Peter the Great

by Robert K. Massie

Although, increasingly, infantry was the decisive arm, it still was the cavalry which provided the high drama and often, by breaking the enemy when he began to waver, carried the day. Light cavalry was used for screening the army, for reconnaissance, for foraging and for raiding. The Russians employed Cossacks for this purpose, and the Ottoman army, Tatars; the Swedes used the same horsemen in these peripheral duties and in the thick of battle. Heavy regular cavalry was organized into squadrons of 150 men, armored for battle in breastplates and backplates, and armed with swords and often pistols for use against ambush along the roads. In most modern armies of the day, the cavalry was as carefully and rigidly trained in tactical maneuver as the infantry. But there were limits on its use. One, obviously, was terrain; cavalry needed flat or gently rolling open fields. Another was the endurance of horses; even the best cavalry horses were reckoned capable of no more than five hours' fighting at a stretch. Still another was the growing destructiveness of infantry firepower. As flintlock muskets became more rapid-firing and accurate, cavalry had to beware. Neither Marlborough nor Charles XII sent cavalry into action until the climactic moment, when as a shock force it might break a crumbling enemy line, slam down on the flank of an advancing line of infantry or, in pursuit, turn a retreat into a rout.

  Despite such limitations, however, these were still the great days of cavalry (Waterloo with its massed cavalry charges was still a century away, and the charge of the Light Brigade at Balaclava a century and a half). From a quarter to a third of the men in most armies were horse soldiers, and in the Swedish army the proportion was higher. Charles trained his cavalry to attack in tight formations. The Swedish horse approached an enemy at a slow trot, riding in a wedge formation, knee to knee, one trooper locked in beside and slightly behind the next. Three ranks deep, this broad arrow bore down relentlessly on whatever opponent, mounted or on foot, its officers designated.

  Seen from afar, a cavalry charge made war seem beautiful: colorful squadrons of horsemen riding across an open field, their swords and breastplates flashing in the sun, their flags and pennants whipping in the wind, moving bravely toward an enemy line. But for those on the battlefield, it was a place of carnage, a corner of hell: cannon roaring and flashing; infantrymen struggling to keep their rigid formations and follow the commands to load and fire, while around their knees writhed the shattered bodies of comrades; men on horseback riding full tilt into a line of men on the ground; the force of impact, shouts, screams and grunts; men stumbling and falling; horsemen leaning from their saddles, slashing frantically with razorsharp blades at everyone in sight; the men on the ground thrusting upward toward the saddles with bayonets, catching riders in the chest, the legs, the back; on both sides, the instant of terrible pain, the last flash of surprise and recognition of what was happening, the overwhelming gush of bright-red blood; running men, riderless horses and, over it all, drifting clouds of thick, blinding, choking smoke. And when the firing had ceased and the smoke had lifted, a blood-soaked field carpeted with men still screaming or gasping, or lying quietly, gazing at heaven with unseeing eyes.

  Thus did the nations decide their differences.

  CHARLES XII

  The blond, blue-eyed child who became King Charles XII of Sweden was born on June 17, 1682, almost exactly ten years after the birth of his great antagonist, Peter of Russia. Charles' parents were Charles XI, a stern, deeply religious man who had himself become king at the age of five, and Queen Ulrika Eleonora, a Danish princess who had managed by her warmth of character to maintain the affection of both the Danish and Swedish people, even when the two countries were at war. Seven children had been born during the first seven years and nine months of their marriage, but only Prince Charles and two sisters, Hedwig Sophia, a year older than he, and Ulrika Eleonora, six years younger than Charles, had survived. Four younger brothers died, one after another, before reaching the age of two.

  Although Charles' body was frail, his boyhood was spent in rough, masculine activity. When he was only four, the people of Stockholm became accustomed to seeing his small figure in the saddle, riding behind his father at military reviews. At six, he was taken out of the care of women and installed in his own apartment with male tutors and servants. At seven he shot a fox, at eight he killed three deer in one day, at ten he killed his first wolf and at eleven his first bear. At eleven also, he lost the last element of feminine warmth in his life when his mother died at thirty-six. The Queen was beloved by her family, and at her death the King fainted and had to be bled and Prince Charles was carried to bed with a fever; soon after, he came down with smallpox, but his body was actually stronger after the disease than before. His face was pocked with deep scars, which he proudly considered marks of manliness. At fourteen, Charles had a slender, wiry body and was a superb horseman, an excellent hunter and an avid student of the military arts.

