History of Hertfordshire Kings Langley. He gave the alm of a groat to the poor. Henry Chichele, the Archbishop of Canterbury, visited Barnet in 1423. No bells rang, and the archbishop took offence at his poor welcome. When he returned in 1426, the church doors were sealed against him. Three important battles of the Wars of the Roses took place in Hertfordshire. At the First Battle of St Albans on 22 May 1455, which was the first major battle of the Wars of the Roses, Richard of York and Neville the Kingmaker defeated the Lancastrians, killed their leader, Edmund Beaufort and captured King
Wars of the Roses and the growth of a centralised monarchy under the Tudors. The wars heralded the end of the medieval period in England and the movement towards the Renaissance. After the wars the large standing baronial armies that had helped fuel the conflict were suppressed. Henry VII, wary of any further fighting, kept the barons on a very tight leash, removing their right to raise, arm and supply armies of retainers so that they could not make war on each other or the king. The military power of individual barons declined, and the Tudor court became a place where baronial squabbles were