Northern War

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Great Northern war (1700-20). This was the second Northern war, engulfing the Baltic and much of eastern Europe, including parts of the Ottoman empire, which provided Peter ‘the Great’ of Russia with his entrance to European power-politics and an opportunity to deploy his new, western-style army and navy. Begun as a reaction against earlier Swedish expansion and the arrogant and aggressive Charles XII, the war was fought on an astonishingly wide stage, with Russian naval expeditions to Denmark, advances into what are now Poland and Ukraine, and against the Turks as far south as Brailov on the Danube.

The Swedish involvement in the Thirty Years War and the first Northern war of 1655-60 between Sweden and Poland had made the Baltic a ‘Swedish lake’ which antagonized neighbouring states and blocked Russia's access to the sea. In 1697 Charles XI died and was succeeded by his son Charles XII, aged 14. Perceiving weakness, the then united realm of Denmark-Norway initiated an anti-Swedish coalition with Poland-Saxony and Russia.

The war fell into four main periods. In the first (1700-6), Frederick IV of Denmark-Norway moved into Schleswig-Holstein in March 1700, after Augustus II ‘the Strong’, king of Poland and elector of Saxony, attacked Livonia. In October Peter ‘the Great’ laid siege to Narva. Charles XII, now approaching adulthood, attacked Denmark first, forcing Frederick to withdraw from the coalition in the Treaty of Trubenthal in August 1700. He then switched to attack the Russians besieging Narva, and destroyed Peter's army on 30 November 1700. During the next six years he concentrated on knocking Poland-Saxony out of the war.

The second period began in 1707 when the Swedes renewed their attack on Russia, working their way south-east deep into what is now Ukraine. Severely depleted by a savage winter they were comprehensively defeated at Poltava. Charles fled to the Turkish dominions, first to Ochakov on the Black Sea and then to Bendery on the Dniestr.

Thus the third period began in 1710. The Russians and their allies had seized Vyborg, Riga, Revel', and other Baltic strongholds and Charles persuaded the Turks that this was the time to declare war on Russia. The Russians launched the Pruth expedition in 1711, pushing south to Yassy and Brailov, on the Danube. The Mongols of the Crimean khanate, who were still independent, launched raids northwards as far as Kharkov and Belaya Tserkov, but the Russians managed to make peace at the price of ceding Azov to the Turks.

In 1713 Gen Menshikov took Stettin (Szczecin) and the Russians pushed far enough west to meet the Danes in Schleswig-Holstein. The Russians also defeated the Swedes in the naval battle at Hango (Gangut) in 1714, cutting them off from Finland, captured the Aland islands, and threatened Stockholm. At this point George I of Britain, who was also the elector of Hanover, and Frederick William I of Prussia joined the anti-Swedish coalition after the Swedes had rejected their promise of neutrality in exchange for territory.

In December 1715 Charles XII returned to Sweden and began negotiating for peace while surreptitiously expanding his armed forces. Russia, meanwhile, exploited its military success. Russian naval patrols reached Gotland in 1715 and Copenhagen and Stralsund in 1716, and ranged north to Stockholm and beyond from 1719-21. Russia also negotiated trade deals with the former Hanseatic cities of Hamburg, Lubeck, and Danzig (Gdansk) and concluded the Amsterdam agreement of 1717 with France and Prussia. Charles XII invaded south-east Norway in 1718 and was killed at the siege of Frederikshald in November 1718.

The final phase lasted from 1719-21. Russia and Sweden concluded peace at the Aland conference of 1718-19 but after Charles's sister Ulrika-Eleanora succeeded to the Swedish throne, hostilities were resumed. The British were on the verge of war with Russia, and sent a squadron into the Baltic under Adm Norris to destroy the Russian fleet, but Russian diplomacy headed off the conflict. The Russians again beat the Swedes in sea battles at Ezel' in 1719 and at Grengam, in the southern Aland islands, on 7 August 1720. The Russians were able to occupy the islands, securing St Petersburg against any further Swedish attacks. Sweden ceded Bremen to Hanover and Szczecin and part of Pomerania to Prussia. At the Treaty of Nystadt on 10 September 1721, Sweden ceded Estonia, Livonia, and a strip of Finnish Karelia to Russia, giving her the secure egress to the Baltic and the wider world she so coveted. As a result of the conflict, Sweden was destroyed as a major power and Russia emerged as a major player in European war and politics.

