The Reds were aiming from the south to the Tampere–Haapamäki railway, in order to the reach the vital junction of Haapamäki, located 40 kilometres northeast of Ruovesi.

The situation, however, changed on 2 February as a White Guard unit from the Ostrobothnian municipality of Ylihärmä entered Ruovesi and took over control in the village.

[2] Two days later, the paramilitary White Guards were pulled out from Ruovesi and replaced by a unit of the Western Army, commanded by the Jäger captain Paul Wallenius.

[3] According to the military plan composed by the Red Guard commander-in-chief Ali Aaltonen, focus in the Northern Tavastia region was to secure the vital railway connecting the towns of Tampere and Pori.

The Soviet unit included 250–350 anarchist sailors from the Baltic Fleet battleships Poltava and Respublika, and the destroyer Orfei, that were docked in Turku.

The sailors were heading back home by train via Tampere, but had decided to participate in the war on the Tavastia Front on their way to Soviet Russia.

However, a unit of White Guard fighters from Lapua, commanded by the prominent warlord Matti Laurila, managed to take the anarchists by surprise as they were crossing an open field.

The sailors were not trained in ground warfare, which caused heavy losses in the machine gun fire, and the anarchists were forced to retreat as the darkness fell.

A day later, they were joined by the Russian volunteers from Kuru, who were pushed back by the 1,650-men squad of the Swedish colonel lieutenant Harald Hjalmarson.