Battle of Crécy

In the late afternoon and evening of 26 August 1346, an English army under Edward III, drawn up on a hillside at Crécy-en-Ponthieu in northern France, beat off repeated attacks by a far larger French army led by King Philip VI. English and Welsh longbowmen cut down the French crossbowmen and cavalry, and a remarkable number of French nobles died. The battle, an early landmark of the Hundred Years' War, opened the way for England's capture of Calais and made the longbow famous across western Europe.

English kings had held lands in France since the Norman Conquest, making them vassals of the French crown. In May 1337 Philip VI declared Edward's French lands forfeit, beginning the long conflict. In 1346 a large French army under Philip's heir, John, Duke of Normandy, besieged Aiguillon in Gascony, and Edward gathered more than 700 ships to carry a new army across the Channel.

On 12 July 1346 Edward's army came ashore at Saint-Vaast-la-Hougue in Normandy. They burned and looted their way south, storming Caen on 26 July, where more than 5,000 soldiers and civilians were killed and the Constable of France was captured. The army then followed the Seine towards Paris, burning villages within a few kilometres of the capital, before turning north towards an allied Flemish army.

Philip's forces blocked the crossings of the Somme, and the hungry English were trapped. On the night of 24 August they forced the tidal ford of Blanchetaque against about 3,500 French defenders. Learning that the Flemings had abandoned their campaign and that no ships awaited him, Edward chose to fight and took up a defensive position near Crécy.

Modern estimates of the English range from about 7,000 to 15,000 men, many of them veterans and archers. The French were much more numerous, perhaps two or three times as many, with around 8,000 mounted men-at-arms, between 2,000 and 6,000 Genoese crossbowmen and many foot soldiers. Edward's men fought on foot in three divisions with archers on their flanks. They had dug pits to break up charges and brought a few early gunpowder weapons. The vanguard was led by his son Edward, Prince of Wales, later known as the Black Prince.

Although his commanders advised waiting until the next day, the French attack began late on 26 August, either by Philip's choice or because his knights pushed ahead regardless. After a sudden rainstorm, the Genoese crossbowmen, without their large protective shields, were quickly outshot by the longbowmen and fell back. The advancing French knights rode into them, and the leading division fell into confusion.

Charge after charge then went uphill over muddy ground, through the pits and under heavy arrow fire that brought down large numbers of unarmoured horses. Those that reached the English line had lost their momentum, and a brutal hand-to-hand struggle followed. At one point the Prince of Wales was hard pressed and needed help from the reserve. The attacks went on until nearly midnight. The blind King John of Bohemia had his horse tied to those of his companions and rode into the fighting, where all were killed. Philip was wounded in the jaw by an arrow before he left the field. The next morning newly arriving French troops were also routed.

The English lost very few men: a roll-call after the battle reportedly found 40 dead, though some historians suggest around 300. English heralds counted 1,542 dead French men-at-arms from the first day, and thousands more died the following morning. Among the French dead were the king of Bohemia, Philip's brother the Count of Alençon, the Duke of Lorraine and many other great nobles. No reliable figures exist for the French foot soldiers.

Edward went on to besiege Calais, which fell after eleven months because the French could not relieve it. It stayed in English hands until 1558. The victory established England's reputation as a military power.

Our 1300 map shows the Kingdom of France and the Kingdom of England with its lands in Gascony, the situation a generation before the war began. For the region today, see France.