The Great Northern war, 1700-21.
(Click to enlarge)

— Christopher Bellamy

The Great Northern War (1700 - 1721) was the main military conflict of Peter the Great's reign, ending in a Russian victory over Sweden that made Russia an important European power and expanded Russia's borders to the Baltic Sea, including the site of St. Petersburg. The war began in the effort of Denmark and Poland-Saxony to wrest control of territories lost to Sweden during the seventeenth century, the period of Swedish military hegemony in northern Europe. When the rulers of those countries offered alliances to Peter in 1698 and 1699, he saw an opportunity to recover Ingria, the small territory at the eastern end of the Gulf of Finland that Russia had lost to Sweden in 1618. Possession of Ingria would once again give Russia access to the Baltic Sea, which seems to have been Peter's principal aim. To achieve this aim Peter built a European-style army and a navy based in the Baltic. The war also served as a major stimulus to Peter's reforms.

The initial phase of the war (1700 - 1709) was marked by Swedish successes. Peter's attempt to capture the port of Narva in Swedish-held Estonia ended in catastrophic defeat on November 30, 1700, at the hands of Charles XII, king of Sweden. The defeat meant the destruction of most of Peter's new army, which he then had to rebuild. Fortunately, Charles chose to move south into Poland, hoping to unseat August II from the throne of Poland and expand Swedish influence. In 1706 Charles succeeded in forcing August II to surrender and leave the war and to recognize Stanislaw Leszczynski, a Swedish puppet, as king of Poland. In 1707 Charles moved east through Poland toward Russia, apparently hoping to both defeat and over-throw Peter and replace him with a more compliant tsar from among the Russian boyars. Charles also managed to convince Ivan Mazepa, the Hetman of the Ukrainian Cossacks, to join him against Peter, but in Russia itself there was no move in favor of Charles. Instead, the Russian army retreated before the Swedes, acquiring experience and mounting ever more effective resistance. Charles was forced south into Ukraine during the fall of 1708, and Peter's defeat of the Swedish relief column at Lesnaya (October 9, 1708) left him without additional food and equipment.

The battle of Poltava (July 8, 1709) proved the turning point of the war. The Swedish army suffered heavy casualties and fled the field southwest toward the Dnieper River. When they reached the banks with the Russians in hot pursuit, they found too few boats to carry them across and had to surrender. Only Charles, his staff, and some of his personal guard escaped into Ottoman territory. Thus the way was clear for Peter to occupy the Baltic provinces and southeast Finland, then a Swedish possession, in 1710.

By the end of 1710 Peter had achieved his principal war aims, for these conquests secured the approaches to St. Petersburg. In 1711 the outbreak of war with the Turks provided an unwelcome distraction, and he was able to turn his attention to the Northern War only in 1712. His allies now included the restored August II of Poland-Saxony, as well as Denmark and Prussia. Russian troops moved into northern Germany to support these allies, and Sweden's German possessions, Bremen, Stralsund, and Stettin, fell by 1714. In 1713 Peter managed to occupy all of Finland, which he hoped to use as a bargaining chip in the inevitable peace negotiations. Charles XII, who returned to Sweden from Turkey in 1714, would not give up. Ignoring Sweden's rapidly deteriorating economic situation, he refused to acknowledge defeat. Peter's small but decisive naval victory over the Swedish fleet at Hangö peninsula on the Finnish coast in 1714 preserved Russian control over Finland and allowed Peter to harass the Swedish coast. A joint Russo-Danish project to invade Sweden in 1716 came to nothing, and the war continued until 1721 with a series of Russian raids along the Swedish coast. The death of Charles XII in 1718 even prolonged the war, for Great Britain, worried over Russian influence in the Baltic region and northern Germany, began to support Sweden, but it was too late. In 1721 the treaty of Nystad put an end to the war, allowing Russia to keep southeast Finland (the town of Viborg), Ingria, Estonia, and the province of Livonia (today southern Estonia and Latvia north of the Dvina river).

Peter's victory in the Great Northern War radically altered the balance of power in northern and eastern Europe. The defeat of Sweden and the loss of most of its overseas territories other than Finland and Stralsund, as well as the collapse of Swedish absolutism after 1718, rendered Sweden a minor power once again. The events of the war revealed for the first time decisively the political and military weakness of Poland. Russia, by contrast, had defeated the formerly hegemonic power of the region, recovered Ingria, acquired the Baltic provinces and part of Finland, and founded St. Petersburg as a new city and new capital. These acquisitions gave Russia a series of seaports to support both trade and a naval presence in the Baltic Sea, as well as a shorter route to Western Europe. Victory in the war justified Peter's military, administrative, and economic reforms and the Westernization of Russian culture. It also enormously reinforced his personal prestige and power.

