Livonian garrisons in August 1696
Topic: Livonia

Riga with Kobron and Kokenhusen:

Two companies of Rembert von Funcken's Åbo Infantry Regiment (Lt. Col. Posse's and Captain von Schmitten's). 205 men.

Eight companies of Johan von Campenhausen's Österbotten Infantry Regiment (Campenhausen's, Lt. Col. Silfversparre's, Major Stålhammar's, Captain Witting's, Captain Gyldenhoff's, Captain Borg's, Captain Meijerfeldt's and Captain Weidenhielm's). 1043 men.

23 soldiers from Col. Hans Isak Ridderhielm's regiment.

Eight companies of Erik Dahlberg's regiment (Dahlbergh's, Lt. Col. Helmersen's, Major Ranck's, Captain Brandt's, Capt. Lilliiestierna's, Captain Beckern's, Captain Helmersen's and Captain Hägerflycht's).1089 men.

Eight companies of Erik Soop's regiment (Soop's, Lt. Col. Roos', Major Wrangel's, Captain Schlippenbach's, Captain Rosencron's, Captain Sperling's, Captain Ribbing's and Captain Engelhardt's). 1079 men.

 

Neumünde:

Four companies of Gotthard Wilhelm von Budberg's Nyland Infantry Regiment (Budberg's, Major Rehausen's, Captain Lode's and Captain Staël von Holstein's). 468 men.

 

Pernau: 

Four companies of Erik Pistolekors' regiment (Pistolekors',  Major Schwengeln's, Captain M. G. Pistolekors' and Capt. Löwenburg's). 672 men.

 

Dorpat:  

Four companies of Tiesenhausen's regiment (Tiesenhausen's, Major Berg's, Captain Meijercrantz' and Captain Brömsen's). 572 men. 


Source: EAA. 278.1.XXI-62, Rahvusarhiiv Tartu

 

 

 

A very long hiatus
Topic: Battles

For various reasons I have not posted since November. I'll try and improve upon that during the coming months. 

Recently I found myself in a discussion focused on the Poltava battlefield. Some ten years ago a group of Swedish archaeologists went to Poltava in order to "solve" the many remaining questions once and for all. At the time I expressed considerabler skepticism, being under the impression that too much had happened to the battlefield since 1709 for such a project to be successful. 

As far as I can tell from written reports the investigations yielded very limited results. The only real cluster of ammunition was for example retrieved in an area which traditionally has been seen as the western part of the fortified Russian camp. Most of the retrieved ammunition was judged to have been Russian, but the presence of a couple of "Swedish looking" musket balls resulted in the conclusion that the Russian camp was smaller than it's shown on most plans and looked more like it appears on the well-known Husson plan . 

The Husson plan is indeed among the oldest, as it was printed in the Netherlands already in 1709. From some letters found by Anna Croiset van der Kop it would seem that the Russian envoy Andrey Matveyev was involved in the publication, i.e. it had some sort of Russian source. But where does that leave the official Russian plan?

Ingria : part 3
Topic: Miscellaneous

Som bits and pieces about the garrisons:

Koporie seems to have had a very small garrison (12 soldiers) when the Russians entered Ingria, but the fortress was apparently abandoned almost immediately - Rullor 1620-1723, , SE/KrA/0022/1700/20 (1700), bildid: A0054479_00344

Nyen: Two companies of Horn's regiment in Narva were stationed there - Rullor 1620-1723, , SE/KrA/0022/1700/20 (1700), bildid: A0054479_00317

Nöteborg: The garrison seems to have consisted of about one company and a compliment of "soldiers' sons". In 1702, before the siege started, the garrison consisted of slightly more than 200 men. 

Additional units:

When Otto Vellingk took over as Governor in 1699 he wrote that three companies of Tiesenhausen's Cavalry regiment were stationed in Ingria (Vellingk to Charles XII, 12 August 1699, Livonica II, vol. 192)

When the news from Riga arrived Vellingk began raising more troops. On 31 March he reported that he was intent on rasing a regiment of dragoons in Kexholm County. He wanted, he wrote on 21 April, to make it a permanent regiment. 

