The speaker hopes to commemorate the actions of the Light Brigade at the Battle of Balaclava. Immense sympathy is given to the “noble six hundred” (Line 55) who fought. Yet, the speaker also questions the tactical error made and explains how a series of devastating factors cost so many lives. Of the 670 men who served in the Charge of the Light Brigade, 271 were killed, wounded, or taken prisoner.

The first stanza begins with the brigade starting for battle, galloping at one and a half mile lengths—“[h]alf a league, half a league, / [h]alf a league onward” (Lines 1-2). With this repetition, the speaker shows how the men make pace with surety and speed. It also places us in medias res, or in the middle of the ensuing action, suggesting that forces are already in motion and cannot be stopped. This aligns the reader with the soldiers as the action unfolds. The speaker and the reader both know the outcome of the failed mission, however, and are aware that the brigade is plunging into “the valley of Death” (Line 3)—the literal valley in the Ukrainian peninsula between the Causeway and Fedyukhin Heights.