Bibliography

Bushkovitch, Paul. (2001). Peter the Great. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield.

Hatton, Ragnhild. (1968). Charles the Twelfth. London: Weidenfeld and Nicholson.

Frost, Robert I. (2000). The Northern Wars: War, State, and Society in Northeastern Europe. Harlow, UK: Longman.

—PAUL A. BUSHKOVITCH

The Northern Wars (1558–1721) were a cycle of general conflicts between the major powers of northern and eastern Europe surrounding the Baltic—principally Denmark-Norway, Sweden, Poland-Lithuania, and Muscovy (Russia)—of fundamental importance for modern European history. The wars began following the breakdown of the Hanseatic League (or Hansa), the medieval political and economic system in the Baltic region. The breaking of the economic grip of the Hanseatic League just as western European demand grew for the increasingly lucrative commodities of Baltic grain, timber, pitch, hemp, and flax, stimulated the interest of these major states in controlling the principal ports such as Riga, Danzig, Elbing and Stettin, through which Baltic trade flowed. The southern and eastern Baltic had been controlled by the crusading order of the Teutonic Knights, based in Prussia and Livonia, but the Prussian branch had already lost control of western Prussia to Poland in 1466, while eastern Prussia became a Polish fief in 1525 when its Grand Master, Albrecht von Hohenzollern (ruled 1525–1568) secularized the Order, establishing himself as hereditary duke of Prussia. The evident decline of the Livonian branch of the Order had by the mid-sixteenth century attracted the attention of all the four major Baltic powers. After a short frontier war between Muscovy and Sweden (1554–1557), the cycle of general, multilateral conflicts now known as the Northern Wars really began in 1558 when tsar Ivan IV of Muscovy (Ivan the Terrible; 1530–1584; ruled 1533–1584) invaded Livonia, sparking off a series of conflicts now known collectively as the Livonian War or the First Northern War (1558–1583). Over the next century and a half, no single power was able to achieve hegemony in the region and long-term political stability proved elusive. If at first Denmark and Poland-Lithuania seemed to have the upper hand, Sweden emerged powerfully in the seventeenth century to defeat Denmark and Poland-Lithuania, before the Russia of Peter I (Peter the Great, 1672–1725; ruled 1682–1725) emerged to eclipse Poland-Lithuania and defeat Sweden, securing a victory that was of fundamental importance for the future of the European states system.

The First Northern War (1558–1583)

Although access to and control of access to the Baltic Sea figured largely in the Northern Wars, they were more than a struggle for Dominium Maris Baltici ('lordship of the Baltic Sea'). The causes were both economic and political and involved power struggles of long standing, as the war over Livonia and Estonia breathed new life into old conflicts. The Oldenburg monarchy in Denmark controlled the Sound at Helsingör, the outlet from the Baltic to the North Sea, enabling it to levy tolls on all ships sailing into or out of the Baltic. The Oldenburg monarchy was still smarting over the loss of its dominant position in Scandinavia following the collapse in 1523 of the Union of Kalmar with Sweden, established in 1397. Denmark's continued possession of the provinces of Bohuslän, Halland, Scania, and Blekinge left Sweden with only a narrow outlet to the North Sea at Ä lvsborg, which was highly vulnerable to Danish attack. The series of wars between Poland-Lithuania and Muscovy, whose Grand Duke had begun to style himself 'Tsar of all the Russias' over the Ruthenian lands (modern Belarus and Ukraine), most of which were in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, had reached stalemate in the 1530s without providing a satisfactory settlement for either side.

