Hunting across the Curonian Lagoon

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The Great Elector's sleigh in the Prussia Museum

With the hunt over the Curonian Lagoon , the "Great Elector" Friedrich Wilhelm von Brandenburg ended the Northern War between Brandenburg-Prussia and Sweden in 1679 .

prehistory

The Swedish general Henrik Horn invaded East Prussia with 16,000 men in November 1678 , occupied all fortified places and threatened the Prussian capital Königsberg . In the Duchy of Prussia only weak forces were during the war, were unable impending Swedish invasion of Livonia fend off. Sweden wanted to invade Poland-Lithuania on its side in order to conquer the duchy for itself. The Polish King Johann Sobieski had made considerations in this direction, but was unable to free up forces for participation due to the strain on Poland-Lithuania in the Turkish war . In October 1678, the Swedish army set up in Livonia under Field Marshal Henrik Horn, around 12,000 to 16,000 men, began the advance towards Courland. On November 15, she crossed the Prussian border north of Memel . Resistance was low, so the Swedes advanced without any problems. However, even after peace was made with the Ottomans, Poland-Lithuania stayed away from an alliance with Sweden when it became known that Stralsund had surrendered to the Brandenburgers; because with the capture of Stralsund the original purpose of the Swedish enterprise, the relief of Swedish Pomerania, became obsolete. The Swedes were now faced with the risk of being confronted with the Brandenburg army, which had now become free. Due to this changed strategic situation, the Swedes stopped their advance to Königsberg . The Swedish field marshal now received orders from Sweden to move into winter quarters in Prussia and to remain passive.

Crossing over the Curonian Lagoon

The news of the Swedish invasion reached the Electors in December 1678 during the siege of the Swedish fortress of Szczecin . Elector Friedrich Wilhelm decided to drive the Swedes out of East Prussia by “a quick ride” despite the icy cold and the usual practice of winter quarters, just as he had driven them out of the march four years earlier. In mid-December he set out from Berlin with an army of 9,000 men and 30 guns in the direction of Prussia. On January 20, the Brandenburg relief crossed the Vistula and reached Marienwerder , the first assembly point for the infantry. The elector prepared the famous Great Sleigh Ride from here . In a letter to the governor and the city council, he gave orders to provide 1,100 sleds and 600–700 horses for his army . On December 30th the Elector set out; on January 10, 1679 he was in Marienwerder and took over the inspection of the small army that he had so quickly led from the Oder to the Vistula. He also gave orders to the cavalry troops standing in Königsberg, 3000 Brandenburgers under the command of General Görzke , to pursue the fleeing Swedes immediately. After they had received the news of the arrival of the elector, they withdrew to Livonia and reached Tilsit on January 29, 1679 . Since there was no longer any question of enclosing and capturing the enemy, it was necessary to catch up with the Swedes. In express marches it went to Braunsberg and Heiligenbeil , then from Carben to save time, in sledges over the fresh lagoon . The Brandenburg cavalry tried to catch up with the Swedes as ordered. On January 16, Koenigsberg was reached and after a day's rest the Swedes, who had meanwhile occupied Tilsit and stopped there, followed in three departments. The three Brandenburg departments consisted of an outermost top of a thousand men, of an actual avant-garde of three thousand and of a bulk of about five thousand men. Joachim Henniges von Treffenfeld was in charge , Joachim Ernst von Görzke the avant-garde, Derfflinger and the Elector himself the bulk. Just as the troops had passed the Fresh Lagoon ten days earlier, the Curonian Lagoon was now crossed between Labiau and Gilge . Without waiting for the arrival of the main army, a Brandenburg advance command consisting of 1000 cavalry men under Colonel von Treffenfeld attacked some Swedish regiments housed at Tilsit on January 30th and dispersed them. The Swedes lost a few hundred men in the battle at Tilsit.

