The battle was a major element in ongoing frontier hostilities between English colonists from the Province of Carolina and Spanish Florida, and it was a prelude to more organized military actions of Queen Anne's War.

[4] Carolina-based merchants such as Anthony Dodsworth and Thomas Nairne had established alliances with Creek Indians in the upper watersheds of rivers draining into the Gulf of Mexico, whom they supplied with arms and from whom they purchased slaves and animal pelts.

[6] In January 1702, French naval officer and founder of Mobile Pierre Le Moyne d'Iberville encouraged the Spanish commander at Pensacola to equip the Apalachee with firearms in order to prevent further raids from Carolina into Florida.

[8] Word of this reached the Apalachicola Province community of Achita, where Carolina trader Anthony Dodsworth (referred to in Spanish documents as "Don Antonio") was meeting with the local tribes.

According to a report an Indian woman made to Manuel Solano, the deputy governor at San Luis, about 400 warriors, principally Apalachicolas and Chiscas, went with Dodsworth, two other white men, and two blacks, to meet Uriza's force.

[9] The exact date of the battle is unknown; the woman reporting to Solana saw the battlefield on October 18,[9] the day Uriza and the remnants of his force returned to the Apalachee town of Bacacua.

[12] The battle further stirred up passions in Charles Town, where Governor James Moore had already secured approval for an expedition against St. Augustine after learning that war had formally been declared in Europe between England and Spain.