The importance of these ancient rivalries soon became clear. Denmark gave up its historical claim to Estonia to declare war on Sweden, beginning the Nordic Seven Years' War (1563–1570). Denmark captured Ä lvsborg, Sweden's only direct outlet to the North Sea, but was unable to extend its control of southern Scandinavia beyond its provinces of Bohuslän, Halland, Scania, and Blekinge. Denmark was allied with Lübeck and Poland, but Dutch and Russian support enabled Sweden to repel the Danish challenge. Peace was made at Stettin in 1570, but the conflict in the eastern Baltic continued, as Sweden secured control of Reval (Tallinn) and most of Estonia in 1560. The Livonian Order was secularized and the duchy of Courland was created as a Polish fief in 1561, while the rest of Livonia, including Riga, was incorporated into Poland-Lithuania. Poland-Lithuania, however, was more concerned with the threat to Lithuania, where Ivan IV had seized the trading center of Polotsk in 1563. A new Polish-Swedish alliance, initiated by John III of Sweden (ruled 1568–1592; of the House of Vasa), who was married to Catherine, the sister of King Sigismund II Augustus (ruled 1548–1572) of Poland-Lithuania, successfully fought off successive Russian invasions of Livonia. From 1579, Stephen Báthory of Poland-Lithuania (ruled 1576–1586) recaptured Lithuanian territory lost to Russia in the 1560s, before forcing peace at Iam Zapol'skii in 1582. Meanwhile Sweden had seized Narva and Ivangorod, making peace in 1583 to end the First Northern War, although in renewed fighting (1590–1595) Sweden captured Ingria and Kexholm.

A new phase of the wars opened in 1600 with the collapse of the Polish-Swedish alliance after the election of John III's son Sigismund III as king of Poland-Lithuania (ruled 1587–1632). Sigismund then inherited the Swedish throne in 1592 (ruled 1592–1599), but his Catholicism provoked a political crisis in Lutheran Sweden. After a brief civil war (1598) he was deposed at the instigation of his uncle, Duke Charles of Södermanland, who was crowned in 1604 as Charles IX (ruled 1604–1611). In 1600 Charles invaded Livonia, beginning a cycle of wars with Poland-Lithuania that lasted until 1660. Initially Poland-Lithuania did well, crushing Charles at Kircholm (1605). Both sides were then sucked into Russia's Time of Troubles (1605–1613), from which the Poles emerged with important gains. Moscow was occupied by a Polish garrison (1610–1612), Smolensk was captured (1611), and Sigismund's son Wladyslaw (king of Poland-Lithuania 1648–1668) was elected tsar by a leading group of Russian nobles. This provoked a strong reaction, however. Following the election of Michael Romanov as tsar (ruled 1613–1645) and an abortive attempt to capture Moscow (1617–1618), Poland-Lithuania made peace at Deulino (1618). Sweden had settled with Russia at Stolbova in 1617, cutting Russia off from the Baltic.

After the brief but indecisive War of Kalmar (1611–1613) between Sweden and Denmark, political and military reform under Charles IX's son Gustavus II Adolphus (ruled 1611–1632) brought success in renewed war against Poland-Lithuania. Sweden captured Riga (1621) and invaded Polish Prussia (1626), where initial successes failed to prevent ultimate stalemate. International pressure led to the truce of Altmark (1629), which freed Sweden to intervene in the Thirty Years' War (1618–1648) and gave it control of most of Livonia. A Russian attempt to recapture Smolensk in 1633–1634 was beaten off by the Poles, who threatened to invade Livonia. Sweden, then facing problems in Germany, surrendered the right to levy tolls on the Prussian ports, won at Altmark, in the truce of Stuhmsdorf (1635), which provided sufficient concessions to persuade the Polish diet to withdraw its backing for further hostilities. Sweden's subsequent success in Germany was rewarded with the grant of Bremen, Verden, and most of Pomerania, including Stettin, at the Peace of Westphalia (1648), while its crushing defeat of Denmark in "Torstensson's War" (1643–1645) broke Denmark's stranglehold on the Sound, securing Jämtland, Härjedalen, Ö sel, Gotland, and Halland at the Peace of Brömsebro.

The Second Northern Wars (1655–1660)

The next phase of the wars was sparked off by Poland's internal problems. Sigismund's intervention in Russia and the dynastic quarrel with the Swedish Vasas, maintained by his sons Władysław IV (ruled 1632–1648) and John Casimir (ruled 1648–1668), increased the reluctance of the Polish Diet to finance royal foreign policy, while the Commonwealth's inability to defeat Khmelnytsky's Cossack revolt in the Ukraine after 1648 provoked Russian intervention in 1654. Lithuanian defenses crumbled, and Russia seized a series of cities, including the capital, Vilnius. In July 1655, fearing extensive Russian gains, Charles X of Sweden (ruled 1654–1660) overran Poland in a preemptive strike, thereby forcing Frederick William of Brandenburg-Prussia (ruled 1640–1688) into an alliance.

