The Battle of Poltava on 27 June 1709 was the decisive victory of Peter I of Russia
over the Swedish forces under Field Marshal Carl Gustav Rehnskiöld, in one of the battles
of the Great Northern War.
It is widely believed to have been the beginning of Sweden's decline as a Great Power, as the
tsardom of Russia took its place as the leading nation of north-eastern Europe.
The battle also bears major importance in Ukrainian national history: as hetman Ivan
Mazepa sided with the Swedes, seeking to create an uprising in Ukraine against the tsardom.
Prelude Charles XII led early Swedish victories in
North Zealand and in the Battle of Narva in 1700.
However, it would take six years before he defeated Augustus II of Saxony-Poland.
Peter I withdrew from Poland in the Spring of 1706, and offered to surrender all of his
Baltic possessions to Sweden except St. Petersburg, but Charles refused.
Peter subsequently adopted a scorched earth policy in order to deprive the Swedish forces
of supplies.
Charles ordered a final attack on the Russian heartland with a possible assault on Moscow
from his campaign base in Poland.
The Swedish army of almost 44,000 men left Saxony on 22 August 1707 and marched slowly
eastwards.
Charles took the field in November after waiting for reinforcements to arrive.
Continuing east, Charles crossed the Vistula River on 25 December 1707, then continued
through a hostile Masuria and took Grodno on 26 January 1708 after the Russian troops
had abandoned the city.
At the time, the Russians had been occupied with a large rebellion of Don Cossacks, known
as Bulavin Rebellion.
This revolt was contained in part by the forces of the Cossack Hetmanate led by Hetman Ivan
Mazepa.
The Swedes continued to the area around Smorgon and Minsk, where the army went into winter
quarters.
Left in western Poland were 8,000 dragoons under Major-General Ernst Detlof von Krassow.
Poor weather and road conditions kept the Swedish troops in winter quarters until June.
In July, the Swedes defeated Marshal Boris Sheremetyev's forces at the Battle of Holowczyn
and advanced to the Dnieper River.
During the spring, General Lewenhaupt in Courland had been ordered to gather supplies and march
with his army of about 12,000 men to join Charles' forces.
However, his departure from Mitau was delayed until late June and consequently only joined
Charles' forces on 11 October.
Rather than winter in Livonia or wait for Lewenhaupt, Charles decided to move southward
into the Ukraine and join Mazepa, who had decided to rebel against Peter.
Peter sent Sheremetev to shadow the Swedish army.
Lewenhaupt followed south and was attacked while crossing a river near a small village
that gave name to the Battle of Lesnaya, losing the supply train and half of his force.
In need of resupply, Charles moved towards Baturyn, Mazepa's headquarters, but Russian
troops under Aleksandr Menshikov reached the city first.
Anticipating the Swedish arrival, Menshikov ordered the merciless massacre of the population,
razing the city and destroying or looting arms, ammunition and food.
By the spring, Charles' force was reduced to half of its original size.
After the coldest winter in Europe in a century, Charles was left with 20,000 soldiers and
34 cannon.
Short of supplies, Charles laid siege to the Russian fortress at Poltava on the Vorskla
River on 2 May 1709.
Peter's force of 80,000 marched to relieve the siege.
Upon his arrival, Peter built a fortified camp on the Vorskla, 4 km north of Poltava.
While observing the Russian position on June 20th, Charles was struck by a stray bullet,
injuring his foot badly enough that he could not stand.
In addition, Charles' last hope of reinforcement expired, as the Swedish forces under von Krassow
had turned aside to deal with the anti-Swedish Sandomierz Confederation in Poland.
Between the Russian and Swedish forces was a corridor formed by the Yakovetski and Budyschenski
woods, which the Russians defended by building six forts across the gap.
Peter, in addition, ordered four more redoubts built so the entire system of ten forts would
have a "T" shape, providing flanking fire to a Swedish advance.
Two of the redoubts were still being constructed by the morning of the battle, but the remaining
eight were manned by 4,000 Russians with 10,000 cavalry under General Aleksandr Danilovich
Menshikov stationed behind them.
Battle
Because of his wound, Charles turned over operational command to Field Marshal Carl
Gustav Rehnskiöld.
Four columns of infantry and six columns of cavalry were to form during the night, 600
meters south of the redoubts, intending to attack before dawn in order to swiftly bypass
the redoubt system and attack the Russian fort.
The infantry was in place by 2:30 AM but the cavalry arrived late, having lost their way.
Riding forward, Axel Gyllenkrok observed the Russians at work on the two nearest redoubts,
and rode back to inform Rehnskiöld.
A reconnoitre by Major-General Wolmar Anton von Schlippenbach was discovered by the Russians
and the alarm was sounded by the firing of a pistol.
Having lost the element of surprise, and without sufficient cannon to breach the fortifications,
Rehnskiöld consulted with Charles, Carl Piper, and Lewenhaupt on whether or not to proceed
with the assault.
By the time Rehnskiöld decided to proceed with the attack by quoting, "In the Name of
God then, let us go forward", it was nearly 4:00 AM on 28 June, and dawn was already approaching.
The Swedes in Carl Gustaf Roos' column quickly overran the first two redoubts, killing every
Russian soldier inside them, but by 4:30 AM, he had stalled attempting to take the third.
Lewenhaupt's ten battalions on the right bypassed the first four redoubts entirely, advancing
to the back line, and with the aid of cavalry, took some redoubts while bypassing others.
Two of Roos' rear battalions joined them, indicating orders were lacking clarity as
to whether to avoid the redoubts or attack them in series.
The cavalry on the left wing, commanded by Major-General Hamilton, and an infantry regiment,
advanced by passing the redoubts on the left and charged the Russian cavalry, forcing them
to retreat.
