Henry and his troops were marching to Calais to embark for England when he was intercepted by forces outnumbering his own.

The battle was fought in the defile (gorge) formed by the wood of Agincourt (close to the modern village of Azincourt) and that of Tramecourt. The army was positioned by d'Albret at the northern exit so as to bar the way to Calais. The night of 24 October was spent by the two armies on the ground, and the English had little shelter from the heavy rain.

Early on the 25th, Henry deployed his army (900 men-at-arms and 5,000 archers ) Across a 750 yard part of the defile. It is probable that the usual English battle line was Archers (Longbowmen) on either flank, Men-at-arms and Knights in the center, and at the very center roughly 200 archers. The English men-at-arms in plate and mail were placed shoulder to shoulder four deep. The English arhcers on the flanks drove stakes into the ground in frount of them to make cavalry veer off from the points. It is argued that fresh men were braught in after the siege of Harfluer, however this is generally considered as wrong and that it was 9,200 English that left Harfluer and after more sickness set in they were down to roughly 5,900 by the time of the battle

The French were arrayed in three great lines called "battles" each with roughly 6,000 in however the first is thought to of swelled to near 9,000. Situated on each flank were smaller "wings" of mounted men-at-arms and French Nobles (Probably 2,400 in total, 1,200 on each wing ), while the centre contained dismounted men-at-arms, many of whom were the 'cream' of France, including 12 princes of royal blood. The rear was made up of 6,000-9,000 (Some sources estimate lower, some estimate higher) of late arriving men-at-arms and armed servants known as "gros varlets" . The 4000-6000 French crossbowmen and archers were posted in front of the men-at-arms in centre.

Contrary to popular belief, the French force was a force of paid soldiers led by experienced commanders, not an ill-disciplined force of levied noblemen.

Altogether, there were roughly 36,000 Frenchmen compared to 5,900 Englishmen.

An important factor in the battle was the terrain, which was very muddy from the recent rain. This deep mud favored the English force because, once knocked to the ground, the heavily armored French knights would find it very difficult to stand back up, eliminating them as an effective fighting force. The mud was deep enough that more than one knight suffocated after being knocked into it. The mud also increased the ability of the English archers to fight in the melee. Lightly armoured or even unarmoured compared to the men-at-arms on both sides, the archers suffered only minor problems from the mud.

French accounts state that, prior to the battle, Henry V gave a speech reassuring his nobles that if the French prevailed, the English nobles would be spared, to be captured and ransomed instead. However, the common soldier would have no such luck and therefore he told them they had better fight for their lives.


On the morning of the 25th the French were still waiting for additional troops to arrive. The Duke of Brabant, the Duke of Anjou and the Duke of Brittany, each commanding 1000-2000 fighting men, were all marching to join the army. This left the French with a question of whether or not too advance towards the English.

For three hours after sunrise there was no fighting; then Henry, finding that the French would not advance, moved his army further into the defile. Within bowshot from the French line (400 yards), the archers dug in pointed wooden stakes called palings, at an angle, to ward off cavalry charges, and opened the engagement with a barrage of arrows and the famous 2 fingures were pointed at the French followed by much cursing. It should be noted that these palings were an innovation. At Crécy and Poitiers, two similar battles between the French and the English, the archers had not had them.


The French at this point lost some of their discipline and the wings took it upon themselves to charge and destroy the archers, only to be decimated and then driven back in confusion. The constable himself headed the leading line of dismounted men-at-arms, but weighed down by their armour and sinking deep into the mud with every step, they struggled to reach and engage the English men-at-arms. Wallowing in the mud, they were easy targets for the English bowmen. Once the French reached the English line it became worse: the French were far too closely packed to even lift their weapons to attack the enemy, this was because of the number of men they had tried to push through the defile. However, as casualties mounted and prisoners were taken, the French started to engage the line to good effect. The thin line of defenders was pushed back and Henry himself was almost beaten to the ground. But at this moment, the archers, using hatchets, swords and other weapons, penetrated the gaps among the now disordered French, who could not cope with their unarmoured assailants, and were slaughtered or taken prisoner. By this time the second line of the French had already attacked, only to be engulfed in the mêlée. Its leaders, like those of the first line, were killed or captured, and the commanders of the third line sought and found their death in the battle, while their men rode off to safety.

One of the greatest anecdotes of the battle occurred when the Duke of Gloucester, Henry V's brother, was wounded in the abdomen. According to the story, Henry, upon hearing of his brother's wound, took his household guard and cut a path through the French and stood over his brother's body beating back waves of soldiers until Gloucester could be dragged to safety. Notable chroniclers have said that Henry fought more bravely than any other soldier during the battle.

The only success for the French was a sally from Agincourt Castle behind the lines. Ysambart D'Agincourt seized the King's baggage with 1,000 peasants. Thinking his rear was under attack and worried that the prisoners would rearm, Henry ordered the slaughter of the captives (who could easily have helped themselves to the weapons strewn about the field). The nobles and senior officers, still wanting to ransom the prisoners, refused the task and the job fell to the common soldiers. Henry's actions could be regarded as savage, but if the captives had armed themselves, his army could have been caught between the remaining French forces and the prisoners.

In the morning, Henry returned to the battlefield and had any wounded Frenchman who had survived the night in the open killed. All the nobility had already been taken away and any commoners left on the field were too badly injured to survive without medical care.

Claims that the English losses were only thirteen men-at-arms (including Edward of Norwich, 2nd Duke of York, a grandson of Edward III) and about 100 of the foot soldiers are not supported by reliable documentation and are quite unlikely given the ferocity of the fighting. Henry quite deliberately concealed the actual English losses by paying the English retinues at their pre-battle strengths while quickly spreading the story of only minor English losses which survive to this day.

The French suffered heavily, mainly because of the massacre of the prisoners. The constable, three dukes, five counts and 90 barons (see below) were among the dead, and a number of notable prisoners were taken, amongst them the Duke of Orléans (the famous poet Charles d'Orléans) and Jean Le Maingre, Marshal of France.

Due to a lack of reliable sources it is impossible to give a precise figure for the French and English losses at Agincourt. What is clear though, is that in a battle where the English were considerably outnumbered, their final losses were much lower than those of the French.

The Battle of Agincourt did not result in Henry conquering France, but it did allow him to escape and renew the war two years later.