Vellingk also wanted to raise a regiment of infantry (also permanent). He wanted to begin by using two existing companies from Skytte's regiment, one stationed in Kexholm and the other in Nöteborg. This the King rejected, but the regiments were created (1,000 infantry, 600 dragoons), 

Ingria : part 2
Topic: Miscellaneous
Otto Wilhelm von Fersen, Governor General 1691-1698, sent a report on the fortresses of Ingria on 7 June 1697.

Kexholm: Insignificant and poorly built. A small island called Kalasaari nearby dominated the fortress and it should be moved to that island. 

Koporie: Four good towers and walls. A deep valley surrounding the castle. Fersen believed Koporie should be preserved as it was situated between Narva and Nyen. It could serve as protection for the poor peasants who had no other place to go in time of war. It could also serve as a stronpoint for Swedish detachments. 5 or 6 5-pounders and a garrison of 20-30 men would be sufficient. The fortress would be useless for the enemy as it was very small. 

Nöteborg: Mostly as it were, but one tower had been built. Nöteborg ought to be repaired and preserved.

Nyen: The place was beautiful and well chosen and the population was considerable. Many beautiful ships had been built there. Nyen was preferable to Narva, but was poorly fortified. It was a key spot for commmunication between Ladoga and the Baltic sea and the Baltic provinces and Finland. It was absolutely imperative to strengthen Nyen, even if it meant stopping work on other fortresses. In it's present state 1 lieutenant (or possibly a captain) along with 50 men would be sufficient as garrison. At present there were two companies and some artillery.

Narva: The key to Estonia as far as Reval and Livonia as far as Dorpat or Pernau. The present state of Narva was poor. The ongoing work went too slow. 

Ivangorod: It had been strengthened, but much work was still needed. 

Karl XII : kungamord (once more)
Topic: Literature

The newspaper article I discussed in the previous entry is a key piece of evidence in the book. I would argue that an experienced historian with knowledge of the events of 1718 who found such a sensational item would react in two ways:

1. Could it be a false rumour going round Europe, much as there in 1709 had been a rumour that the Swedish army had been victorious in the battle of Poltava (a lengthy account of the victory even found its way into the official Swedish newspaper)? The experienced historian would then proceed to check some Dutch, French and German newspapers to see if they contained the same story. 

2. The experienced historian would carefully analyze the other news reports on the same page and look at the paper very closely. Could it be that those pages weren't from 1718? 

Why would he/she be incredulous? Well, because an event  of this magnitude (a revolution in Sweden and an official proclamation of the King's death more than a month before he actually was killed) would surely have left traces everywhere. The new authorities would have had to inform the county governors, the bishops and so on - there would be letters everywhere. Not only that, there would be a need to explain how a small British paper in Lincolnshire would know something which for example the Danish government or their commanders in Norway didn't. How come the Czar knew, but Goertz who negotiated with the Russians didn't? It is, in short, very hard work to build a theory which would explain all of this. 

Now to what Nordenkull on page 72 calls evidence of Frederick's guilt:

1. The coup: as explained above and in the previous post this is based on a British newspaper item which has been incorrectly dated. 

2. That Frederick managed to surround the King with people loyal to him: it's not clear that all of them were or that this in itself would mean anything. Above all it's not clear who the replaced people were.

3. There was a Swedish artillery battery on Oskleiva, which fired the lethal bullet. The King's body was then carried to the trenches etc: No evidence for the existence of such a battery is presented. No evidence for the theory that the King was hit by a number of canister balls is presented. No evidence for an alternative place of death is presented. (what I mean by evidence is witness accounts, maps, drawings etc. - any sort of contemporary documentation). No discussion about the possibility of making precision shots with canister at such a distance or what the likely spread of such a volley would be etc. No discussion of why "murder by artillery" was chosen ahead of a simple gunshot at close range etc.

4. Kaulbars and Maigret by mistake disclosed the plot in their testimonies: Kaulbars (if Anonymous is indeed him) points to Overberget - how can this be an evidence of murder? Maigret speaks of a large projectile and dismisses the idea that someone on the Swedish side killed the King - how can this be evidence of murder?