These events opened the indecisive Second Northern War (1655–1660). A Polish military revival in 1656 pushed back the Swedes, despite a Swedish-Brandenburg victory in the battle of Warsaw (July 1656). Sweden failed to take Danzig while Russia, alarmed at the prospect of a Swedish victory, signed a truce with Poland (1656). The Austrian Habsburgs and Denmark joined the anti-Swedish coalition in 1657, with Frederick William switching sides in return for Poland recognizing his sovereignty over Ducal Prussia. Bogged down in Poland, Charles mounted a brilliant attack on Denmark in February 1658, marching his army to the walls of Copenhagen over the frozen Baltic Sea to force the treaty of Roskilde (1658). Reluctant to return to Poland, Charles attacked Denmark again in the summer, but the Dutch and English supported the Danes and put pressure on Sweden to make peace. At the Treaty of Oliva (1660) with Poland, Brandenburg, and Austria, Sweden gained little beyond John Casimir's resignation of his claim to the Swedish throne; at the Treaty of Copenhagen with Denmark (1660), Sweden retained Scania, Bohuslän, and Blekinge, won at Roskilde, but returned Bornholm and Trondheim. Sweden made peace with Russia in 1661, but the Polish-Russian war had resumed in 1658: the Russians were driven out of most of Lithuania but Polish political divisions and military exhaustion led to a truce at Andrusovo (1667). Russia retained Smolensk and gained the Ukraine on the left bank of the Dnieper, including Kiev, nominally for three years, but ceded definitively by Poland in 1686.

The Second Northern War revealed the problems Sweden faced in defending its empire, which were confirmed in the Scanian War (1674–1679). Forced to attack Brandenburg by Louis XIV (ruled 1643–1715), who was paying them generous subsidies, the Swedes were defeated at Fehrbellin (1675); Sweden was then invaded by Denmark. Charles XI (ruled 1660–1697) beat off the Danish attack, but lost all of Sweden's German territories; they were only returned at the Peace of Fontainebleau (1679) at the behest of Louis XIV.

The Great Northern Wars (1700–1721)

Neither Poland-Lithuania nor Russia, involved in wars against the Ottoman Empire, was in a position to exploit Swedish weakness in the 1670s, but both powers still had scores to settle. The Turkish Wars ended in 1699, while the accession of the young Charles XII (ruled 1697–1718) seemed to provide an opportunity for revenge. An anti-Swedish coalition soon formed including Frederick IV of Denmark (ruled 1699–1730), Augustus II, elector of Saxony and king of Poland-Lithuania (ruled 1697–1732), and Tsar Peter I of Russia (ruled 1682–1725). A botched attempt to take Riga by Augustus in 1700 launched the Great Northern War (1700–1721).

Charles XII of Sweden, a talented soldier, defeated each element of the coalition separately. Denmark was knocked out of the war immediately, before Charles destroyed a much larger Russian army besieging Narva in November 1700. He then invaded Poland-Lithuania (1702), where he won a series of victories, forcing Augustus to abdicate the Polish throne at the treaty of Altranstädt (1706). The Swedish-sponsored election of King Stanisław Leszczyński (ruled 1704–1709; 1733–1736), however, had merely deepened Polish political divisions. When Charles's bold invasion of Russia ended in defeat at Poltava (1709), Augustus returned and Leszczyński fled. Denmark, Brandenburg-Prussia, and Hannover now entered the war in the hope of securing something from the wreckage of the Swedish empire. Charles, on his return from Turkish exile in 1714, staved off disaster, but after his death in action (1718) the way was open to peace. Sweden kept part of Pomerania, but lost its other holdings across the Baltic. If Denmark failed to reverse its previous losses, Russia secured Kexholm, Ingria, Livonia, and Estonia at the Peace of Nystad (1721), and a new system of power was established in northeastern Europe. Sweden and Denmark were now second-rank powers, while continuing Polish weakness enabled Russia and Brandenburg-Prussia to emerge as the victors of the Northern Wars.

Bibliography

Englund, Peter. The Battle of Poltava: The Birth of the Russian Empire. London, 1992.

Frost, Robert I. The Northern Wars: War, State, and Society in Northeastern Europe, 1558–1721. Harlow, U.K., 2000.

Kirby, David G. Northern Europe in the Early Modern Period: The Baltic World, 1492–1772. London and New York, 1990.

Roberts, Michael. The Swedish Imperial Experience, 1560–1718. Cambridge, U.K., and New York, 1979.

