The third phase in the operations which led up to the battle of Blenheim is one of no more than nine days.
It stands distinct from all that went before, and must be regarded in history as a sort of little definite and enclosed preface to the great action. The distinctive character of this, the third phase, resides in the completion of the Franco-Bavarian force, its manœuvring in the presence of the enemy, and its finding itself unexpectedly confronted with the reinforcements of Eugene.
To seize the character of this third phase, the sketch map opposite must be referred to.
It is the 5th of August. Tallard has fully effected his junction with Marcin and the Elector of Bavaria, and the united Franco-Bavarian force lies in and to the east of Augsburg. On the opposite bank of the river Lech this force is watched by the army of Marlborough and Baden, which has been ravaging Bavaria. But Marlborough and Baden, though they have an advanced depot at Donauwörth, have their forward munitions and supplies far up northwards. Nördlingen is their advanced base, two days’ marching beyond the Danube. A week away to the north Nuremberg contains their only large and permanent collection of stores. Marlborough and Baden are in perpetual difficulty for food, for ammunition, and for forage—especially for ammunition.
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Map showing the situation when Eugene suddenly appeared at Hochstadt, August 5-7, 1704.
Since the whole object of Marlborough in marching to the Upper Danube was to embarrass in this new seat of war the alliance of the French and Bavarian forces, it is, conversely, the business of the French commander to get him out of the valley of the Upper Danube and restore the liberty of action of the French monarch and of his ally the Elector of Bavaria.
The surest way of getting Marlborough out of the Upper Danube is to threaten his line of supply. He will then be compelled to fall back northward upon his base. Further (though Tallard did not know it at the moment), there is present the very real difficulty of friction between the two commanders of the army opposing him. Marlborough and Baden are not getting on well together. If it were possible for Marlborough to persuade Baden to go off on some little expedition of his own, withdrawing but a few soldiers, Marlborough would be well content, and Marlborough is by far the more formidable of the two men. But though the opportunity for such a riddance of divided command is open, for Prince Louis of Baden is anxious to besiege Ingolstadt, Marlborough dares not weaken the combined forces, even by a few battalions, now that Tallard has effected his junction with the Elector and with Marcin, and that a formidable force is opposed to him.