I have said that the essentials of the Black Prince’s defensive plan were:
(1) A prepared defensive position, which it might or might not be necessary to hold, coupled with
(2) an obstacle, the Miosson River, which (when he should retreat) he could count upon to check pursuit; especially as its little valley was (a) fairly deeply cut, (b) encumbered by wood, and (c) passable for troops only at the bridge of Nouaillé, which he was free to cut when it had served him, and at a somewhat hidden ford which I will later describe.
I must here interpose the comment that the bridge of Nouaillé, being of stone, would not have been destroyable during a very active and pressed retreat under the conditions of those times; that is, without the use of high explosives. But it must be remembered that such a narrow passage would in any case check the pursuit, that half an hour’s work would suffice to make a breach in the roadway, and perhaps to get rid of the keystones, that a few planks thrown over the gap so formed would be enough to permit archers defending the rear to cross over, that these planks could then be immediately withdrawn, and that the crush of a hurried pursuit, which would certainly be of heavily armed and mounted knights, would be badly stopped by a gap of the kind. I therefore take it for granted that the bridge of Nouaillé was a capital point in Edward’s plan.[3]
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The line along which the Black Prince threw up entrenchments was the head of the slight slope upon the Nouaillé or eastern side of the depression I have mentioned. It ran from the farm Maupertuis (now called La Cardinerie) to the site of those out-buildings which surround the modern steadings of Les Bordes, and to-day bear the name of La Dolerie. The length of that line was, almost to a foot, one thousand English yards, and it will easily be perceived that even with his small force only a portion of his men were necessary to hold it. Its strength and weakness I shall discuss in a moment. This line faces not quite due west, indeed nearly twenty degrees north of west.[4] Its distance as the crow flies from the Watergate of Poitiers is just under seven kilometres, or, as nearly as possible, four miles and six hundred and fifty English yards.[5] While its bearings from the town of Poitiers, or the central part thereof, is a trifle south of due south-east.[6]
The line thus taken up, and the depression in front of it, are both singularly straight, and the slope before the entrenchments, like its counterpart opposite, is regular, increasing in depth as the depression proceeds down towards the Miosson, which, at this point, makes a bend upward to meet, as it were, the little valley. A trifle to the south of the centre of the line there is a break in the uniformity of the ridge, which comes in the shape of a little dip now occupied by some tile-works; and on the further, or French, side a corresponding and rather larger cleft faces it; so that the whole depression has the shape of a long cross with short arms rather nearer its base than its summit. Just at the end of the depression, before the ground sinks abruptly down to the river, the soil is marshy.
Leading towards this position from Poitiers there was and is but one road, a winding country lane, now in good repair, but until modern times of a poor surface, and never forming one of the great high roads. The importance of this unique road will be seen in a moment.