army, led by Marshal Dietrich von Altenburg, was to pull back from Poland. Władysław I the Elbow-high, who by this time was suffering from poor health, led the Polish forces. Though his troops outnumbered the Teutons, they were not equipped as well as their enemy. The Polish king followed the Teutonic army and found an opportunity when Marshal Dietrich von Altenburg split his forces into three sections. Władysław decided to attack the weakest of these three sections, which had descended upon the small village of Płowce. A heavy fog had descended over the area when Altenburg gathered his forces and divided them into five divisions. They Polish were also grouped into five divisions. A lengthy, hard-fought battle ensued that lasted from sunrise until 3:00 p.m. the same day. The armies were fairly evenly matched, and the deadlock was only broken when a horse carrying the marshal's banner was pierced by a spear and the Teutonic army saw the banner fall, assuming that their leader had fallen, and began to flee the battle. The Polish forces took advantage of the fleeing Teutons and struck hard, turning the tide of the battle in their favor. By the end of the battle, Władysław and his son Casimir III of Poland had 56 Teutonic knights in their custody, along with Altenburg however Teutons managed to take back most of the captives. An army of Teutonic knights was dispatched from Prussia to relieve the forces at Płowce and were fast approaching the battle. The exhausted Polish troops engaged in another hard-fought battle, continuing until nightfall, when King Łokietek ordered the withdraw from the battlefield. Altenburg was released after he was found chained to a wagon. After the battle, the Teutonic Knights kept 56 of the most valuable Polish prisoners alive, murdering the rest. According to the chronicler Wigand from Marburg, Bishop Maciej from Gołańcza ordered to count the dead before the burial after the battle, and it was found that 4,187 fighters on both sides were killed, most of whom were Teutonic Knights. Aftermath The Chełmno Commander Otto von Lutterberg, despite repelling the attack of the Polish army, decided to stop the march to Brześć Kujawski and, under the cover of darkness, to immediately retreat to Toruń without burying his own fallen. The decision to withdraw the Teutonic forces also meant that the entire campaign in Poland was interrupted, and therefore this battle can be