Blenheim

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For this item Engels made excerpts from the article "Höchstädt" in Brockhaus' Allgemeine Encydopädie der Wissenschaften und Künste edited by I. S. Ersch and I. G. Gruber. These excerpts are extant.

Blenheim, or Blindheim, a village about 23 miles from Augsburg, in Bavaria, the theatre of a great battle, fought Aug. 13., 1704, between the English and Austrians, under Marlborough and

Prince Eugene, and the French and Bavarians, under Marshal Tallard, Marsin, and the elector of Bavaria.

The Austrian states being menaced by a direct invasion on the side of Germany, Marlborough marched from Flanders to their assistance. The allies agreed to act on the defensive in Italy, the Netherlands, and the lower Rhine, and to concentrate all their available forces on the Danube. Marlborough, after storming the Bavarian intrenchments on the Schellenberg, passed the Danube, and effected his junction with Eugene, after which both at once marched to attack the enemy. They found him behind the Nebel brook, with the villages of Blenheim and Kitzingen strongly occupied in front of either flank. The French had the right wing, the Bavarians held the left. Their line was nearly 5 miles in extent, each army having its cavalry on its wings, so that a portion of the centre was held by both French and Bavarian cavalry. The position had not yet been properly occupied according to the then prevailing rules of tactics. The mass of the French infantry, 27 battalions, was crammed together in Blenheim, consequently in a position completely helpless for troops organized as they were then, and adapted for line fighting in an open country only. The attack of the Anglo-Austrians, however, surprised them in this dangerous condition, and Marlborough very soon drew all the advantages from it which the occasion offered. Having in vain attacked Blenheim, he suddenly drew his main strength toward his centre, and with it broke through the centre of his opponents. Eugene made light work of the thus isolated Bavarians, and undertook the general pursuit, while Marlborough, having completely cut off the retreat of the 18,000 Frenchmen blocked up in Blenheim, compelled them to lay down their arms. Among them was Marshal Tallard. The total loss of the Franco-Bavarians was 30,000 killed, wounded, and prisoners; that of the victors, about 11,000 men. The battle decided the campaign, Bavaria fell into the hands of the Austrians, and the prestige of Louis XIV was gone.

This battle is one of the highest tactical interest, showing very conspicuously the immense difference between the tactics of that time and those of our day. The very circumstance which would now be considered one of the greatest advantages of a defensive position, viz., the having [of] 2 villages in front of the flanks, was with troops of the 18th century the cause of defeat. At that time, infantry was totally unfit for that skirmishing and apparently irregular fighting which now makes a village of masonry houses, occupied by good troops, almost impregnable. This battle is called in France, and on the continent generally, the battle of Höchstädt, from a little town of this name in the vicinity, which was already known to fame by a battle fought there on Sept. 20 of the preceding year.