War of the Ring Battles

Here is a list of Battles that happened during the Time of the War of the Ring.

Battle at Weathertop & Nazgul's Chase

 * Skirmish at Weathertop

When Pippin, Merry, Sam, Frodo, and Aragorn were camped at Weathertop, the Nazgul, led by the Witch King attacked them. Aragorn was able to drive several of them away with fire, but the Witch King got past him. At this point Frodo put on the One Ring. The Witch King saw him in the wraith-world, and stabbed his shoulder with a Morgul-blade. Frodo fainted, but took off the Ring before losing consciousness completely. Aragorn was able to drive the rest of the Nazgul off, but Frodo had sustained a wound that would haunt him in the years after.


 * Chase of the Nazgul

Book: The group finds Glorfindel, and together with him they go to Imladris. When they arrive on the borders of the elven territory, the Nazgul that were chasing them are embraced by the waters of Bruinen, and Frodo was safe.

Film: They find Arwen, who offers to bring Frodo to Imladris (Rivendell) herself. Aragorn trusts her, and let her bring Frodo to Rivendell, but she is chased by the Nazgul. She rides faster, and when she gets to the elven territory, the Nazgul are taken by the waters, when they pass the river, and Frodo was saved, and brought to Rivendell.

The Battle of Moria

 * The Pass of Caradhas

The Fellowship tries to go through the Pass of Caradhas, but Saruman was casting spells, so it was too dangerous to continue their way through the Pass, so they have to choose if to go through the Mines of Moria or continue their way through Caradhas. They let Frodo choose and he chose to go through the Mines of Moria.


 * Battle with the Watcher

Film: The Fellowship arrives at Moria, and Pippin throws some rocks in the water, but Aragorn stops him. Gandalf tries to enter Khazad-um, but there was a gate, with a riddle: "Speak friend, and enter ". Gandalf finds that the password is the elvish word for friend: melon. After saying the password, the gate opens. The Fellowship enter the mines, but finds that Moria was full with dead dwarfs. The Fellowship wants to leave the mines, but a kraken, the "Watcher in the Water" grabs Frodo, and wants to eat him , but the Fellowship rescue Frodo, and go back into the mines , but some rocks fall, blocking them into the mines. The Fellowship have no other choice than to face the dark-long path of Moria. Gandalf advises the Fellowship to be on its guard because there are older and fouler things than orcs there.


 * Fight in Balin's Tomb

The Fellowship enters a chamber, and Gimli finds that it was his cousin, Balin's, son of Fundin, tomb. Pippin touches a skull, and the whole skeleton fall, alerting the goblins about their presence. Boromir closes the door of the tomb, but he gets an arrow in his shoulder, but he sees that the goblins haves a cave troll with them. The Cave troll breaks the door, and the Fellowship fights him. The troll hits Frodo in his stomach, but he is then killed. Everyone thinks that Frodo is dead, but he was protected by his mithril vest. Then, the Fellowship continues their quest.


 * The Battle at the Bridge of Khazad-um

The Fellowship goes out of Balin's tomb, but they are surrounded by thousands of goblins. But the goblins are scared by something. Gandalf says that the thing that scared them was the Balrog of Moria .Then they run, after they realise the Balrog was after them. They go to the Bridge of Khazad-um, and Boromir was nearly to fall in the lava. The Fellowship runs, but some goblins throw arrows in them. Legolas shoots some of them, and then they continue to run. When the Fellowship was ready to leave Moria, the Balrog comes, and Gandalf stays to confront Him. Gandalf defeats him, and pushes him in the abyss, but the Balrog caches him with his whip, causing him to fall. His last words were "Fly, you fools". The Fellowship is ruined and Gandalf Fights for seven days with the Balrog; a fight which he wins but dies because of him Wounds.

Battle of Amon Hen
Book: Frodo goes to scout, and Boromir wants to take the ring from him. Frodo puts the ring on his finger, and becomes invisible. He then takes out the ring, and finds Aragorn, that aids him, but they are attacked by orcs. Aragorn fights with them, so that Frodo may escape. He then sees Merry and Pippin and offers him a chance to hide with them, but he refuses and he was nearly seen by uruks, so Merry and Pippin distract them so that Frodo may run. Then Boromir comes to their defenses but he is killed by arrows leaving the Ugluks to capture Merry and Pippin. Aragorn fights with the orcs and then Boromir tells him that the hobbits were captured. Then Aragorn Legolas and Gimli go to save the hobbits while Sam and Frodo take a boat and go to Mordor themselves.