  After the death of Queen Ulrika, King Charles XI spent as much time as possible with his children, who reminded him of their mother. The Prince took on as many of his father's beliefs and mannerisms as he could; his speech became brief, dry and understated, saved from being hopelessly cryptic by occasional glimmers of sympathy and wit. Honor and the sanctity of one's word became his two cardinal principles: A king must put justice and honor ahead of everything; once given, his word must be kept.

  Charles' tutors found that he had a quick intelligence and learned easily. He did not much care for the Swedish language and always spoke and wrote it unevenly. German, the court language of all the northern kingdoms, came more easily to him and he used it as his mother tongue. He became extremely proficient in Latin, speaking it and listening to university lectures in it with much enjoyment. He was taught French, but, despite his tacit alliance with Louis XIV during his years of rule, he disliked speaking it; nevertheless, he read it with ease, and admired French theater. During his fifteen years of campaigning on the continent, he read and reread Corneille, Moliere and Racine. The idea of travel stirred him immensely and he devoured accounts and drawings by travelers and explorers. As a boy, he wistfully wished for a brother who might stay in Sweden to rule while he himself traveled the world. He was fascinated by history and biography, especially the lives of the military conquerors—Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar and Sweden's Gustavus Adolphus; later, he carried a biography of Alexander with him through all his campaigns, sometimes making specific comparisons between the Macedonian and his own military achievements. Charles was genuinely interested in religion. As a boy and young man, he spent an hour every morning with a bishop discussing the chapters of the Bible one by one. He was intrigued by mathematics and, like Peter, by its application to the arts of artillery ballistics and fortification. While his tutors admired his quick grasp, they worried about the strength of his will, which often seemed pure obstinacy. Once the Prince considered himself right, they discovered, it was impossible to change his mind.

  Charles' education, off to a good start, was permanently interrupted when he was fourteen. On April 5, 1697, King Charles XI died at forty-two of cancer of the stomach. Traditionally, Swedish princes did not reach their majority and could not be crowned until they were eighteen, and with this in mind, the dying King appointed a council of regents, including the boy's grandmother, the Dowager Queen Hedwig Eleonora. After his father's death, Charles attended meetings of the Regency Council and at first made an excellent impression by his intelligent questions and, even more, by his willingness to remain silent and listen to the debate among his elders. He also surprised everyone by his cool behavior during a great fire which destroyed the royal palace even as his father's body lay in state inside the building. In contrast to his grandmother, who totally lost her head, the boy calmly issued orders and saved the body from the flames although the building itself was reduced to ashes.

  Within six months, it became apparent that the Regency Council would not work. The Regents were divided in their opinions and often could not reach decisions, and Charles was too intelligent and too strongly attracted to powe
r to be left on the sidelines while others ruled his kingdom. The regents, reminded by the late King's will that they would be held responsible for their actions when young Charles reached his majority, grew eager to have his views on every subject under discussion. Increasingly, he was surrounded by those anxious to gain his favor, and the power of the regents was heavily undercut. The government of Sweden was lapsing into paralysis. The only solution, taken in November 1697, was to declare the boy, then fifteen, to be of age and to crown him King of Sweden.

  To most of his countrymen, Charles' coronation ceremony was a shock. He was succeeding to the crown as the sole and absolute ruler of Sweden, unchecked by council or parliament, and he meant to drive the point home in his coronation. He refused to be crowned as previous kings had been: by having someone else place the crown on his head. Instead, he declared that, as he had been born to the crown and not elected to it, the actual act of coronation was irrelevant. The statesmen of Sweden, both liberal and conservative, and even his own grandmother were aghast. Charles was put under intense pressure, but he did not give way on the essential point. He agreed only to allow himself to be consecrated by an archbishop, in order to accede to the Biblical injunction that a monarch be the Lord's Anointed, but he insisted that the entire ceremony be called a consecration, not a coronation. Fifteen-year-old Charles rode to the church with his crown already on his head.

