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Northampton was one of the principal seats of Medieval Royal Government: its castle and administrative centre for the southern part of the kingdom. This accounts for the fact that the trial of Thomas Becket took place here and the University was founded here in 1261 but also for the significant Battle of Northampton in The Wars of the Roses. The Lancastrian King Henry Vl with his wife Margaret Anjou held the strategic position on the far side of the river Nene with the castle behind them. On the 10th July 1460 the Yorkist forces under Warwick the Kingmaker and the Royal claimant Edward Earl of March massed on the sloping ground of Delapre Abbey (now Delapre Golf Club).
At 2pm they advanced towards the Lancastrian army which was well dug in behind a water filled ditch filled with sharpened ...
The other principal Yorkist site in the county is at Fotheringhay where the tombs of Edward lV father and his uncle Edward, 2nd and 3rd Dukes of York are to be found.
The battlefield is now in the grounds of Delapre Abbey, hugely popular year-round with walkers and garden lovers.
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