It was 5:00 AM when the left and right wings of the Swedish army had made it past the back
line of redoubts, sending the Russian cavalry in retreat.
However, Rehnskiöld ordered his cavalry to stop their pursuit, and ordered Lewenhaupt,
already advancing towards the fort, to withdraw to the west.
There they awaited Roos' battalions for two hours, while the Russian cavalry and Ivan
Skoropadsky's Cosacks waited to the north, and thirteen Russian battalions deployed north
of their camp and ten to the south, anticipating a Swedish advance.
General Roos and six battalions became isolated attempting to take the third Russian redoubts.
After suffering severe casualties from several assault attempts, Roos led the remaining 1,500
of his original 2,600 men into the Yakovetski woods to the east at 6:00 AM.
The Russians reoccupied the first two redoubts and launched a two-pronged attack by ten regiments
around 7:00 AM, forcing Roos to retreat towards Poltava and refuge in an abandoned fort by
9:00 AM when he couldn't make it to the Swedish siege works.
Roos was forced to surrender his command at 9:30 AM.
The Swedes continued to wait for Roos' troops to return, unaware of their surrender.
As time went by, Peter led the 42 battalions of Russian infantry, 22,000 soldiers, into
an advance out of the fortified camp, supported by 55 three-pounders plus 32 guns on the ramparts
of the fort.
Ten regiments of dragoons formed under Lt. General Adolf Fredrik Bauer on the Russian
right and six regiments under Menshikov on the left.
Just west of the camp, the Russians were faced by 4,000 Swedish infantry, formed into ten
battalions with four three-pounders, and Creutz's cavalry in the rear.
The Russians slowly moved forward to engage.
According to Charles and other reports from other Swede officers, the weather at that
time was already very hot and humid with the sun obscured by smoke from the Russian cannons
of the fort.
At 9:45 A.M., Rehnskiöld ordered Lewenhaupt and the Swedish line to move forward, advancing
towards the Russian line, which started firing their cannon at 500 meters.
When the Swedes were 50 meters from the Russian line, the Russians opened fire with their
muskets from all four ranks.
Advancing to within 30 meters of the Russian line, the Swedes fired a volley of their own
and charged with their muskets and pikesmen, and the Russian first line retreated towards
their second line.
The Swedes seemed to be on the verge of a breakthrough, and needed the cavalry under
General Creutz to break the Russian lines.
Unfortunately for the Swedes, Creutz's and the other cavalry units were unable to reform
completely and in time.
With the Russian line longer than the Swedish line, the Swedish infantry on the left flank
lagged behind the right and finally threw down their weapons and fled.
As the Swedish right flank was still advancing, a gap began to open in the Swedish line which
the Russians filled and the battle turned into a Cannae variation.
Barely able to gather his cavalry squadrons, Creutz tried to advance on the right flank,
but the Russian battalions were able to form into hollow squares,, while Menshikov's cavalry
outflanked the Swedes and attacked them from the rear.
At this point, the Swedish assault had disintegrated, and no longer had organized bodies of troops
to oppose the Russian infantry or cavalry.
Small groups of soldiers managed to break through and escape to the south through the
Budyschenski wood, while many of the rest were overwhelmed, ridden down, or captured.
Realizing they were the last Swedes on the battlefield, Charles ordered a retreat to
the woods, gathering what remaining forces he could for protection, including the remnants
of Creutz's detachment.
The Russians halted at the edge of the woods and their artillery fire stopped, only the
Cossacks and Kalmucks roamed the plains south of the woods.
Emerging from the woods around 12 noon, Charles on horseback after his litter was destroyed,
and protected by a square of a couple of thousand men, headed to Pushkaryovka and his baggage
train 5 km to the south, reaching it after 1:00 PM which by that time the battle was
over.
Charles gathered the remainder of his troops and baggage train, and retreated to the south
later that same day at about 7:00 PM, abandoning the siege of Poltava.
Lewenhaupt led the surviving Swedes and some of the Cossack forces to the Dnieper River,
but was doggedly pursued by the Russian regular cavalry and 3,000 Kalmyk auxiliaries and forced
to surrender three days later at Perevolochna, on 1 July.
Aftermath
High-ranking Swedes captured during the battle included Field Marshal Rehnskiöld, Major
Generals Schlippenbach, Stackelberg, Hamilton and Prince Maximilian Emanuel, as was Piper.
Peter held a celebratory banquet in two large tents erected on the battlefield.
Two mass graves contained the Russian dead, 500 meters southwest of their camp.
Charles and Mazepa escaped with about 1,500 men to Bendery, Moldavia, then controlled
by the Ottoman Empire.
Charles spent five years in exile there before he was able to return to Sweden in December
1715.
Popular culture The battle was portrayed in Poltava, a poem
by Alexander Pushkin written in 1828-9, and the monumental 1925 Swedish film Karl XII
with Gösta Ekman as king Charles XII and the Russian emigrant actor Nicolai de Seversky
as Peter I. Recently the battle was also portrayed in the 2007 Russian film The Sovereign's Servant.
The story of the battle, told from the point of view of a dying soldier, is related in
the Al Stewart song The Coldest Winter in Memory.
On their 2012 album Carolus Rex, Swedish power metal band Sabaton has a song named "Poltava",
detailing the battle.
Notes
References
Sources
See also Surrender at Perevolochna
Battle of Lesnaya External links
Media related to battle of Poltava at Wikimedia Commons
Sequel to Poltava: Diplomacy to contain Russia 1709-1714 By Bertil Haggman
Battle of Poltava on the Encyclopedia of Ukraine Russian Order at Battle
Swedish Order at Battle Battle of Poltava animated battle map by Jonathan
Webb