5. Frederick manipulated the Council of War on 1 December: it's far from obvious why "an unfortunate and very lamentable event" should be interpreted as referring to a shot from the Swedish side. Surely it would be possible to use the same words about a stray norwegian bullet?

6. The participants in the plot were rewarded in various ways: well, it was quite natural for officers to be promoted. My "old friend" Gustaf von Psilander went from being the son of a minor official to baron and head of the Admiralty. Was he also involved in a plot or was he (like Cronstedt) good at his work? 

In short: I would label a lot of the book pure speculation. One example: the author suggests that Charles XII in October made a trip to Armfeldt's army. Has she studied "Riksregistraturet" (copies of outgoing letters from the King's field chancery)? No evidence of this is presented. Has she looked for Royal letters written to county governors or various government bodies in Stockholm during this period to check where and when they are dated? No evidence of this is presented. Has she checked if there are records from the King's kitchen, i.e. evidence of where he spent days and nights, who dined with him etc? No evidence of this is presented...

I have spent hundreds (if not thousands) of hours during the last twenty years pouring over actual documents sent to Charles XII and his officials and letters and documents signed by him. I have visited quite a few archives in several different countries and bought copies from many, many more. I have today scans or photos of more than one thousand volumes from mostly Swedish, Baltic, Danish and Norwegian archives, i. e. I have done real archival research many, many times and spent a very considerable amount of my private money (and vacation days) doing it. Why? Because it is a fascinating period. I have made an index of about 15,000 incoming letters in the archive of the Swedish Governor General of Livonia. I have bought hundreds of books published in Poland, Russia, Belarus, Ukraine and other relevant countries in order to keep up with research abroad. I have also fact checked a significant number of book manuscripts before publication and I have been heavily involved in other ways in a couple of book projects, including Peter From's "Karl XII:s död". So I do know something about the period and the events in 1718, perhaps even more than most people do. Based on all of this I must say that I rather resent being "lectured" by some who have done very little of such hard, time consuming and costly work (see above). 

This will, barring unforeseen events, be my final statement about this strange book. 

A very peculiar book : again
Topic: Literature

Some weeks ago I published a brief review of Cecilia Nordenkulls' book Karl XII : kungamord (Charles XII : Regicide). Towards the end I stated that a certain newspaper article, which forms the basis for Nordenkull's theory, has been incorrectly dated. 

The issue is available online through the British Newspaper Archive . It's dated 13 November 1718, but it should be noted that the date only appears on the first page of each issue. The newspaper in question (Stamford Mercury) has however page numbers. The third page of this issue is numbered 219, the relevant page is numbered 226. 

One particular detail is worth noting: each page ends with a word (or part of a word) which is then repeated on the following page. Page 219 ends with "pre-venting" and the first word on page 220 is "venting". Om page 220 the last word is "Difficul-ties" and on page 221 the first is "ties". 

This system is in place until the end of page 224, where the last word is "Next", but page 225 begins with "We". Page 225 ends with "And" and page 226 starts with "And". The final page is 226, although there obviously should be at least one more page as it ends in the same way with the word "Car". 

Ok, this suggests to me that something is wrong, i.e. that there has been a mix-up of some sort. Page 225-226 likely belongs to another year. So which one?

What does it say on page 225-226? A few things worth investigating:

1. A great plague in France (several items about this)

2. The Duke of Chandios going to Gravesend

3. A certain Doctor Parson, Chaplain to the Duke of Dorset

4. The arrival of a Russian Adjutant-General Romansoff in Stockholm

So what do these items tell us:

1. https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peste_de_Marseille_(1720)

2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duke_of_Chandos

3. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duke_of_Dorset

So the great plague in France occurred in 1720, there was no Duke of Chandos until 1719 and the Dukedom of Dorset was created in June 1720. 

So what does that indicate? Well, that the newspaper pages cannot be from November 1718 but from some later date - with 1720 being the earliest. 

Ok, so lets look through the issues for 1720 in order to find a connection between pages 224 and 225, where the break occurred in the issue dated 13 November 1718. The issue dated 3 November 1720 looks interesting, with the final page being numbered 224 and ending with the word "We" (see above). 

