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16-15.]
Maritime operations and
engagements.
CHRISTINA. THE REGENCY.
Defeat of tlie Imperialists
under Gallas. 319
door, and so embarrassing to us at sea, that what-
ever other comes against ns Denmark will give us
disturbance. Therefore, after mature deliberation,
we judge it best to have an eye upon the emperor,
but to direct our main intention to bi’eaking the
strength of Denmark. In Germany we must give
constant heed to the sea-coast and its strong places.
It seems not probable that the emperor should
move onwards, leaving in his rear the fortresses
we possess in Silesia and Moravia, especially as the
country on the sea-coast is mostly desolate, and no
army can live there before the grain is housed.
Howbeit if he come, you must meet him as well as
may be, keeping in view the main intention for
Denmark. We count upon a short war, since the
Danes already seek to treat. Then may ye grapple
with the emperor ’."
The course of events did not in all things answer
to these calculations. Louis de Geer indeed ma-
naged in Holland to equip thii-ty ships in his own
name ’, (for the States-general would yet take no
open part,) which put to sea in May; but Idng
Christian, who on his side had commenced the war
by an attack on Gottenburg, encountered them off
the coast of Jutland, and compelled them to return
to North Holland, where a mutiny of the crews
threatened to frustrate the whole undertaking. It
is a proof of the interest with which it was em-
braced by the merchants of Holland, that Dc Geer
and his admiral Martin Thysen % accomplished the
equipment of a new squadron, which now sailed
for Gottenburg. Meanwhile the Swedish fleet,
numbering forty ships, had put to sea in June,
under the command of Clas Fleming, councillor of
state and admiral, who, on the 29th June, took the
island of Femcrn. But here too king Christian,
though now almost seventy years old, was not slow
in showing himself ;
and on the 6th July, when the
Danish and Swedish fleets four times engaged, he
was wounded at the mast of his ship, twelve men
being killed round him. Not without good ground
^ To Torstenson, March 14, 1644. Reg.
^ In an autograph letter from Louis de Geer to bishop
Johannes Matthiae, the former tutor of Christina, preserved
in a volume of manuscripts in the Library of Upsala, and
dated at Amsterdam, March 20—30, 1C44, he says, "Quant
k mon equipage j’espere que dans 15 jours je le pourrois
rendre prest. Je suis le marchaud convert! en homme de
guerre.
—Le Marquis Spinola est mort, il faiit qu’un autre le
relive," he adds, jestingly. The council of state engaged to
contribute to the equipinent of this fleet 50,000 rix-dollars,
which Louis de Geer was to raise in Holland. The sum
was to be repaid, with eight per cent, interest, in two years,
either in cash, or with land which might be conquered from
the enemy. Minute of May 1, 1644. Reg. These 50,000
rix-dollars were really furnished from the crown estates in
Halland, whicli province was annexed to Sweden by the
peace of Bromsebro. Jan. 21, 1645, de Geer received an
assignment on the excise for three years for 300,000 rix-
dollars, which he had expended in the public service. The
first year’s instalment was repaid, and the residue assigned
on the customs. We are not aware whether he obtained it,
but when De Geer’s purchase of crown estates was con-
firnied, June 30, 1046, the earnest-money was remitted at his
request. Reg.
3 Ennobled in Sweden under the name of Ankarhielm.
’ "
King Gustavus Adolphus affirmed, that among all po-
tentates he esteemed the king of Denmark most, and with
no one preferably would keep good correspondence; the sole
obstacle to which was that he was a neighbour." Axel
Oxenstierna in the council. Palmsk. MSS. t. 190, p. 387.
2
"July 26, at six in the morning, happened this mis-
did Gustavus Adolphus say, that of all the rulers
of his time with whom politics did not pei-mit him
to maintain amity, he esteemed this sovereign the
most highly*. Both sides claimed tlie victory; but
it would have remained decisively with the Swedes,
if admiral Aco Ulfsparre had done with the right
wing of the fleet what was expected from him.
The high admiral Clas Fleming, after he had re-
turned to Christianspris, was struck on the 20th
July by a ball from a Danish battery 2, and in his
last moments transferred the command to the
general of infantry, Charles Gustave Wrangel,
who was now to find a new field of glory on the
sea. Meanwhile the imperial court, contrary to
the expectation of Oxenstierna, had determined
to send Gallas in pursuit of Torstenson, without
regard to the fortresses occupied by the Swedes, or
to the inroad of Ragotzi from Transylvania. The
attack on the Danish islands it was now necessary
to discontinue. "Gallas approaches with his whole
force, and we must desist from the plan concerted,"
Torstenson writes from his sick bed to Wrangel *,
by whom he intended to execute this attack. " I
wish the devil would take Gallas," Wrangel re-
plies in his vehement manner,
" he hinders me
from a great piece of fortune ;
I am the most
unlucky of men." Gallas, reinforced by a Danish
corp.s, broke into Holstein, and took Kiel, but con-
fined himself in this campaign to his old tactics
of sitting down in fortified camps, and avoiding
battles *. Torstenson committed the command in
Jutland and Holstein to colonel Hellmuth Wrangel,
and with an army reinforced and refreshed in their
late quarters, passed before the eyes of Gallas,
offered him battle in vain, and alluring him in pur-
suit to Gei’many, routed at length and destroyed
his whole army ^. Charles Gustave Wrangel was
confix-med by the government in the chief command
of the fleet, which he brought into port. Imme-
diately afterwards he led it to meet De Geer’s
squadron, which from Gottenburg had passed the
chance, that a spent ball, after glancing ofT the water in its
course, passed unexpectedly through the cabin of the ad-
miral’s ship, and carried away the leg of the admiral, Clas
Fleming, while washing himself there, so that he lived only
an hour and a half longer. His servant who stood by had
both legs carried away by the ball, which else did not do the
least damage. We have lost in Clas Fleming a true man,
and one indispensable to us." The administration to field-
marshal Gustave Horn, Aug. 6, 1644. Reg. In revenge,
Torstenson carried the redoubts of the Danes, cut down fif-
teen hundred men, and took six cannon.
3 Torstenson to C. G. Wrangel, Kiel, and Christianspris,
June 23, 1644. The draught of Wrangel’s answer is an-
nexed. Correspondence of Wrangel.
• On occasion of the camjiaign of the Imperialists in Hol-
stein a coin was struck in Hamburg, on the one side of which
were these words, "What Gallas achieved in Holstein you
may see on the other side." The reverse was left smooth
and without impression. Slange, History of Christian IV.
p. 1252.
5 " I doubt not that the field-marshal has signified to you
the ruin of the Imperialist main army." John Oxenstierna
(the chancellor’s son, envoy in Osnaburg,) to C. G. Wrangel.
Correspondence.
" You have done all well. For the rest,
we value your services so highly, that for your pains and
sufferings we would gladly grant you immediate furlough
and releasenient. But your success in war, and authority
over the foreign soldiery, are so great, and the circumstances
j’et so difficult, that we must beg you to have patience for
some time further." The administration to Torstenson, Oct.
26, 1644. Reg.
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