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| Czarevich Alexis |
Two days
after the battle Peter entered Poltava and celebrated his name day at the
Spasskaya church with the commander of the garrison at his side.
Following
his return from receiving the mass surrender of the Swedes Menshikov was
promoted to Field Marshall; all the Russian generals received promotions or
estates. Peter allowed himself to be promoted to Lieutenant General and became
a Rear Admiral in the navy. Moscow was en fête and Czarevich Alexis hosted a
banquet for the foreign ambassadors at Preobrazhenskoe.
At a council
of war, held between 14th and 16th July 1709, it was
decided that Sheremetev would attack Riga and Menshikov would move into Poland
to attack King Stanislaus and the Swedish army there.
Peter’s
victory at Poltava meant that the courts of Europe were now eager to ally with
Russia. Louis XIV proposed to guarantee Russian conquests in the Baltic to
injure English and Dutch trade; Hanover and Prussia indicated their desire to
increase their ties with Russia. Denmark proposed a new anti Swedish alliance
with Russia and following the agreement invaded southern Sweden.
Augustus of
Saxony repudiated the Treaty of Altranstadt[i] and invaded with an army
of 14,000, calling on his former subjects to renew their allegiance. The Polish
nobles welcomed Augustus’s return and Stanislaus fled, finally joining Charles
in the Ottoman Empire. Peter and Augustus signed a new treaty of alliance on 9th
October 1709 at Thorn[ii].
Thorn
Peter
promised to help Augustus regain the throne of Poland and by the end of the
month Menshikov had secured the greater part of the country without a fight, as
the Swedish army retreated to Swedish Pomerania.
From Thorn
Peter travelled to Marienwerder to meet Frederick ! of Prussia; a treaty of
defence was signed by the two countries and a marriage between Peter’s niece
and the Duke of Courland[iii] was arranged.
Annexing the Baltic States
On 9th
November Peter arrived at Riga, joining Sheremetev and his troops encircling
the city. On the 13th Peter fired the first shots of the bombardment
of the city. The city resisted fiercely and Peter ordered the troops into winter
quarters, leaving the city blockaded.
Vyborg
In the spring of 1710 Peter’s troops swept
through the Baltic provinces. While Sheremetev besieged Riga; Apraxin and
18,000 men attacked Vyborg, a strategic town at the head of the
Karelian isthmus. They were backed by the Russian Baltic fleet. Peter travelled
with the fleet, bringing supplies and reinforcements. After approving the siege plans Peter returned to St Petersburg, where once again he fell ill; he wrote to Apraxin at the beginning of June;
‘I hear you intend making
the assault today. If this has already been ordered, God aid you. But if it is
not fixed for today put it off until Sunday or Monday when I can get there, for
this is the last day that I take medicine and tomorrow I shall be free.’[iv]
On the 13th
Vyborg fell; Peter was there to witness the surrender;
‘And thus through the taking
of this town, final safety has been gained for St. Petersburg.’[v]
On July 10th
Riga surrendered to Sheremetev[vi] and three months later
Reval capitulated; Peter was overjoyed
‘The last town has
surrendered and Livonia and Estonia are entirely cleared of the enemy. In a
word, the enemy does not now possess a single town on the left side of the
Baltic, not even an inch of land. It is now incumbent upon us to pray the Lord
God for a good peace.’[vii]
Peter agreed
that the churches could remain Lutheran, that German would remain the language
of the local administration and allowed the nobles and merchants to keep all
their former privileges, customs, possessions and immunities.
Charles and the Ottomans
Ahmed III
Having
sought sanctuary with the Ottomans, Charles was treated as an honoured guest; Sultan Ahmed III ordered a wagon train of supplies. Ahmed suggested that his guests moved to Bender on the Dniester, 150 miles to the south-west[viii].
‘’The Basha Ismael having
brought the King to his Seraglio at Bender, gave him his own apartment, where
he was served in state, but not without a guard of Janisaries at the chamber
door.’[ix]
Charles
hoped to return to Poland as soon as his heel was healed, and take command of
the Swedish armies left there to keep Stanislaus on the throne. He also
believed that it would be possible to rejoin his troops left behind in the
Ukraine. Charles sent orders to the governing council in Stockholm requiring
the raising of new regiments to be sent across the Baltic.
Charles’s
wound took a long time to heel and while he was waiting the news of the death
of his elder sister[x] arrived; Charles was grief
stricken and for days refused to see anyone. Then another disaster struck;
Mazeppa died on 22nd September. And the news of Lewenhaupt’s
surrender was followed by news of the events in Poland and the rest of northern
Europe.
Charles’s
best option would have been to return to Sweden; Louis XIV, eager to have
Sweden create mayhem in eastern Europe, several times proffered the use of a
ship to ferry him home[xi]. Instead Charles hoped to
persuade the Sultan to join him in an attack on Russia. He thought that one
successful campaign would regain the losses of the previous year’s campaign.
Charles’s
agents were working to overturn the Russian-Turkish agreement, while there were
many of the Sultan’s advisers who wanted their master to accept Peter’s demand
that Charles be expelled from the empire.