Battle at the Plains of Fangorn
After Grima banished Eomer and his troops, he continued to fight against Isengard. He and his troops attacked the Orc and Uruk army that Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli were following. His troops vanquished the entire army, allowing Merry and Pippin to escape, but an uruk, named Grishnákh followed them, and was ready to kill Merry , but Treebeard smashed him.

Meanwhile, Eomer's troops met Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli. Aragorn asked Eomer if he had seen any hobbits but Eomer said that they left none alive, and that the hobbits were so small they his troops could trample them. Eomer gave them some horses and then he leaves with the rest of the company. After getting there, Aragorn found that the hobbits were still alive and that they went into Fangorn Forest. The three warriors didn't find the hobbits but they did find Gandalf the White!

Battle of Hornburg
"A new power is rising, its victory is at hand. This night the land will be stained with the blood of Rohan. March to Helm's deep, leave none alive. TO WAR! There will be no Dawn for Men."

- Saruman


 * Book : After being freed by Gandalf from Gríma Wormtongue's influence, Théoden went to the Fords of Isen where Erkenbrand was battling Saruman's Orcs. When Théoden got there, he realized that the army was scattered, so Gandalf told Théoden to help the refugees to Hornburg where many people from Westfold were also taking refuge. Soon Gandalf brought the Rohirrim to defend Helm's Deep from Saruman's attacking forces. The soldiers were led by a local captain called Gamling the Old. Unfortunately, many of the soldiers there were either too young or too old.

The army of Saruman made up of Uruk-hai, common Orcs, Wild Men of Dunland, and half-orcs arrived in the middle of the night. Legolas and Gimli agreed to do a contest to see how many kills they could get.

The Orcs quickly overran the first defence in Helm's Dike, approaching the fortress as the Rohirrim retreated. They shot arrows at the Rohirrm, but there was no response at first. When the Orcs got closer to the fortress, the defenders sent a volley of arrows and stones at them, forcing the Orcs to fall back. The Orcs soon got close enough to Hornburg and attempted to break the gate down with a battering ram, but were scattered by a small attack team led by Aragorn and Gimli.

The attackers then raised hundreds of ladders to scale the Deeping Wall; the worn-out defenders threw down the ladder attacks, but were attacked from behind by Orcs who had crawled through the culvert at the base of the wall. Legolas and Gimli attacked the Orcs who got through the hole and Gimli helped block the culvert. Unfortunately, the Deeping Wall was breached by Saruman's explosive blasting-fire.

The defenders led by Éomer and Gimli retreated into the Glittering Caves while Aragorn and Legolas led a retreat into the keep. Aragorn called for a parley and told the Orcs that they would die if they didn't surrender, but the Uruk-hai laughed at his threat and attempted to shoot him down, almost killing Aragorn. The Orcs then made it to the gate and destroyed the arch with Saruman's 'blasting-fire'. Suddenly, Théoden and Aragorn led a vicious cavalry charge out of the keep, driving the Uruks away from the remains of the gate.

Just then, Gandalf on his horse Shadowfax arrived with Erkenbrand and a thousand swordsmen on foot, and they charged the Orcs. As the Uruks were driven out of the valley, they realized that the entrance to the valley was blocked by an army of Huorns. After the Orcs and Uruks were driven into the Huorns, the Dunlendings surrendered and were spared, but were forced to take an oath never to attack Rohan again.

The surviving Dunlendings were sent home and their slain were buried in a communal mound. The Orc carcasses were simply piled off to the side of the battle field and left to rot. One of the Rohirrim dead was Háma, a captain of Théoden's personal guard and doorguard of Meduseld. Gimli had lost his helmet in the battle and was wounded badly on the head, but he had killed forty-two orcs to Legolas' forty-one.


 * Film : In The Two Towers (film), the city of Edoras was evacuated to Helm's Deep. Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli accompanied King Théoden and his people there.  Along the way they were attacked by Saruman's Warg-Riders.  During this fight, Éowyn led the evacuees on to Helm's Deep while the Riders of Rohan fought off the attack.  Aragorn became entangled with the harness of a Warg and was dragged off the side of a cliff.

After reaching Helm's Deep, the Rohirrim began to prepare for a siege. During these preparations, Aragorn, who had been found by the horse Brego, arrived with news of 10,000 Uruk-hais coming from Isengard. In response to this, Théoden orders every male able to bear arms, including some of the older children, to be armed and ready to fight. Aragorn suggested calling for aid but Théoden didn't believe anyone would come.

