After the Kingdom of France captured Lille in 1668, the famous military engineer Sébastien Le Prestre de Vauban was ordered to improve its defenses.

The four-month 1708 siege of Lille ended in the city's surrender to Prince Eugene of Savoy and John Churchill, 1st Duke of Marlborough when the garrison of Louis François, duc de Boufflers ran out of gunpowder.

[1] On 19 August, Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de La Fayette left his command at the Army of the North and entered Coalition territory with 22 members of his staff.

On 17 August, the increasingly radicalized French Legislative Assembly had demanded that La Fayette report to Paris for questioning and on the 19th he was charged with treason.

On 24 August, the politically-connected François Joseph Westermann arrived at headquarters with the news that Longwy had fallen to the Coalition the day before after a feeble defense.

After calling Anne François Augustin de La Bourdonnaye from the command of Lille to lead the northern wing of the Army of the North, Dumouriez headed south with Westermann and his aide-de-camp Jacques MacDonald.

There were 4,000 soldiers led by Jacques Henri Moreton Chabrillant spread between Bruille-Saint-Amand, Saint-Amand-les-Eaux and Orchies as well as 4,000–5,000 men in the Camp of Maulde.

Duke Albert of Saxe-Teschen decided to divert French strength away from Brunswick's invasion by launching attacks on the enemies before him.

When Maximilian Anton Karl, Count Baillet de Latour advanced from Tournai toward Lille on 5 September, Moreton abandoned the Camp of Maulde and fell back behind the Scarpe River.

Lille was one of the most powerful of the barrier fortresses, with a well-supplied garrison of 3,000 regular infantry under Jean-Baptiste André Ruault de La Bonnerie.

The Austrian effort was handicapped by the fact that their siege train was too small and their army was too weak to entirely surround Lille.

After rejecting Saxe-Teschen's summons to surrender, the energetic Ruault mounted sorties every night but was unable to halt progress on the siege works.

On 29 September, the Austrian batteries opened a devastating bombardment upon the buildings of Lille with shot, shell and hot-shot.

On 3 October, the citizen captain Charlemagne Ovigneur continued to serve his gun even though he knew his house was burning and his wife was going to give birth.

On 4 October, Saxe-Teschen's wife, Maria Christina, Duchess of Teschen[8] appeared in the Austrian camp and the bombardment was redoubled.

The Austrians evacuated the trenches on 8 October and withdrew almost unmolested in the face of a weak pursuit led by Félix Marie Pierre Chesnon de Champmorin.

[11] Since the summer of 1792, Charles François Duhoux was the commander of Lille but he was ordered to take charge of the Camp of Soissons, just before the start of the siege.

Saxe-Teschen organized his army into three divisions under Latour, Duke Ferdinand Frederick Augustus of Württemberg and Beaulieu, each with one brigade.

Charles Eugene, Prince of Lambesc led a second cavalry brigade which included two squadrons of the Wurmser Hussars Nr.

[9] With Brunswick in full retreat, Dumouriez noticed that the large forces assembled to defend Lille could now be used for his pet project to invade Belgium.