may represent siege - works built for the campaign . Parts of the walls were built or rebuilt in stone in the late 12th century or early 13th century , and further work was carried out in the 13th century , perhaps when Hugh de Mortimer ( 1197 - 1227 ) was given Royal money for the castle ' s garrisoning . The works included the curtain wall that surrounds the bailey , which still stands to this day at its full height on the east side and the south side between the south tower and the gatehouse . The castle was the subject of extensive works in the late 13th or early 14th century , when it was held by Roger Mortimer ( 1231 - 1282 ) , Edmund Mortimer ( 1282 - 1304 ) and Roger Mortimer , 1st Earl of March ( lived 1287 - 1330 ) . The walls were raised , the gatehouse remodelled and other buildings were constructed on the site , including a substantial block , possibly a lodgings range , within the inner bailey . Roger had succeeded his father Edmund in 1304 , and strengthened the position of the Mortimer family considerably , acquiring Ludlow Castle and many lands in Ireland through marriage to the heiress Joan de Geneville . Roger was a leader of the party opposed to Edward II in the 1320s , and c . 1325 became the lover of Edward ' s queen , Isabella of France . Following Edward ' s deposition and death in 1327 , Mortimer , as the queen ' s lover and the effective stepfather of the young King Edward III , became the most important man in the kingdom . In 1328 Mortimer held a tournament near Wigmore , attended by the young king and almost all the magnates of England . Roger de Mortimer was executed in 1330 by King Edward III , and his lands seized by the crown . Edward III spent several weeks at Wigmore in the summer of 1332 . Mortimer ' s grandson ( also named Roger ) regained Wigmore and the rest of his lands in 1342 . His own son Edmund married Edward III ' s granddaughter Phillipa . In 1381 their son , Roger , inherited at the age of six and was declared the heir presumptive should Richard II ( Phillipa ' s cousin ) die childless . Roger de Mortimer was killed in battle in Ireland in 1398 and when the male line of the Mortimers died out in 1424 , the castle passed to Richard Plantagenet , 3rd Duke of York through his mother Anne Mortimer , sister of the last Roger Mortimer . Wigmore castle is said to have been derelict in 1425 , but archaeological excavations suggest that building work was carried out there in the mid 15th century . Richard ' s son Edward , earl of March was almost certainly based at Wigmore Castle before his victory at the Battle of Mortimer ' s Cross in 1461 . He deposed Henry VI and was crowned as Edward IV that year . Throughout the 16th century the castle was managed by the Council of the Marches , partly as a prison , although the castle was already beginning to decay again . John Dee saw the records of Wigmore Abbey in an old decayed chapel within the castle in 1574 . In 1595 it was given to Sir Gelly Meyrick . In 1601 , after Meyrick was executed as a traitor , Elizabeth I sold Wigmore Castle to Thomas Harley of Brampton Bryan . His son , Sir Robert Harley , a Puritan and Parliamentarian , later inherited the castle . During the English Civil War Harley left the castle in charge of his wife , Lady Brilliana Harley , who had the castle ' s defences dismantled in order to prevent the Royalists using it against her . After the Civil War , the castle was left in a state of ruin , and was gradually covered in trees and other vegetation . By the 20th century neglect and the growth of vegetation had left the remains of the castle as a scattering of ruins with features such as towers , curtain walls and the gatehouse almost indiscernible . Unusually , because it remained in private hands , Wigmore was not subject to the large scale clearances carried out at most other major historic sites in the late 19th and early 20th centuries . In 1995 Wigmore Castle came into the guardianship of English Heritage , which carried out some conservation work and small - scale excavation , making the site a little more accessible to visitors . Additional site presentation panels were installed in 2008 . Structure and topography . The castle is of great strategic importance as it lies almost halfway between the rivers Teme and Lugg ( about 4 km from each ) and commands the wide area between them . Wigmore Castle itself straddles the south - eastern edge of a spur , with marshland ( since drained ) to its north . The defences of the castle were further strengthened by the construction of ditches across the spur , between which the castle was built . These ditches acted as moat s with the north - western one running past a mound , which was also fortified . This fortification was originally probably a wooden palisade , but later a stone keep was constructed in its place .