‘The King of Sweden has
fallen like a heavy weight on the shoulders of the Sublime Porte.’[xii]
For Charles
to have any real influence in the empire he needed a Swedish army ready to
influence events in Europe and beyond. His demands for fresh regiments abroad
caused consternation in Stockholm, already trying to fight off the Danes in the
south. Charles was informed that no troops could be spared to further his
ambitions.
The Ottoman Turks Go to War
The Valide Sultan Emetullah
There was a
pro-war faction in Constantinople; one of the foremost was Devlet
Gerey, Khan of the Crimea. He and the Sultan’s mother Emetullah
had been persuaded by Charles’s envoys to look kindly on the idea of crushing
Russia. Peter’s continued demands for Charles’s expulsion played into the hands
of the war party and on 21st November 1710 the Ottomans declared war
on Russia. But when the troops marched to war Charles was unable to play an
active part in the campaign.
Selimye Mosque at Adrianople
Peter had
decided that his troops would march through Bulgaria and threaten the second
city of the Ottoman Turks, Adrianople. The army of 54,000 would be dwarfed by the armies that the
Turks could put into the field. But Peter planned to call on the Christians in
the Balkan provinces of Wallachia and Moldavia to rise up and join his army. It was estimated that up to 40,000 might
be expected to fight against their Muslim overlords.
Peter’s
proclamation called upon the Sultan’s vassals to ensure that
‘The descendents of the
heathen Mohammed were driven out into their old homeland, the sands and steppes
of Arabia.’[xiii]
Pruth campaign
But Peter’s
call did not have the ultimate success he might have hoped for. His bold move
was far from his normal defensive policy and eventually in October 1713, after
four declarations of war by the Turks and a disastrous defeat at Pruth in July 1711 for the Russians, a
treaty was signed between the two nations; the terms were in the victor’s
favour and the Ukraine passed back into Turkish hands; the forts at Taganrog
and Azov were destroyed.
‘The Lord God drove me out
of this place, like Adam out of Paradise’[xiv]
Peter wrote
of the loss of these vital possessions and there would be no Russian Black Sea
fleet in Peter’s lifetime. But for him his border in the west was vital for the
future of his country and St Petersburg and the Baltic were more important than
Azov and the Black Sea.
Cathedral at Bender
Peter’s
envoys continued to press for Charles to be expelled from Turkish territories. Throughout
his stay in the Ottoman Empire Charles resided in Bender. He was paid an
allowance by the Sultan, but in July 1711 Charles fell out with the Grand
Vizier, putting paid to Charles’s attempts to lead an army against the Russians[xv]. His allowance was cut
off, his mail was intercepted and merchants were forbidden to sell goods to the
Swedes.
Constantinople
In
retaliation Charles complained to Ahmed of his vizier’s behaviour and his
agents in Constantinople spread rumours that the vizier had allowed Peter and
his army to escape after Pruth, because he had been bribed to do so. Charles
helped incite the three further short wars the Ottomans declared on the
Russians but his chance to regain his losses slipped away after the first
campaign.
On 15th
June 1713 the Russians and the Turks signed a treaty at Adrianople, pledging
peace for twenty-five years. Charles was now invited to leave Turkish
territory. He decided to travel incognito and travel light, leaving his
entourage to bring the gifts from Sultan Ahmed;
‘The presents they brought
him from the Grand Signor were, a large tent of scarlet embroidered with gold,
a sabre set with jewels, eight beautiful Arabian horses with fine salles and
stirrups of massive silver.’[xvi]
Stralsund
Charles’s
departure was delayed until September 1714 and he made the journey to Stralsund[xvii] in two weeks, travelling by coach
and on horseback. It had been fifteen years since he had last set foot on the
territories he ruled and it was not until the following summer, after the fall
of Stralsund to a joint Prussian-Danish-Saxon enemy, that Charles finally
returned to his native land.
Bibliography
Natasha’s
Dance – Orlando Figes, Penguin Books Ltd 2002
Russia and
the Russians – Geoffrey Hosking, The Penguin Press 2001
Peter the
Great – Robert K Massie, Abacus 1992
The History
of Charles XII of Sweden – Mr de Voltaire, C Davis & A Lyon 1732
[i]
Whereby he had been forced to give up the Polish crown
[ii]
His trip had been delayed by yet another bout of ill-health
[iii]
Frederick’s nephew
[iv]
Peter the Great - Massie
[v]
Ibid
[vi]
Originally the city had been allocated to Augustus, but as it had been gained
with Russian troops and Peter claimed that the city and province were gained as
the result of the Russian victory at Poltava, he decided it would be Russian,
not Polish
[vii]
Peter the Great - Massie
[viii]
Now called Bessarabia
[ix]
The History of Charles XII of Sweden – Voltaire
[x]
The widowed Duchess of Holstein
[xi]
Charles’s refusal was part in concern that he might be captured by pirates and
that accepting the offer would mean choosing sides in the War of the Spanish
Succession
[xii]
Peter the Great - Massie
[xiii]
Ibid
[xiv]
Ibid
[xv]
The Vizier informs Charles that an unbeliever could not lead Ottoman troops
[xvi]
The History of Charles XII of Sweden – Voltaire
[xvii]
A Swedish territory
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