This indicates that pages 225 and 226 in fact belong to the issue dated 3 November 1720. But how about "Adjutant-General Romansoff"?

Let's look in C. G. Malmströms classical Sveriges politiska historia från konung Karl XII:s död... On page 298 in volume one of the second edition Malmströms describes the arrival in Stockholm of the Adjutant-General Romanzov (in fact Aleksandr Ivanovitj Rumjantsev)  in September 1720 and his mission to congratulate Fredrick on his accession to the throne. The arrival of the Russian envoy made the Swedes believe that he brought a peace offer, but when he didn't want to negotiate he was sent away in October. This very closely matches the newspaper article Nordenkull bases her idea of a coup d'etat in October 1718 on, i.e. she has simply not understood that a couple of the pages have been incorrectly labeled during scanning and that events described on pages 225 and 226 occurred in 1720. 

 

 

Ingria : part 1
Topic: Miscellaneous

In an another forum there came a question about the state of the Swedish provinces Ingria and Estonia in 1700. I have mostly studied Livonia, but I will try and give some details about the others as well. I'll start with Ingria.

The most recent work in Swedish about Ingria is Kasper Kepsu's dissertation Den besvärliga provinsen (2014). He has the following to say:

The province Ingria: About 15,000 square kilometers, population around 60,000 (based on an estimate by Forsström in 1890). It consisted of four counties: Ivangorod, Jama, Koporie and Nöteborg. The province had two towns: Narva and Nyen. The administrative capital was Narva, where the Governor General (later the Governor) resided. Ingria was adminstratively joined with Kexholm county. When war broke out in 1700 General Otto Vellingk (1649-1708) was Governor. Other key military officials were the garrison commanders Henning Rudolf Horn (Narva and Ivangorod), Johan Apollof (Nyen) and Gustaf Wilhelm Schlippenbach (Nöteborg). 

The main fortress was Narva, which had been substantially expanded during the 1690's. Nyen was significantly weaker and Nöteborg quite neglected. The two minor fortresses Jama and Koporie were insignificant. 

In february 1698 Erik Dahlbergh gave the following estimate:

Nöteborg was basically as it had been, but one tower had been added. 

Nyen was a town of major importance, but the existing fort was useless. The Russians had a great appetite for a Baltic port and wanted to recapture Ingria. A stronger fortification hade been planned and work begun in 1672, but it had never been finished. It was of vital importance to strengthen Nyen. 

Narva and Ivangorod had been in a terrible state in 1682 and Charles XI had decided that something had to be done. He had asked Dahlbergh to submit ideas and one of the designs had been approved. Much work had been done, but it was still insufficient. Ivangorod was in a reasonable state, but also needed strengthening. 

Jama was basically a ruin. 

Koporie was worth preserving.

Wasknarva was an old, almost ruined castle on the shore of the Peipus where the Narva river began. It was a place that need a strong fort as ships based there could dominate the entire lake and keep communications with Dorpat open. 

A visit to Halden
Topic: Museums
A couple of weeks ago visited Halden and Fredriksten fortress, partially acting as an expert on the events of 1718. This was (I think) my fifth visit. Among other things I got the opportunity to follow in Bengt Wilhelm Carlberg's footsteps down the very steep hill he and his small group of soldiers brought the dead king. I manages to get down without falling, partly because of the many trees growing there nowadays. If Carlberg went down where I did it's certainly very understandable that the body fell off the stretcher on the way down. 

The museum exhibition was not very large, but nice. For some not quite obvious reason they focused on the "canister scenario", one of the most unlikely theories. It's strange that such basic things still have not been quite cleared up despite the fact that serious research started as far as in the 1840's. 

I will visit Halden two more times this autumn, the final one being a conference 10-12 December. Maybe I will then get a chance to explain why the canister theory is quite unreasonable. 

A very peculiar book
Topic: Literature
I have previously on a couple of occasions mentioned the upcoming Karl XII : kungamord (Charles XII : regicide) by Cecilia Nordenkull. It has now been published. I don't exaggerate when saying unequivocally that it's the most weird book on this subject that I have ever encountered. 

