Blenheim Blitz Order of Battle

Blenheim Blitz will be a 6mm recreation of the Battle of Blenheim taking place on a 4' x 3.5' table and played out in an hour (or less). The inspiration comes from Baccus' previous presentations of Gettysburg, Leipzig and the retreat from Moscow. I have already planned out much of how I intend to do this, which I will cover in forthcoming posts here.

First up is my intended order of battle for my Blenheim Blitz game. Now clearly some liberties have to be taken to cram the battle onto a small table and to allow the game to be played out in the specified time. Whilst accepting this, I still want a fairly accurate representation of the troops that fought on the day. The Allied army in particular is a real hodgepodge of nationalities that will at least keep the painter happy with a huge variety of uniforms.

The Allied army will look something like:

Foot

4 British
2 Hesse
1 Dutch
3 Hanoverian
1 Wurtemburg

4 Prussian
2 Danish

Horse

3 Danish
1 Hanoverian
1 Hesse
2 Prussian
2 British
1 Dutch

Dragoons

1 Danish
1 British
1 Hanover
1 Prussian

Cuirassier

2 Austrian

These are as close to the correct ratio of regiments present, scaled down to be manageable in the game. This gives a total of 17 Foot bases and 16 Horse/Dragoon bases.

Opposing them will be the French and Bavarian army made up thus:

Foot

16 French
4 Bavarian
1 Walloon
1 Irish

Horse

7 French
1 Spanish

Dragoons

2 French

Cuirassier

2 Bavarian

Which amounts to 22 Foot and 12 Horse/Dragoons. I have taken some liberties with the French. I really want to paint an Irish unit and the Walloons just lept off the page to say 'Don't leave us out!".

I am struggling to find information around what nations used Grenadiers in their foot units and what sort of headwear they used. All of the figures for this project will come from the excellent Baccus Miniatures who list 4 types of Grenadier, one of which is Austrian but the others are listed as tall mitre, short mitre and fur cap. I may be digging too deep here but i would like each base of foot troops to have the correct head dress. I must invesatigate further.

This is my plan for the battlefield. The grey squares are built up areas. Ignore the green yellow and brown shapes. This was me trying to be 'arty' as there is nothing I dislike more than plain green battlefields. Anyone who has ever flown will know that countryside is far from the billiard like tables that we see in most wargames. The odd shapes are meant to represent the patch work quilt look of fields in various stages of use. I realise the continent may have had a different look than in the UK at the time, in particular I am unsure if any sort of enclosure system was in use at the time.

So things are in motion once more for a project I doubted I'd ever complete. Hopefully up next will be some more details on how this thing will get done as well as some photos of finished troops.

More soon...