The recent fall of the French occupied fortress city of Badajoz, on 6 April 1812, allowed the Anglo-Portuguese forces under Wellington to take the strategic offensive. Prior to moving the bulk of his forces north where he would launch his Salamanca campaign Wellington entrusted a considerable proportion of his available cavalry to a force under General Sir Rowland Hill who was ordered to drive the retreating French army of Marshal Soult, who had failed in his attempt to relieve Badajoz, back into Andalusia to the south. The French rearguard under General D'Erlon were under orders to fall back towards Seville if pressed hard. Hill's cavalry, under Sir Stapleton Cotton, were indeed pressing those French forces still remaining in the province of Extremadura hard.