The Battle of Verdun was fought from 21 February to 18 December 1916 on the Western Front in France. The battle was the longest of the First World War and took place on the hills north of Verdun-sur-Meuse. The German 5th Army attacked the defences of the Fortified Region of Verdun and those of the French Second Army on the right (east) bank of the Meuse. Using the experience of the Second Battle of Champagne in 1915, the Germans planned to capture the Meuse Heights, an excellent defensive position, with good observation for artillery-fire on Verdun. The Germans hoped that the French would commit their strategic reserve to recapture the position and suffer catastrophic losses at little cost to the German infantry.

Fort Vaux, in Vaux-Devant-Damloup, Meuse, France, was a polygonal fort forming part of the ring of 19 large defensive works intended to protect the city of Verdun. Built from 1881 to 1884 for 1,500,000 francs, it housed a garrison of 150 men. Vaux was the second fort to fall in the Battle of Verdun after Fort Douaumont, which was captured by a small German raiding party in February 1916 in the confusion of the French retreat from the Woëvre plain. Vaux had been modernised before 1914 with reinforced concrete top protection like Fort Douaumont and was not destroyed by German heavy artillery fire, which had included shelling by 16-inch (410 mm) howitzers. The superstructure of the fort was badly damaged but the garrison, the deep interior corridors and stations were intact when the fort was attacked on 2 June by German Stormtroops.