_Second Battle of St. Albans._--On Shrove Tuesday, 17th February, 1461, Queen Margaret defeated the Earl of Warwick, who retreated with considerable loss, the battle being mostly fought out on Bernard's Heath, N. from St. Peter's Church. This engagement also was stubbornly fought out. According to Stow and Hollinshead, the Lancastrians were thwarted in their efforts to pass through the town from S. to N., being repulsed by arrows in the Market Place, and eventually reached Bernard's Heath by a circuitous route from the W. If this is so, visitors who ramble down the High Street, turn right into Katherine Lane, coming out of Wellclose Street near St. Peter's Church, will probably tread in the footsteps of the troops of Margaret. After the fight had been decided the victorious Lancastrians poured back into the town, which was again plundered, and the Abbey also partially stripped. This was during the second abbacy of John Wheathampsted, and Stow records that the day after the battle Queen Margaret, and the King (Henry VI.) were led by the abbot and monks to the High Altar of the Abbey, where they returned thanks for the victory.
ST. MARGARET'S, on the river Lea, has a small church with several unimportant memorials. It was probably formed from one aisle of an older edifice.
_St. Margaret's_ is also the name of a few cottages a little N.W. from Great Gaddesden, near the site of the Benedictine convent of _Muresley_, the refectory of which was almost intact early last century.
ST. PAUL'S WALDEN (4 miles S.W. from Stevenage Station, G.N.R.) is a large and scattered parish; much of it is very picturesque. The church, which was restored twenty years ago, is of several styles, but contains little worthy of comment. Note the tablet on the W. wall of the chapel to Henry Stapleford and Dorothy his wife. "The said Henry was servant to Queen Elizabeth, King James and King Charles" (d. 1631). The manor was formerly called first _Waldene_, then Abbot's Walden, being the property of the abbots of St. Albans. _St. Paul's Walden Bury_, ½ mile S.W. from the church, is the seat of Lord Strathmore. Note the fine avenues in the park, commanding good views of the house. The walk S. to Whitwell, through the steep and twisted lane and across the bridge over the Maran, keeping the "bog" and cress beds on the right, is very pretty.