On this day...... 14 August

1352: In one of the more important battles of the Hundred Years War, Sir Walter Bentley defeated the French under Guy de Nesle at Mauron in Brittany.  The French cavalry broke the English archers on the right wing, but failed to follow up, whilst attacks on the centre and left wing failed.  The English counter-attacked, and the French retreat turned into a rout, with de Nesle being killed.  The battle preserved England's control of Brittany.

1385: A Portuguese force, including an allied English contingent, intercepted at Aljubarrota the Castilian army, which included an allied French contingent, marching on Lisbon.  The Portuguese marshal, Nuno Alvares Pereira drew up his army in the same style that had proved so successful in recent years for the English against the French and Scots - dismounted men-at-arms in a strong defensive position flanked by English longbowmen.  King Joao commanded the reserve.  Castile's King Juan attempted to outflank the position from the south, but the Portuguese adjusted their deployment to counter this move and battle was joined in the afternoon in uncomfortably hot weather.  An initial charge by the French cavalry suffered heavily from the English archery and broke to no effect on the Portuguese defences.  The very large main Castilian force then advanced, but were disorganised by the terrain and their own weight of numbers.  Despite very intense fighting, such that prisoners were slaughtered out of hand due to a lack of men to guard them, the Portuguese line held, and the Castilians finally turned and ran, suffering further grievous losses from the pursuit. 

1598: At the Yellow Ford on the Blackwater, the Ulster rebels of Hugh O'Neill achieved their greatest success against the English, defeating Marshal Bagenal as he tried to relieve the besieged Blackwater Fort.  O'Neill had prepared an ambush with very effective concealed defences on boggy ground, and the English column, which had become rather disjointed, suffered very heavy casualties, including Bagenal himself.

1779: A small Royal Navy squadron destroyed a large revolutionary American transport force in the Penobscot River, Maine.

1900: The Peking Legations, besieged by "Boxers", were relieved by British, Japanese, Russian, US, French, German, Austrian and Italian troops under General Sir Alfred Gaselee.  The Legations, under the leadership of Sir Claude Macdonald, and with their defences planned by the engineer, later US President, Herbert Hoover, had been besieged since 20 June.  British personnel in the relief force included Indian troops, Royal Marines, and Royal Navy sailors.

1940: Heavy Luftwaffe attacks continued along the south coast.  The air defences claimed some 30 victories; 11 RAF fighters were destroyed.  The day's events are recorded on the RAF's Battle of Britain website.

1944: During a daylight attack by 805 Bomber Command aircraft on German troop positions in Normandy, intended to open the way for an attack by Canadian troops, tragic confusion led to some of the bombers hitting the 12th Canadian Field Artillery Regiment.  The Canadians set off yellow flares to try to warn off the aircraft, but this compounded the problem - whilst yellow was the colour normally used by friendly Allied ground forces to signal their presence to fighter-bombers (a fact unknown to the Bomber Command crews), it was also the colour of the target markers being used that day.  Thirteen Canadians were killed, and 53 injured.  To make matters worse, the same regiment was mistakenly strafed by USAAF and RAF fighters the following day.