The Battle of Pontvallain, part of the Hundred Years' War, took place in north-west France on 4 December 1370. A French army under Bertrand du Guesclin heavily defeated an English force which had broken away from an army commanded by Robert Knolles. The French numbered 5,200 men, and the English force was approximately the same size. The English had plundered and burnt their way across northern France from Calais to Paris. With winter coming, the English commanders fell out and divided their army. The battle consisted of two separate engagements: one at Pontvallain where, after a forced march which continued overnight, Guesclin surprised a major part of the English force, and wiped it out. In a coordinated attack, Guesclin's subordinate, Louis de Sancerre, caught a smaller English force the same day, at the nearby town of Vaas, also wiping it out. The French harried the surviving Englishmen into the following year, recapturing much lost territory.
Read more: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Pontvallain
_______________________________ Today's selected anniversaries:
1893:
First Matabele War: A patrol of 34 British South Africa Company soldiers was ambushed and annihilated by more than 3,000 Matabele warriors. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shangani_Patrol
1909:
The first Grey Cup, the championship game of the Canadian Football League, was held in Toronto. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grey_Cup
1980:
The English rock group Led Zeppelin officially disbanded. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Led_Zeppelin
2006:
Six black teenagers assaulted a white student in Jena, Louisiana; the subsequent court cases became a cause célèbre for perceived racial injustice in the United States. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jena_Six
_____________________________ Wiktionary's word of the day:
status symbol: A visible possession that is a sign of one's personal wealth or social status. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/status_symbol
___________________________ Wikiquote quote of the day:
The whole universe is carried on on the credit system, and if the mutual confidence on which it is based were to collapse, it must itself collapse immediately. Just or unjust, it lives by faith; it is based on vague and impalpable opinion that by some inscrutable process passes into will and action, and is made manifest in matter and in flesh: it is meteoric — suspended in mid-air; it is the baseless fabric of a vision so vast, so vivid, and so gorgeous that no base can seem more broad than such stupendous baselessness, and yet any man can bring it about his ears by being over-curious; when faith fails, a system based on faith fails also. Whether the universe is really a paying concern, or whether it is an inflated bubble that must burst sooner or later, this is another matter. If people were to demand cash payment in irrefragable certainty for everything that they have taken hitherto as paper money on the credit of the bank of public opinion, is there money enough behind it all to stand so great a drain even on so great a reserve? --Samuel Butler https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Samuel_Butler_%28novelist%29