Battle of Patay

The battles of Patay is an major event of the Guerre One hundred Year old, which was held the June 18th 1429 between the French Armies and English. Although the victory of Charles VII is often put at the credit of Jeanne d' Arc, the essence of the combat took place to the avant-garde of the French Army.

Context

At the end of 1428, in the last years of the War One hundred Year old the Burgundian, English and their allies occupied the near total of the north of France to the Loire. They had also seized several strategic places along the Loire, and Orleans, the last big city on this river, was besieged as from October 1428. That the English have suddenly controlled all Loire Valley, and the south of France, ultimate refuge of “king de Bourges”, would be ripe for the invasion.

In early March 1429, Jeanne d' Arc arrived at Chinon to find the Dolphin there and, after a interrogation by the ecclesiastical authorities in Poitiers, it rejoined an important army corps to release Orleans on the way. This operation was crowned success, and the city was released on May 9th.

Once raised the Head office of Orleans, the French took again to the English several fortresses of the Valley of the Loire. They took thus the control of bridges making it possible to continue by an invasion of the English and Burgundian territories more in north. Almost all the north of the Loire was indeed under foreign domination, and the French victory of Orleans had been accompanied by the destruction of the only French bridge on the Loire: the later battles had enabled them to recover three bridges. The countryside of the Loire Valley of 1429 comprised five engagements:

1. the Head office of Orleans.

2. the battle of Jargeau.

3. the battle of Meung-sur-Loire.

4. the battle of Beaugency.

5. the battles of Patay .

The battle of Patay took place the shortly after the English rendering of Beaugency. This ultimate combat was the only battle line of the countryside of the Loire. Patay can be put in parallel with the famous English victory of Azincourt: the English stuck to their usual tactic, which had succeeded to them systematically against the French cavalry for 83 years (i.e. since the Bataille of Crécy in 1346).

This time, the victory of the French was as complete as their defeat with Azincourt had been catastrophic, and the consequences of the combat were of comparable range. In Orleans, the French had proven that they could from now on exceed their adversaries in the art of the machine of seat. Battles of Jargeau, Meung-sur-Loire, and Beaugency had been only simple skirmishes. But in Patay, the elite of the English franc-archers was decimated, and with it a whole army.

No country of Europe had as much recourse to the archers as England during the Middle Ages. In spite of the moderate cost of the longbow English (long arc), the intensive training of the men of this crack corps was actually extremely expensive, because these soldiers of trade were to be remunerated permanently. During the the Middle Ages, much of English enlisted in a seasonal way, the campaigns finishing about in time so that they can take part in harvests of autumn! Only the archers and the knights were soldiers of trade, although the noble ones screw of an evil eye the presence of this body of commoners, that they regarded as an attack with their privileges of class.

The body of the English franc-archers suffered from two weaknesses: these men deprived of armor made poor defenders in the combat with the body-with-body, and the need for an intensive drive slowed down the recruitment of an army of changing. The French Army exploited them starting from 1429.

The battle

With the advertisement of the defeat of Orleans, an English army of help, ordered by Sir John Fastolf, left Paris. The French had exploited their advantage with energy, taking again back-to-back three bridges and obtaining English rendering with Beaugency the junction day before of the troops of Fastolf. The French knew that they could not overcome their adversary in arranged battle if he managed to reorganize his rows. They thus operated a series of recognitions in the hope to intercept the English before they could finish their preparations.

The English made them also recognitions with the troops left in defense in Meung-sur-Loire. The French had been able to seize the bridge, but had not been able to take the castle ordering the city. The overcome troops with Beaugency could rejoin the garrison of Meung-sur-Loire. Thanks to their power of feature, the English excelled since decades in the pitched battles; one does not know the place exactly where they gave an opinion, but the tradition allots this honor to the small village of Patay.

John Fastolf, John Talbot and Thomas de Scales ordered the English army.

The usual tactics defensive of the English franc-archers consisted in driving spears cut out of ground in front of their batteries, which stopped the loads of cavalry and slowed down sufficiently progress of the infantry to leave them time to eliminate the attackers. But in Patay, these men revealed their position before to have been able to put itself in battle order: it is reported that a stag having crossed the field close to the English lines, the archers cut down the animal and pushed a cry of triumph which revealed their position with the French scouts.

The French avant-garde of approximately 1.500 men, carried out by the captains Hire, Ambroise de Loré and Jean Poton de Xaintrailles, attacked the archers by the sides which were not protected (by lack of time). Those Ci were relaxed quickly. While the elite of the archers was cut in part by the piquiers, the English knights fled the load of French cavalry. For the first time, the French tactics of the load of heavy cavalry carried it, with unexpected results.

Consequences

Talbot and of many officers were captured by the French. Fastolf, accompanied by a small troop, managed to flee but was consequently disgraced: the duke of Bedford put the defeat on its account and erased it Order of the Garter. Thus the annoying reputation occurred which was to make of him the prototype of the character of Falstaff.

Ultimate important fact of the reconquest of the Loire Valley, the battle of Patay decapitated for a long time the English army, which lost there its best officers and the elite of its archers. The French could escort Charles VII worms Rheims without having to fight and made there crown their prince, thus putting a term at the disputes on the succession with the throne of France.

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