The Rohirrim were surprised by the arrival of Haldir from Lórien and his archers. They were sent by Elrond to support the Rohirrim, in honor of the ancient treaty with the king of Gondor, represented by Aragorn. "An alliance once existed between Elves and Men. Long ago we fought and died together. We come to honor that allegiance."

- Haldir speaking to Théoden and Aragorn

The battle began when an older man fired an arrow at the Uruk-hai, killing one. At first it consisted primarily of volleys of arrows. Then the Uruk-hai began raising ladders, each with a berserker on top. Many Elves were killed during this stage of the battle but they and the Rohirrim were managing to keep the Uruk-hai from getting a good foothold on the wall. While the Elves were sword-fighting with the Uruk-hai on the wall, the sappers, a group of four Uruk-hai, laid the charges that were prepared by Saruman in the culvert under the wall. A berserker lit the blasting powder despite Legolas shooting him.

Once the wall was blown, the Uruk-hai poured into Helm's Deep. The Elves, led by Aragorn, were the first defense against them. While they fought, more Uruk-hai brought a battering ram up to the door. Théoden led his men to brace the door, which eventually broke under the assault. Aragorn and Gimli worked together to give the Rohirrim enough time to mend the door and then escaped via a rope lowered by Legolas.

The Uruk-hai then raised massive ladders that carried dozens of Uruk-hai up to the fortress wall. Although one was shot down by Legolas, Théoden decided to pull his men back to the keep itself. During the retreat, Haldir was killed.

Once inside the keep, Théoden fell into despair while his men tried to brace the door. Aragorn sent word to evacuate the caves. He remembered Gandalf telling him that he would arrive at dawn and convinced Théoden to ride out. The Rohirrim, along with Aragorn and Legolas, charged out while Gimli sounded the horn of Helm Hammerhand. Outside the keep, Théoden and Aragorn saw Gandalf arrive on Shadowfax. Behind him were Éomer and his men, who charged down the hill to attack. Between the combined forces, the Uruk-hai were driven into retreating into a Huorn forest. The Huorns eliminated the remaining Uruk-hai.

Destruction of Isengard
After a three day long Entmoot, an army of Ents and Huorns set off for the tower-fortress of Isengard, making terrifying music. They arrived and began their attack on March 2nd, the time of their attack was fortunate because they arrived just when the wizard Saruman was emptying Isengard for a final assault on Rohan. As a result, there were few left to defend Isengard besides Saruman himself.

Once the army of Isengard had left for Rohan, the Ents launched their attack on the walls. Attempts were made to hinder them with arrows, but these only served to irritate the attackers further, and, in a matter of minutes the gate and much of the southern wall was reduced to ruin. As Merry and Pippin later recounted to their friends, Ents are so strong that their punches can crumple iron like tinfoil, and they can tear apart solid rock like breadcrusts. A ring of Huorns surrounded Isengard and killed all escaping Orcs.

Once the gate and walls had been reduced to rubble, a young Ent named Bregalad or ‘Quickbeam’ in the Westron tongue, spotted Saruman, and made for him, shouting ‘The Tree Killer!’, for his people and all Fangorn forest in general had suffered from heavy deforestation to fuel the furnaces of Saruman. He was followed by other Ents, but Saruman narrowly succeeded in escaping into the tower of Orthanc. Once in the tower, he activated spouts and vents all over the plain, scorching many Ents who had entered the fortress. One ent, Beechbone, was unlucky enough to be caught fully in one of the fiery blasts, and the death of this ent by Saruman's fire caused the Ent host to go berserk. The hobbits Meriadoc Brandybuck and Peregrin Took, who were present there and later narrated the battle to the Three Hunters, recounted the fury of the Ents, saying that their enraged roars were enough to crack the stones. They destroyed the buildings and machinery on the plain, but could do nothing to hurt the tower itself.

At this point the Ents took counsel, and came up with a new plan of attack. By digging trenches and destroying Saruman's dam, the Ents and Huorns diverted the course of the river Isen itself, causing it to flood the ‘bowl’ of Isengard, submerging everything but the tower and filling in all the tunnels and holes where the machinery of war had been. The destruction of Isengard was complete, although Saruman was still untouched in the tower.

Saruman’s sound defeat at the Battle of the Hornburg and the destruction of his fortress rendered him incapable of causing the West any military harm, although he still had the power of his persuasive and commanding voice, with which he could still do (and did do) further harm. Had the Ents not destroyed Isengard, although Saruman's main army had been destroyed he could still have withstood a siege with his few remaining forces behind Isengard's normally impregnable walls, and bided his time until he could renew his strength.