Battle of Grandson The Battle of Grandson , took place on 2 March 1476 , was part of the Burgundian Wars , and resulted in a major defeat for Charles the Bold , Duke of Burgundy . Siege of Grandson , February 1476 . In late February 1476 , Charles the Bold , also called Charles the Rash , besieged the castle of Grandson , located on the lake of Neuchâtel . Grandson belonged to Charles ' ally Jacques de Savoie , and the place had been brutally taken by the Swiss the previous year . Charles brought a large mercenary army with him together with many heavy cannon , and the Swiss garrison soon feared , after the effectiveness of the bombardment was demonstrated , that they would be killed when their fortress was stormed . The Swiss , under heavy pressure from the canton of Bern , organized an army to come to the garrison ' s relief . A boat approached the garrison with the news that an army was coming to its relief , but the vessel was unable to approach the fortress closely for fear that it would be hit by Burgundian cannons . The men in the boat gestured to the defenders in the fortress to inform them that help was on the way , but their gestures were misunderstood , and the garrison decided to surrender . Execution of the garrison of Grandson . Swiss sources are unanimous in stating that the men only gave up when Charles assured them they would be spared . The historian Panigarola , who was with Charles , claimed that the garrison had thrown themselves on the mercy of the duke , and it was up to his discretion of what to do with them . He ordered all 412 men of the garrison to be executed . In a scene Panigarola described as " shocking and horrible " and sure to fill the Swiss with dread , all the victims were led past the tent of Charles on 28 February 1476 and hanged from trees , or drowned in the lake , in an execution that lasted four hours . The Swiss had no news of the fate of the garrison and assembled their forces in the hope of lifting the siege . This army numbered a little over 20 , 000 men without artillery and probably slightly outnumbered the Burgundians . On 2 March 1476 the Swiss army approached the forces of Charles near the town of Concise . The Swiss , eager to avenge their slaughtered countrymen , advanced in three heavy columns , echeloned to the left rear , moving directly into combat without deploying , in typical Swiss fashion . Poor reconnaissance left Charles uninformed as to the size and deployment of the Swiss , and he believed that the Swiss vanguard was the entire force sent against him . The vanguard , consisting mainly of men from Schwyz , Bern , and Solothurn , realized they would soon be in battle and knelt to pray . When they said three Our Fathers and three Hail Marys , some of the Burgundian army reportedly mistook their actions as a sign of submission . In their zeal , they rode forward shouting , " You will get no mercy ; you must all die . " The Burgundian knights soon surrounded the Swiss vanguard , but then Charles made a serious mistake . After brief skirmishing , Charles ordered his cavalry to pull back so the artillery could reduce the Swiss forces before the attacks were renewed . At this time , the main body of the Swiss emerged from a forest which had hitherto obscured their approach . The Burgundian army , already pulling back , soon became confused when the second , and larger , body of Swiss troops appeared . The speed of the Swiss advance did not give the Burgundians time to make much use of their artillery and missile units . Charles attempted a double envelopment of the leading Swiss column before the other two arrived , but as his troops were caught shifting to make this attack , they caught sight of the other Swiss columns and retreated in panic . The withdrawal soon turned into a rout when the Burgundian army broke ranks and ran . For a time , Charles rode among them shouting orders for them to stop and hitting fleeing soldiers with the flat of his sword . But once started the rout was unstoppable , and Charles was forced to flee as well . Few casualties were suffered on either side : the Swiss did not have the cavalry necessary to chase the Burgundians far . At insignificant cost to themselves , the Swiss had humiliated the greatest duke in Europe , defeated one of the most feared armies , and taken a most impressive amount of treasure . The booty Charles carried with him was most impressive , and included jewellery , silver and gold plate , tapestries and much of Charles ' artillery . The Swiss initially had little idea of its value . What is probably a small surviving part of this fantastic booty is on display in various Swiss museums today , while a few remaining artillery pieces can be seen in the museum of La Neuveville , near Neuchâtel , Switzerland . Aftermath . After the battle , the Swiss troops came upon the bodies of their countrymen still hanging from trees . An eyewitness , Peterman Etterlin , described the scene : " There were found sadly the honorable men still freshly hanging on the trees in front of the castle whom the tyrant had hanged . It was a wretched , pitiable sight . There were hung ten or twenty men on one bough . The trees were bent down and were completely full . There hanged a father and a son next to each other , there two brothers or other friends . And there came the honorable men who knew them ; who were their friends , cousins and brothers , who found them miserably hanging . There was first anger and distress in crying and bewailing . . . . " Charles had attempted to break the will of the Swiss by killing anyone of their countrymen he could apprehend . Instead he united them as never before in an attempt to destroy him . When the Burgundians met the Swiss at the Battle of Murten ( Morat in French ) in June 1476 , the Swiss annihilated his army .