Her theory goes like this: Frederick of Hesse had been plotting against Charles XII for many years. In October 1718 he managed to convince Charles to visit Armfeldt's army outside Trondheim. When the King was well on his way Frederick made for Stockholm as quickly as he could, launched a coup and took power together with his wife, the King's sister. On carrying out this coup they claimed that the King had been killed (their plan was to have him assassinated during the journey to Armfeldt). It all went well and and even an envoy from the Czar arrived to congratulate them on their accession to the throne. 

Meanwhile, the King had managed to avoid all traps and returned to his army in late October. Frederick, who also was back, found himself in a bit of difficult situation. First of all he needed to make sure that Charles didn't find out that he had been deposed. Secondly, he had to convince Charles to go "deep undercover" - Fredrick could not risk having someone finding out that Charles wasn't dead. Thirdly, he needed to kill Charles. 

Then about a month passed, Charles never realized that he had been deposed and none other than the conspirators found out that the King was still alive. Now came the time to kill him, but how?

Well, Fredrick came up with a very complicated plan. He set up a battery across the river (some 700 meters from the Swedish trenches), borrowed some British officers and soldiers from admiral Norris, added a few trusted Germans and waited.

On the evening of 30 November the opportunity presented itself. The King had arrived at a gathering point behind the Swedish trenches, There he was approached by a young officer who had been ordered to carry a lamp. This young officer did not know the purpose, but when he reached Charles he gave a signal with his lamp. The battery across the river fired canister and Charles and the young officer were hit by many balls. Both men were killed on the spot.

Some of the conspirators now sprang into action. They carried the King tightly wrapped in his own coat to the trenches without being discovered and then put the King on top of the outer wall. Just as they were finished Lt. Carlberg appeared. He saw the King and joined the group of men. After some time one of the conspirators exclaimed: "The King has been hit!" and then everything proceeded as told in Carlberg's testimony. 

So what's the evidence Nordenkull cites. Well, first of all a famous painting by Gustaf Cederström - dated 1897! It's not clear how Nordenkull thinks that Cederström knew the correct circumstances...

Another piece of evidence is a newspaper article from Stamford Mercury, which describes the visit by a representative for the Czar to Stockholm. Unfortunately for Nordenkull the relevant page has been mislabeled during scanning. It's quite obviously from November 1720, not November 1718. 

What I have described above is just the tip of the iceberg. It's an amazing book - for all the wrong reasons. Even more amazing is that the author has been invited to a seminar in Halden -  https://ostfoldmuseene.no/hendelse/historieseminar-1718/

Another book
Topic: Literature

Another book on the same subject is Cecilia Nordenkull's Karl XII : kungamord (Charles XII : murdering a King). It will apparently be released in late September, but the main culprit has already been identified, Unsurprisingly it's Frederick of Hesse, the King's brother-in-law and the standard villain in most murder scenarios. Presumably this means that Sicre is cast in the role of the assassin.

Another new book is Svensk sjömakt under 500 år (Swedish naval power during 500 years). This one volume history of the Swedish navy is obviously neither detailed nor particularly revolutionizing. When it comes to the GNW some of the most familiar arguments are made, such as "the Swedish army had been built for defensive purposes, not for war outside the empire" and "the navy should have had more vessels suitable for the war against Russia". 

The first of these two suggestions would most probably have run into severe supply problems quite soon if it had been acted upon. Onni Korkiakangas, who in the early 1970's investigated the supply situation in 1700-1701, suggested that an important reason behind the decision to move the war into Poland-Lithuania was the impossibility of supplying a large army in the Baltic provinces. I also very much doubt that the Swedish army would have been able to successfully defend the borders from Riga to northeastern Ingria (should be about 900 km) from both Saxons and Russians when the enemies at any given time could choose their point of attack. 

The other argument is not much better. Sweden had not fought a war against Russia for 40 years and the relations appeared quite good. So, with many needs elsewhere - why build and maintain a significant naval force on Ladoga and Peipus for years (if not decades) when a new war with Denmark appeared much more likely?