—ROBERT I. FROST

This is an article about the 18th century war. For wars with similar names see Northern Seven Years' War (1563–1570), Northern Wars (1655–1661) and the Flagstaff War (1845–1846) in New Zealand.

It has been suggested that Charles XII invasion of Russia be merged into this article or section. (Discuss)

Great Northern War
Part of Russo–Swedish Wars, Polish–Swedish wars and Dano-Swedish Wars
Great Northern War. Clockwise from top: Battle of Poltava, Battle of Gangut, Battle of Narva, Battle of Gadebusch, Battle of Storkyro
Date February 1700–1721 Location Europe Result Coalition victory Territorial changes Russia gained the two Swedish dominions Estonia and Livonia. Prussia gained part of Swedish Pomerania. Hanover gained Bremen-Verden.
Belligerents
Swedish Empire Poland–Lithuania (1704-09)  Ottoman Empire (1710-14) Zaporozhian Cossacks Madagascar pirates (1718)1	Russia Denmark–Norway (1700, 1709-) Electorate of Saxony (1700-04, 1709-) Poland–Lithuania (1700-04, 1709-) Prussia (1715-) Hanover (1715-)
Commanders
Charles XII   † Stanislaus Leszczynski Ahmed III Ivan Mazepa	Peter the Great Frederick IV Frederick Augustus I   Augustus II the Strong Frederick William I
Strength
77,000-393,400 77,000-135,000 Total Swedish troops across the whole country including garrisons (1700 and 1707, respectively) 100,000-200,000 Ottomans (only participated in one battle, remained passive during the rest of the war) 8,000-40,000 Cossacks 16,000 Polish troops (1708) 1,400 pirates[citation needed]	Atleast 310,000 170,000 Russians (facing the Swedes, garrisons not included) +40,000 Danes/Norwegians +100,000 Poles and Saxons (at the most) Unknown number of German troops from Prussia and Hannover[citation needed]
Casualties and losses
About 25,000 Swedes killed in combat, estimated total of 175,000 killed by famine, disease and exhaustion etc.[1]	At least 75,000 Russians and 14,000-20,000 Poles, Saxons and an additional 8000 Danes killed in the larger battles, 60,000 Danes in total between 1709-1719.[2] Likely tens of thousands died from each nation (the Russians most likely had higher casualties than the Swedes, the Danish numbers between 1709-1719 are included above) due to disease, exhaustion, famine etc[citation needed]
1 The Madagascar pirates were only collaborating with the Swedish navy and state, they were not formally at war with any of the Coalition countries.[3][4]

v • d • e Great Northern War Narva – Daugava – Erastfer – Kliszów – Pułtusk – Jēkabpils – Poznań – Punitz – Gemauerthof – Warsaw – Grodno – Fraustadt – Kalisz – Holowczyn – Malatitze – Lesnaya – Poltava – Perevolochna – Helsingborg – Gadebusch – Bender – Pälkäne – Storkyro – Gangut – Stralsund – Dynekilen – Ösel – Stäket – Grengam

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v • d • e Polish–Swedish Wars Livonian – Sigismund – 1600–11 – 1617–18 – 1621–25 – 1626–29 – The Deluge – 2nd Northern – Great Northern – War of the Fourth Coalition – War of the Sixth Coalition

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The Great Northern War (1700-1721) was a war in which the so-called Northern Alliance composed of Russia, Denmark-Norway, Poland-Lithuania and Saxony engaged Sweden for the supremacy in the Baltic Sea. The war ended with a defeat for Sweden in 1721, leaving Russia as the new major power in the Baltic Sea and a new important player in European politics. The war began as a coordinated attack on Sweden by the coalition in 1700 and ended in 1721 with the Treaty of Nystad and the Stockholm treaties.

Contents 1 Background 2 Opposing armies 3 Swedish victories 4 Russian victories 5 Conclusion 6 Endnotes 7 Bibliography 8 See also 9 External links

Background

Between 1560 and 1658, Sweden created a Baltic empire centred on the Gulf of Finland and comprising the provinces of Karelia, Ingria, Estonia, and Livonia. During the Thirty Years' War Sweden gained tracts in Germany as well, including Western Pomerania, Wismar, the Duchy of Bremen, and Verden. During the same period Sweden conquered Danish and Norwegian provinces north of the Sound (1645; 1658). These victories may be ascribed to a well-trained army, which despite its comparatively small size was far more professional than most continental armies. In particular, it was able to maintain a high rate of small arms fire due to proficient military drill. However, the Swedish state proved unable to support and maintain its army in a prolonged war as the costs of warfare could not be passed on to occupied countries.

