The Night's Watch garrison against Mance Rayder's wildling army
Outcome
The wildling assault on Castle Black was broken when Stannis Baratheon's army arrived and attacked the besiegers from the rear; Mance Rayder was captured and his army scattered.
A castle held by a garrison a hundredth the size of the army outside it did not fall, and the reasons why arrived, quite literally, by sea.
Commanders
Donal Noye (garrison commander)
Jon Snow
Mance Rayder, King-Beyond-the-Wall
Stannis Baratheon (relief)
What happened
Beyond the Wall, the Night's Watch faced the largest hostile force in its long history: a wildling army under Mance Rayder, come south in numbers no thinly-garrisoned castle should have been able to withstand. The defense of Castle Black that followed cost the Watch dearly, including the officer who had taken command in an emergency, but the castle held through the worst of the night.
How it held, and who arrived to turn a losing fight around, touches on movements the chronicle leaves undescribed here — matters still unfolding for readers who have not yet caught up with events at the Wall.
The Battle of Castle Black in the novels
This carries how the battle plays out in the published novels. Read on only if you do not fear to know.
Mance Rayder brought the largest wildling host in living memory south against a Wall garrisoned by a fraction of its old strength — most of the Night's Watch's fighting men were away on other business, and Castle Black itself was left in the hands of an armorer, Donal Noye, who had never expected to command a battle in his life. Mance planned a pincer: Tormund Giantsbane's force, including giants mounted on mammoths, to strike the Wall itself, while a smaller party led by Styr, Magnar of Thenn, slipped through an old tunnel to take the castle from behind.
The defense held by the thinnest of margins. Donal Noye died holding the gate against Mag the Mighty, a giant twice the height of any man on the wall. Jon Snow, back from his time among the wildlings under circumstances the Watch had not entirely forgiven him for, killed Styr in the tunnel fighting and helped hold the castle's rear. Every account of that night agrees the garrison could not have lasted much past dawn on its own strength.
It did not have to. Stannis Baratheon's army, landed by sea and marching up in secret, fell on the wildling host from behind at first light and broke it utterly. Mance Rayder was taken alive; the wildling army that had seemed unstoppable scattered into the forest it had come from. The victory cost the Watch its acting commander and no small number of brothers, but it held the Wall — and set in motion the choice of a new Lord Commander not long after.
These partings name deaths, endings, and roads not yet ridden in the books. Unveil them only if both roads are known to you — or if you do not fear to know.
In the timeline
SourcesASOS · JonASOS · Samwell
Explore further
Commanders
Houses in the field
Elsewhere in this war
What was The Battle of Castle Black?
A castle held by a garrison a hundredth the size of the army outside it did not fall, and the reasons why arrived, quite literally, by sea.
Is The Battle of Castle Black from the books or the show?
Book canon. This entry follows George R. R. Martin's novels and histories, and notes where the television series diverges rather than following it.