Battle of Patay

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Battle of Patay
Part of the Hundred Years' War

The French crushing the English. The English, however, did not fight on horseback
Date 18 June 1429
Location Near Patay, slightly north of Orleans, France
Result Decisive French victory
Combatants
Kingdom of France Kingdom of England
Commanders
La Hire
Xaintrailles		 Sir John Fastolf
John Talbot, 1st Earl of Shrewsbury
Strength
1,500 cavalry 5,000
Casualties
About 100 2,500 dead, wounded, or captured
Hundred Years' War
Edwardian – Breton Succession – Caroline – Lancastrian

The Battle of Patay (18 June 1429) was a major battle in the Hundred Years' War between the French and English in north-central France. It was a decisive victory for the French and turned the tide of the war. Although credited to Joan of Arc, most of the fighting took place at the vanguard and the battle was over before the main French forces arrived.

Contents

[edit] Background

After the relief of the Siege of Orléans, the French recaptured several English strongholds in the Loire valley. This regained bridges for the subsequent French assault on English and Burgundian territory to the north. Nearly all of France north of the Loire river was under foreign control. The French victory at Orléans had destroyed the only French-controlled bridge. Three smaller battles had recovered bridges along the Loire.

The French Loire campaign of 1429 consisted of five actions:

1. The Siege of Orléans.
2. The Battle of Jargeau.
3. The Battle of Meung-sur-Loire.
4. The Battle of Beaugency.
5. The Battle of Patay.

The Battle of Patay took place the day after the English surrender at Beaugency. This final battle was the only one of the five where both armies fought on open country. Patay bears comparison to the famous English victory at Agincourt. The English attempted the same tactics here, which had been enormously successful for eighty three years (since the Battle of Crecy in 1346).

This time the French victory would be as lopsided as their defeat had been at Agincourt and the effect of the battle would be similarly far reaching. Orléans had demonstrated that the French could win against the English in siege warfare. Jargeau, Meung-sur-Loire, and Beaugency had been minor battles. Patay decimated the numbers of the highly skilled English longbow corps with the main English army on the field.

No other country in Europe used the longbow as extensively as England. Although the weapon was relatively inexpensive to produce, the cost of keeping longbowmen was prohibitive: the constant training needed to operate the weapon required the maintenance of a standing army. During the late Middle Ages most soldiers warred seasonally, and campaigns often ended in time for the fall harvest. Longbowmen and nobles were the only truly career soldiers, but there was some resentment from the latter, seeing the presence of the former as an infringement on class prerogative.

The longbow corps had two weaknesses: its lightly armored men were poor defenders in close combat and extensive training slowed the production of new longbowmen. The French army exploited both of these weaknesses in 1429.

[edit] Tactics

An English reinforcement army under Sir John Fastolf departed from Paris following the defeat at Orléans. The French had moved swiftly, capturing three bridges and accepting the English surrender at Beaugency the day before Fastolf's army arrived. The French knew that they could not win against a readied English army on open land. So they scoured the area in hopes of finding the English before battle preparations were complete.

The English reconnoitered with remaining defenders at Meung-sur-Loire. The French had taken only the bridge at this location, not the neighboring castle or the town. Retreating defenders from Beaugency joined them. The English excelled at open battles; they took up a position whose exact location is unknown but traditionally believed to be near the tiny village of Patay. Fastolf, John Talbot, 1st Earl of Shrewsbury and Sir Thomas Scales commanded the English.

The standard defensive tactic of the English longbowmen was to drive pointed stakes into the ground near their positions. This prevented cavalry charges and slowed infantry long enough to eliminate assailants. But the English bowmen disclosed their position before preparations were complete: a stag wandered onto the field near the English army and the archers raised a hunting cry, attacking it as sport. This alerted nearby French scouts.

About 1,500 men under captains La Hire and Jean Poton de Xaintrailles, composing of the vanguard of the French army, attacked the unprepared English. This soon turned into a rout. Every Englishman with a horse fled under the mounted assault while the infantry, mostly composed of the famed English longbowmen, were cut down. For once the French tactic of a large frontal cavalry assault succeeded, with startling results.

[edit] Aftermath

Talbot was captured by the French along with many other notable English. Fastolf escaped with a small band of men to disgrace. John, Duke of Bedford blamed Fastolf for the defeat and stripped him of his order of the garter. This was the beginning of his somewhat undeserved reputation as the basis for the legendary Falstaff.

As the concluding action of the French offensive along the Loire, Patay left the English army in short supply of two of its most important elements: commanders and longbowmen. This victory permitted the French army to march northward to Rheims without further bloodshed and hold the coronation of Charles VII of France, which settled the disputed succession to the French throne.

[edit] Bibliography

  • Devries, Kelly. Joan of Arc: A Military Leader (Glaucestershire: Sutton Publishing, 1999). ISBN 0-7509-1805-5
  • Richey, Stephen W. Joan of Arc: The Warrior Saint. (Westport, CT: Praeger, 2003). ISBN 0-275-98103-7
  • Allmand, C. The Hundred Years War: England and France at War c. 1300–1450. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988). ISBN 0-521-31923-4

[edit] See also

[edit] External links

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