The Second Battle of St Albans

17th February 1461

​With his father and brother's deaths at Wakefield avenged, Edward, Earl of March's forces made their way to join the forces of Richard Neville in an attempt to prevent Margaret of Anjou claiming back her husband and London itself.  

​With hindsight, Warwick should not have taken Henry VI along with him on his march northwards, he should have left him in London guarded by William Bonville and Thomas Kyriell, the two men who were responsible for him at St Alban’s, but he didn’t. The reason for this, it has been suggested, was that Warwick was overly confident, and considered himself invincible, perhaps he even thought that the meeting between his forces and that of Margaret's was a forgone conclusion, a win for the Yorkist.

​Warwick was hoping to block Margaret’s way along the northern route to St Albans, but this backfired and her troops approached by the north west route. The clash of York and Lancaster took place on the 17th of February 1461, at St Albans, but this time, unlike the previous battle, the result was not a victory for York but a Lancastrian victory. By the end of the day and dusk had settled, Richard Neville’s Yorkist force had been defeated, the king was lost and both Bonville and Kyriell had lost their heads in what Cornish antiquarian, A L Rowse, calls the blooding of Edward of Lancaster, the Prince of Wales. ​

Groby Old Hall, home of Sir John Grey, at Groby, Leicestershire

Including Bonville and Kyriell, lying among those who perished at St Albans was Robert Poynings and John Grey of Groby in Leicestershire. It was John's son Richard who would be executed at Pontefract in 1483, and his widow, Elizabeth, would make an adventurous marriage that would bring this family more wealth and power than they ever dreamed of, but it will also bring the Yorkist dynasty to its knees.