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It has been suggested that the castle may have been greatly enlarged in the latter years of Edward II., when it played an important part in connection with the division of the Gloucester inheritance and the younger Despenser's ambitions. There are a number of notices of the castle in the chronicles and public records of that time, but apparently no references to any building operations.
She meant rightly enough, yet it sounded harsh and cruel, when she bluntly reminded him that Constance manifestly cared nothing for him. Le Despenser's lip quivered with pain. "Let be, fair Mother," he said gently. "It may be yet, one day, that my Lady's heart shall come home to God and me, and that she shall then say unto me, `I love thee." Did that day ever come?
In 1324 the king deprived her of her separate estate, drove her favourite servants from court, and put her on an allowance of a pound a day. The wife of the younger Hugh, her husband's niece, was deputed to watch her, and she could not even write a letter without the Lady Despenser's knowledge. Isabella bitterly chafed under her humiliation.
Among the many magnates who appeared among the royal following were six earls: Pembroke, Badlesmere's own associate; the king's two brothers, Norfolk and Kent; Warenne, Richmond, and Arundel, who as Despenser's kinsman felt himself bound to fight on his side. On October 23 the castle was closely besieged by this overwhelming force, and on October 31 was forced to surrender.
Thereupon Mowbray made common cause with all the other cheated claimants, De Bohun joining the head of his house, the great Earl of Hereford, who, with Roger Mortimer and his uncle, another Mortimer of the same name, revenged their wrongs by a foray upon Lady Eleanor le Despenser's estates in Glamorganshire, killing her servants, burning her castles, and driving off her cattle, so that in a few nights they had done several thousand pounds' worth of damage.
There were barges passing up and down the Channel, and Le Despenser's intention was to row out to one of those bound for Ireland, and so prosecute his voyage. He wore, we are told, a coat of furred damask; and carried with him a cloak of motley velvet. The term "motley" was applied to any combination of colours, from the simplest black and white to the showiest red, blue, and yellow.
From Oxford, Isabella and Mortimer hurried to Gloucester, whence Edward had already fled to the younger Despenser's palatinate of Glamorgan. From Gloucester, they passed on through Berkeley to Bristol, where the elder Despenser, the Earl of Winchester, was in command.
He had already got Newport, had he Swansea also he would rule the south coast from the Lloughor to the Usk. Accordingly, he declared that the custom of the march trenched upon the royal prerogative, and managed that Gower should be seized by the king's officers, as a first step towards getting it for himself. Despenser's action provoked extreme indignation among all the marcher lords.
The earldom of Devon was revived for the house of Courtenay; that of Salisbury in favour of the trusty William Montague, and an Audley, son of Despenser's rival, was raised to the earldom of Gloucester.
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