Victory at Poitiers by Christian Teutsch

Author:Christian Teutsch [Teutsch, Christian]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History, Europe, Medieval, Ancient, General, Biography & Autobiography, Presidents & Heads of State
ISBN: 9781781598740
Google: 4bTNDwAAQBAJ
Publisher: Casemate Publishers
Published: 2010-06-15T00:34:53+00:00

The prince sent a strong reconnaissance party forward to scout the exact disposition of the French. Froissart tells us that the troop comprised sixty men-at-arms, including Sir Eustace d’Aubrecicourt and Sir Jean de Ghistelles.106 Neither commander knew the other’s whereabouts. Jean’s army, itself trying to intercept the Black Prince along his southward route, marched west along the road to Poitiers. The English scouts encountered the rearguard of the fast-moving French army just west of Savigny-Lévescault, perhaps very near the fields on which the great battle would shortly be fought. According to Froissart, d’Aubrecicourt and his companions met a much larger force of French knights, and retreated on the English main body, which had stopped by a forest near Savigny-Lévescault.107 A chase ensued. The 200 French pursuers then encountered the Black Prince’s full force and, though they fought valiantly, were killed or captured almost to the man. Le Baker, the Anonimalle Chronicle and the Scalachronica each differ greatly from Froissart on the description of events, chiefly due to the details they each omit. The various other depictions seem to portray the event described by Froissart, because of the common list of captured French knights, which in each case includes the Comte de Joigny.108 Of the four descriptions, only Froissart mentions the English scouting party. His account of events provides further confusion by including a story of a second English reconnaissance. If it were not for the fact that the account of the earlier scout mission had included the capture of the French counts, this second tale might almost match the other sources better than did the first.

In Froissart’s telling of the second reconnaissance patrol, after selecting the site on which the battle would be fought and beginning preparations for the French attack:

The prince sent out the Captal de Buch, Sir Aymenon Pommiers, Sir Barthélemy de Burghersh, and Sir Eustace d’Aubrecicourt to learn the position of the French army, and with them two hundred men-at-arms, all mounted on the finest chargers. They rode so well, searching all sides, that they gained exact information concerning the French camp, which was bristling with armed men. These scouts could not refrain from harassing the rear of the French; some they unhorsed and took prisoner, at which the army began to take alarm. News of this reached the king of France as he was about to enter the city of Poitiers.109

This episode could possibly have occurred according to Froissart’s description, but it is more likely a blending of the activities of the earlier patrol, and of a later reconnaissance that the Black Prince ordered, even if it is nowhere else mentioned.

The Black Prince, in his version of events contained in the letter to the Londoners, confirms the description given by the first three chroniclers:

And on hearing [that King Jean had crossed ahead of us] we decided to hasten towards him on the road which he would have taken in order to fight him. But his battalions had already passed when we got to the place where we expected to meet him, and only part of his army, some seven hundred men-at-arms, fought us.

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