The events took place about 20 miles north of Zhovti Vody, today on the border of Kirovohrad Oblast and Dnipropetrovsk Oblast in south-central Ukraine when advance forces of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth army led by Stefan Potocki met a numerically superior force of Ukrainian Cossacks and Crimean Tatars under the command of Bohdan Khmelnytsky and Tuhaj Bej. After the Registered Cossacks who were originally allied with the Commonwealth arrived and unexpectedly sided with Khmelnytsky, the Commonwealth forces were annihilated while attempting to retreat following an 18-day battle, only days before reinforcements were to arrive.