The Battle of Poltava: The Birth of the Russian Empire

Abstract

Monday 26 June 1709 was date of one of bloodiest and most significant military encounters in European history. The Battle of Poltava marks end of Sweden's age of greatness, and beginning of rise and westward expansion of vast empire of Russia, affecting subsequent history of untold millions in Eastern Europe. Across a bleak plain, near an unimportant town in Russian heartland of Ukraine, army of King Charles XII of Sweden, outnumbered four to one, faced that of Czar Peter Great of Russia. The Swedish command were not unaccustomed to odds of this order: on countless occasions during previous nine years, in battles raging across Denmark, Germany, Poland and Baltic States and in Russia itself, they had faced similar or worse odds and invariably emerged victorious. Nor did exhausted state of their troops, or their inferior firepower and faulty gunpowder, now prevent them from placing their trust in raw courage and cold steel, iron discipline, inspiring presence of their king, and benevolent hand of God. On this day however, God ceased to smile on Swedish arms. In a blow-by-blow analytical account of precisely what went wrong, this book brings horror of 18th-century warfare to life: we smell battlefield carnage, join doomed men on their heroic final charge, and feel agonies of injured and dying. A multitude of eye-witness accounts from letters, diaries and memoirs lets us hear voices of those who were there. The central drama is underpinned by a profound understanding of economic, political, social and military factors at play. At end of battle Czar Peter wrote that the last stone in foundations of St Petersburg has now been laid. Meanwhile, a Swedish host of 49,500, which had marched out for Moscow preceding year, had virtually reduced to a shattered remnant of 1300, who had escaped death or capture by crossing River Dnieper with their king. And although indomnitable Charles continued to wage Great Northern War against his increasingly triumphant enemy for another decade, scars in Swedish psyche were such, that in terms of world history, in author's words, Sweden left stage and took a seat among spectators.

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