WIGMORE CASTLE, HEREFORDSHIRE. 7 



entrance tower, which is in this wall, is of a square form, the other 

 two, seen at the same time, are one square and the other round.* 



Ralph left two sons, Hugh, married to Matilda, daughter of 

 William Longespee, who became second baron of Wigmore, and 

 William, by the gift of his brother. Lord of Netherley. 



On the accession of Henry II., it appeared politic to destroy 

 various castles throughout his dominions, as the contest between 

 his mother and king Stephen had shewn how much they might aid 

 the cause of disaffection. This measure was strongly opposed by 

 Hugh Mortimer^ and Milo, son of Roger, Earl of Gloucester ; but, 

 on the approach of Henry, with an army, they were obliged to sub- 

 mit jCousequently, in the year 1 158, Hugh delivered up to the 

 king the castles of Wigmore and Brugge, but the position of the 

 former on the Welsh frontier, prevented its destruction. 



Dugdale, in his Monasticon, relates the following particulars :— • 

 " Hugh Mortimer, a noble and great man in the reign of king 

 Stephen, made Oliver de Merlimond his seneschal, or steward, and 

 gave him the town of Scobbedon, and to his son Eudo, the parson- 

 age of the church of Aylmondestree. There was then no church at 

 Scobbedon, but only a chapel of St. Juliana, but Oliver built one 

 there, and dedicated it to St. John Evangelist. Afterwards, the 

 said Oliver went on a pilgrimage to St. James the Apostle, at Com- 

 postela, in Spain ; and having been most charitably entertained, on 

 his return, by the canons of St. Victor, at Paris, when he had 

 caused his church at Scobbedon to be consecrated by Robert Betun, 

 Bishop of Hereford,t and obtained of him the church of Rugeley, 

 he sent to the abbot of St. Victor and obtained of him two of his 

 canons, to whom he gave the said two churches and his lands of 

 Ledecote, providing them a decent house, with barns and store of 

 corn. 



" Some time after, Hugh Mortimer and Oliver Merlimond disagree- 

 ing, the latter went away in the service of Milo, Earl of Hereford, 

 and Hugh re-assumed all he had before given him and what Oliver had 

 granted to the canons, who were thereby reduced to such straits. 



* " It is impossible," says Mr. Gough, in his additions to Camden, '* to con- 

 template the massive ruins of Wigmore Castle, situate on a hill in an amphi- 

 theatre of mountains, whence its owner could survey his vast estates from 

 his square palaee, with four corner towers on a keep at the south-east corner 

 of his double-trenched outworks, without reflecting on the instability of the 

 grandeur of a family, whose ambition and intrigues made more than one 

 English monarch uneasy on his throne." 



f He was bishop from the year 1131 to 1148. 