The next day, the Brandenburg cavalry under Görzke and the Treffenfeld promoted to major general for his victory the day before attacked the retreating Swedes again. In the battle at Splitter 1,000 Swedes were killed, 300 captured and five cannons captured. The next day, on January 21, Görzke attacked the enemy rearguard in the battle near Heydekrug and destroyed half of them. When the Swedes continued their retreat through Lithuanian territory, the elector had the persecution stopped on February 2nd, as the lack of supplies, cold and illness also made itself felt among his troops. They related to accommodation in Prussia. He only sent the Swedes a small contingent of 1,500 cavalry men under the command of Major General von Schöning , who fought on February 7th with the Swedish rearguard near Telschi in Lower Lithuania (Shamaites). This contingent ceased their pursuit eight miles from Riga and began their march back to Memel on February 12th. With the early withdrawal, Schöning acted unauthorized against Görzke's orders and was arrested by the elector while still in Memel. The anecdote prompted contemporary commentators to coined the derision term Schöning maneuver for an early retreat in a favorable strategic situation.

As a result, the Swedes, under Field Marshal Horn, brought only 1,000 horsemen and 500 infantrymen back to Swedish territory in Livonia from formerly 12,000 to 16,000 men.

meaning

The campaign was of little importance to the parties to the conflict in the course of the Northern War. For the Swedes the main concern was to give relief and relief to their troops in Stralsund ; a conquest of Prussia could only be assumed if it was successful. Nevertheless, the great elector's bold campaign was admired by his contemporaries. In general, campaigns and battles were considered impossible in winter time. But it was precisely the ice of the Curonian Lagoon that accelerated the advance of the Brandenburg-Prussian army extraordinarily. This took the opponents by surprise in their winter quarters. In the centuries that followed, the battle was glorified for its boldness, as on a mural in the Hall of Fame in Berlin. The Elector's sleigh was exhibited in the Muscovite Hall of the Prussian Army's Hall of Fame in Königsberg until 1945 .

  • Contemporary representation of the transition

  • Deployment of the Brandenburg Army

  • Elector Friedrich Wilhelm leads the Brandenburg-Prussian army across the ice of the Haffes.

  • Mural by Wilhelm Simmler in the Hall of Fame

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d Friedrich Förster: Friedrich Wilhelm the great elector and his time. Berlin 1855, p. 149 ff.

literature

  • Hans Branig : History of Pomerania Part II: From 1648 to the end of the 18th century. Böhlau, Cologne 2000, ISBN 3-412-09796-9 .
  • Dietmar Lucht: Pomerania - history, culture and science up to the beginning of the Second World War. Verlag Wissenschaft und Politik, Cologne 1996. ISBN 3-8046-8817-9
  • Curt Jany: History of the Prussian Army - From the 15th Century to 1914. Vol. 1, Biblio Verlag, Osnabrück 1967, pp. 229-271.
  • Werner Schmidt: Friedrich I. - Elector of Brandenburg, Queen Prussia. Heinrich Hugendubel Verlag, Kreuzlingen / Munich 2004, ISBN 3-424-01319-6 .
  • Friedrich Förster : Friedrich Wilhelm, the great elector, and his time: A history of the Prussian state during the duration of his government. Publishing house by Gustav Hempel, Berlin 1855.
  • Paul Douglas Lockhart: Sweden in the seventeenth century. 2004 by Palgrave Macmillan, ISBN 0-333-73156-5 .
  • Maren Lorenz : The wheel of violence. Military and civilian population in Northern Germany after the Thirty Years War (1650–1700). Böhlau, Cologne a. a. 2007, ISBN 978-3-412-11606-4 .
  • Michael Rohrschneider: Johann Georg II von Anhalt-Dessau (1627–1693) - A political biography. Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1998, ISBN 3-428-09497-2 .
  • Friedrich Ferdinand Carlson: History of Sweden - up to the Reichstag 1680. Fourth volume, Gotha 1855.
  • Samuel Buchholz : Attempt a history of the Churmark Brandenburg. Fourth part: new history, Berlin 1767.
  • Frank Bauer: Fehrbellin 1675 - Brandenburg-Prussia's rise to a great power. Potsdam 1998. ISBN 3-921655-86-2 .
  • Anonymous: Theatrum Europaeum Volume 11, Frankfurt am Main 1682,