The Battle of Stekene took place on 27 June 1703, during the War of the Spanish Succession, when a Dutch force of 7,000 men, under Karel Willem Sparre, attacked the Franco-Spanish defensive that ran from Ostend to Antwerp.

The War of the Spanish Succession had commenced in the Netherlands in 1702 with the siege and capture of Kaiserswerth, and with the unsuccessful assault of the French army on Nijmegen.

They had no other intention than to protect the regions of Brabant by means of an extensive entrenched line, which, passed over to the right bank of the Scheldt at Antwerp, and extended over Herentals, Aarschot, Diest and the Mehaigne near Huy to the Meuse.

The greater part of May and June continued with inconclusive movements on both side, after which Marlborough decided to attack and break through the entrenched lines behind which the French army had withdrawn.

[4] Marlborough proposed sieges of Ostend and Huy to draw French forces away from the vital centre of Antwerp, but his plan was vetoed by the Dutch.

Another division under general Count Wassenaer Obdam, had to enclose Antwerp via the other side of the Scheldt, and to that end advance to the village of Ekeren.

Coehoorn directed an assault near Kallo, and his forces, without much difficulty or the loss of many troops, managed to secure a redoubt and break through the lines.

Obdam's army, positioned on the other side of Antwerp near Ekeren, only nearly escaped desctruction after being attacked by a French detachment under Louis-François de Boufflers.

[13] Although Huy, Limbourg and Geldern fell into Allied hands in the months following Stekene and Ekeren, Marlborough failed to bring Villeroy's main army to battle.

[14] He feared that the lack of decisive success in the Low Countries would deter the Dutch from sending troops to Germany, where the Holy Roman Emperor was in an increasingly dire military situation.