Louis I de Poitiers, Count of Valentinois

During the English Gascon campaign of 1345, Poitiers led a French army of 7,000 men besieging the castle of Auberoche, 9 miles (14 km) east of Périgueux.

[2] Henry, Earl of Derby, with an initial relief force of 1,200 English and Gascon soldiers: 400 men-at-arms and 800 mounted archers,[3] arrived to relieve the siege.

The French encampment was divided in two, with the majority of the soldiers camped close to the river between the castle and village while a smaller force was situated to prevent any relief attempts from the north.

A small number of Anglo-Gascon infantry had followed a path in the woods to emerge in the French rear and now attacked from the north west.

Halle, realising that the French troops guarding his exit from the castle were either distracted or had been drawn off to join the fighting, sallied with all the mounted men he could muster.