The foreign interventions in Russia during the Time of Troubles resulted in Swedish gains in the Treaty of Stolbovo (1617). The treaty deprived Russia of direct access to the Baltic Sea, meaning that the Russians were not in a position to challenge the Swedish regional hegemony. Russian fortunes reversed during the later half of the 17th century, notably with the rise to power of Peter the Great, who looked to address the earlier losses and re-establish a Baltic presence. In the late 1690s, the adventurer Johann Patkul managed to ally Russia with Denmark and Saxony by the Treaty of Preobrazhenskoye and in 1700 the three powers attacked.

Opposing armies

In 1700, Charles XII had a standing army based on annual training and consisting of 77,000 men, but by 1707 this number had swollen to at least 120,000 despite casualties. It was the army with the best morale in northern Europe,^{[citation needed]} but not the greatest numerically. In contrast, the larger Ottoman forces were poorly disciplined and lacking in morale.^{[citation needed]}

Russia was able to mobilize 170,000^{[citation needed]} men but could not put all of them into action simultaneously. Furthermore, the Russian mobilization system was ineffective, and the expanding nation had to be defended everywhere — garrisons had to be supported and the war paid for. A grand mobilization covering Russia's vast territories would have been unrealistic. Peter the Great tried to enhance his army's morale to Swedish levels.

Denmark contributed 20,000 men in their invasion of Holstein-Gottorp and several more on other fronts. Poland and Saxony together could mobilize at least 100,000 men.

Swedish victories

From the very beginning of the Great Northern War, Sweden suffered from the inability of Charles XII to view the situation from anything but a purely personal point of view. His determination to avenge himself on enemies overpowered every other consideration. Time and again during the 18 years of warfare it was in his power to dictate an advantageous peace, but he decided against from moral beliefs. He would not take over the Polish throne, instead giving it to the other candidate, Stanisław. He also had the chance to crush Saxony but chose instead to let them walk out because he believed highly in the word of royals. The early part of the war consisted of a continual string of Swedish victories under Charles XII. Denmark was forced to withdraw from the war in the summer of 1700. After a minor engagement at Holstein-Gottorp and a Swedish landing of troops at Zealand they agreed to a treaty not to engage in further hostilities against Sweden. Russia then suffered a crushing defeat in the Battle of Narva in November.

After the dissipation of the first coalition through the peace of Travendal and the victory at Narva, the Swedish chancellor, Benedict Oxenstjerna, rightly regarded the universal bidding for the favor of Sweden by France and the maritime powers, then on the eve of the War of the Spanish Succession, as a golden opportunity of ending the war and making Charles the arbiter of Europe.

At that time, the representatives of Poland-Lithuania (which considered itself neutral despite its king's active participation in the anti-Swedish coalition) offered to serve as mediators between the Swedish king and Augustus. But Charles, intent on dethroning Augustus of Saxony from the Polish throne, attacked Poland, therefore ending the official neutrality of Poland-Lithuania. Five years later, on 24 September 1706, he concluded the Polish War through the treaty of Altranstadt, but, this treaty brought no advantage to Sweden, not even compensation for the expenses of six years of warfare. But he did attain his goal of dethroning August II and putting his ally Stanisław on the throne. Since he believed that Poles in general were not responsible he didn't do anything more. That has been regarded as a mistake^{[citation needed]} since it became very easy for August II to retake the throne.

Russian victories

Main articles: Battle of Poltava and Greater Wrath

During the years between 1700 and 1707, two of Sweden's Baltic provinces, Estonia and Ingria, had been seized by the Tsar, and a third, Livonia, had been essentially ruined. To secure his acquisitions, Peter founded the city of Saint Petersburg in Ingria in 1703. He began to build a navy and a modern-style army, based primarily on infantry drilled in the use of firearms.

Even now Charles, by a stroke of the pen, could have recovered nearly everything he had lost. In 1707, Peter was ready to retrocede everything except Saint Petersburg and the line of the Neva, and again Charles preferred risking the whole to saving the greater part of his Baltic possessions. The year following, he invaded Russia, but was frustrated in Smolensk by Generalissimo Menshikov and headed to Ukraine for the winter. However, the abilities of his force were sapped by the cold weather and Peter's use of scorched earth tactics. When the campaign started again in the spring of 1709, a third of his force had been lost and he was crushingly defeated by a larger and better-fed Russian force under Peter in the Battle of Poltava, fleeing to the Ottoman Empire and spending five years in exile. Peter's victory shook all European courts. In just one day, Russia emerged as a major European power.

