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Below the Grade II listed Link remains of Oswestry Castle. The first motte and bailey castle at Oswestry was raised during the late eleventh century by Rainald, Sheriff of Shropshire, utilising a natural, oval-shaped glacial mound. The castle was garrisoned by Royalist troops during the Civil War, but was slighted by Parliamentary forces in 1644 and had been largely demolished by 1650. Today, all that remains of the 13th century keep are two groups of tumbled masonry and a bastion which was largely rebuilt in the late nineteenth century. In 1850 the castle mound was acquired by local gentlemen who landscaped it as a pleasure garden. It was gifted to the Town Corporation in 1885. Further landscaping was carried out to mark Queen Victoria's Golden Jubilee in 1887. It appears to have been at this time that revetment walls at the base of the mound, which incorporate medieval masonry, were constructed. The walls also incorporate two gate piers removed from one of the former town gates known as the Beatrice Gate. The south-facing section of the revetment wall incorporates two grey sandstone piers with carved capitals and round-arched niches to their south face, taken from a demolished town gate. These piers flank a gate access via a flight of stone steps with a crenelated wall. The piers carry a pair of metal plaques recording a brief history of the castle and its restoration by English Heritage and Oswestry Town Council. The crenelated wall to the flight of steps carries two metal plaques recording the castle's opening to the public on 24th June 1890.