26th August 1346: Battle of Crécy during the Hundred Years War won by English king Edward III

The battle was fought against the French army of King Philip VI and led to the port of Calais becoming an English enclave for over two centuries.

Determined to unseat Philip from the French throne and claim it for himself, Edward had already been involved in a series of conflicts across the Channel. The invasion force he brought in 1346 was notably different to previous campaigns due to its large number of longbow archers who made up between half and two-thirds of the approximately 15,000 men in the army.

The key advantage of the longbow was its ability to be fired over long distances and so disrupt the enemy without any threat to one’s own troops. Research has since shown that longbow arrows could only pierce the plate armour worn by knights at a distance of 20 metres, but they were highly effective against their horses and the lighter armour worn on a knight’s limbs. Being able to bring down knights before the onset of hand-to-hand combat was incredibly important. Furthermore, the psychological effect of thousands of arrows raining down is known to have affected the fighting spirit of the enemy.

Having forced over 4,000 Genoese crossbowmen in the service of the French to retreat, Philip’s cavalry were similarly overwhelmed by the archers. He abandoned the battle around midnight and his remaining knights and men-at-arms fled the field soon afterwards. French losses numbered in the thousands while the English lost barely a hundred.