The Russian Victory at Gangut (Hanko), 1714 by Maurice Baquoi, etched 1724

This shattering defeat did not end the war, although it decided it. Denmark and Saxony joined the war again and Augustus the Strong, through the crafty politics of Boris Kurakin, regained the Polish throne. Peter continued his campaigns in the Baltics, and eventually he built up a powerful navy. In 1710 the Russians captured Riga, Tallinn and Viipuri. In 1714, Peter's galley navy managed to capture a small detachment of the Swedish navy in the first Russian naval victory near Hanko peninsula.

The Russian army occupied Finland mostly in 1713-1714, Viipuri had been captured already in 1710. The last stand of the Finnish troops was in the battle of Napue in early 1714 in Isokyrö, Ostrobothnia. The occupation period of Finland in 1714-1721 is known as the Greater Wrath (Finnish: isoviha).

Conclusion

Though Charles returned from the Ottoman Empire and resumed personal control of the war effort, initiating a series of Norwegian Campaigns, he accomplished little before his death in 1718. Only the firmness of the Chancellor, Count Arvid Horn, held Sweden in the war until Charles finally returned from the Ottoman Empire, arriving in Swedish held Stralsund in November 1714 on the south shore of the Baltic. Charles was then at war with all of Northern Europe, and Stralsund was doomed. Charles remained there until December 1715, escaping only days before Stralsund fell. By this point, Charles was considered mad by many, as he would not consider peace and the price Sweden had paid was already dear, with no hope in sight. All of Sweden’s Baltic and German possessions were lost.

Over the next few years little changed, but a series of raids on Sweden itself demonstrated that there was little fight left, and soon Prussia, Hanover, and many smaller German states entered the war in the hope of gaining territory when peace was made. Eventually a series of massive seaborne invasions by combined Danish and Russian navies of the Swedish homeland forced the issue.

The war was finally concluded by the Treaty of Nystad between Russia and Sweden in Uusikaupunki (Nystad) in 1721. Sweden had lost almost all of its "overseas" holdings gained in the 17th century, and ceased to be a major power. Russia gained its Baltic territories, and became the greatest power in Eastern Europe. Prussia and Hanover, which made peace agreements with Sweden before Russia, gained territory from Sweden's German possessions. Sweden's dissatisfaction with the result would lead to its fruitless attempts at recovering the lost territories, such as Hats' Russian War, and Gustav III's Russian War.

Endnotes

1. ^ Ericson, Lars, Svenska knektar (2004) Lund: Historiska media
2. ^ Lindegren, Jan, Det danska och svenska resurssystemet i komparation (1995) Umeå : Björkås : Mitthögsk
3. ^ Liljegren, B. (2000). Karl XII: En Biografi. Lund: Historiska media, p. 308-309. ISBN 91-85377-14-7
4. ^ Bergstrand, F. (1997). Då Madagaskar skulle bli svenskt-och England katolskt. Karolinska förbundets årsbok (KFÅ).

Bibliography

• This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica, Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.
• Sweden and the Baltic, 1523 – 1721, by Andrina Stiles, Hodder & Stoughton, 1992 ISBN 0-340-54644-1
• The Struggle for Supremacy in the Baltic: 1600-1725 by Jill Lisk; Funk & Wagnalls, New York, 1967
• The Northern Wars, 1558-1721 by Robert I. Frost; Longman, Harlow, England; 2000 ISBN 0-582-06429-5
• Norges festninger by Guthorm Kavli; Universitetsforlaget; 1987; ISBN 82-00-18430-7
• Admiral Thunderbolt by Hans Christian Adamson, Chilton Company, 1958
• East Norway and its Frontier by Frank Noel Stagg, George Allen & Unwin, Ltd. 1956

See also

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Great Northern War

Extensive information on the major battles and campaigns of the Great Northern War can be found as part of these articles:

• Peter I of Russia | Charles XII of Sweden | Battle of Narva | Battle of Holowczyn | Battle of Lesnaya | Battle of Poltava | Battle of Gangut | Battle of Gadebusch | Treaty of Nystad | Great Northern War and Norway | Russo-Turkish War, 1710-1711

• Greater Wrath

External links

• Great Northern War timeline
• About Northern Wars

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