  Those who looked for omens found many in the ceremony. By the new King's command, in respect for his father's memory, everyone present, himself included, was dressed in black; the only touch of color was the purple coronation mantle worn by the King. A violent snowstorm produced a stark contrast of black on white as the guests arrived at the church. The King slipped while mounting his horse with his crown on his head; the crown fell off and was caught by a chamberlain before it hit the ground. During the service, the archbishop dropped the horn of anointing oil. Charles refused to give the traditional royal oath and then, in the moment of climax, he placed the crown on his own head.

  This astonishing scene soon was followed by further evidence of the new King's character. The nobility, hoping that Charles would mitigate the stern "reduction" decrees, was distressed to find the young monarch determined to continue his father's policy. Members of the council shook their heads over the King's self-confidence, his obstinacy, his absolute refusal to turn back or change a decision once he had made it. At meetings, he would listen for a while, then stand and interrupt the dialogue, saying that he had heard enough, that he had made up his mind and that they had his permission to depart. Too late, the Swedish statesmen repented their hasty advancement of the King's coming of age. Now, they and the greatest power in Northern Europe were under the absolute power of a headstrong, willful adolescent. Feeling their hostility, Charles decided to downgrade, if not eliminate, the council. The old councilors and ministers were kept waiting in anterooms sometimes for hours before the King would see them— then, after listening briefly to their arguments, he would dismiss them. Only later would they learn what decisions had been taken on the gravest national matters.

  Charles' formal education came abruptly to an end; his indoor hours were now completely taken up by affairs of state. But he was still a vigorously healthy adolescent, attracted by violent physical exercise and a keen wish to test his body and spirit against a whole spectrum of physical challenges. To satisfy his urge to break free of responsibility and the reproachful words and glances of older people, he began taking long rides on horseback. Determined to absorb his energy and drive away his problems by shear physical exhaustion, he chose to concentrate on immediate challenges such as clearing a high wall on his favorite horse or beating a friend to a distant tree at a dead gallop. In the winter, accompanied only by a page and an officer of the guard, he left the palace in the darkness of early morning to ride through the forest among the lakes outside the capital. There were accidents. Once, in deep snow, his horse fell on him, pinioning him so that he could not move. As usual, he was far in advance of his companions, and by the time they found him he was nearly frozen. Another time, riding across a frozen lake, Charles had almost reached the far side when he found a fifteen-foot stretch of open water between himself and the bank. Although he could not swim, he urged his horse into the icy water and clung to its back while the animal swam across.

  Every sport had to provide him the thrill of danger—and the greater the danger, the more attraction it held for him. Just to prove that he could, he rode his horse straight up a steep cliff, and both horse and rider fell over backward; the horse was injured, but not the King. He raced toboggans down icy hills. He drove sledges at breakneck speed, sometimes fastening a number of sledges together in a long train down a slope. In spring, summer and fall, he hunted, but, having decided that it was cowardly to hunt with firearms, he took only a pike and a cutlass when he went in search of bears. After a while, he decided that even the use of steel was unfair, and he went with only a strong wooden pitchfork. The sport was to taunt the cornered bear until it rose on its hind legs, then spring forward and catch it in the throat with the fork and hurl it over backward, whereupon the King's companions would hurry to bind the animal in a net.

  Even more dangerous were the military games Charles loved. As Peter had done at Preobrazhenskoe, Charles divided his friends and staff into two companies, equipping them with staves and supposedly harmless hand grenades made of pasteboard which nevertheless exploded with painful effect. While the King was storming a snowy rampart, one such blast shredded his clothing and wounded several of his friends.

  The King's closest companion and greatest competitor in these martial sports was Arvid Horn, a young captain of the elite Royal Cavalry Guards, the Drabants. The Drabants were essentially a kind of cadet corps, whose ranks were filled with men who would eventually become officers of the Swedish army; indeed, each cavalryman in the ranks was already a future lieutenant and, as such, received a lieutenant's pay. With Horn at his side, Charles threw himself fervently into the vigorous and often violent training program of the Drabants. Frequently, two groups of horsemen, with Charles commanding one and Horn the other, rode at each other without saddles, using stout hazel sticks as weapons. Blows were given with maximum force; no one, not even the King, was spared. In one such fray, Charles, trading blows with Horn, lost his temper and lashed out at his adversary's face, which was not permitted. As it happened, Charles' blow landed on an already swollen boil on Horn's cheek. The Captain fell fainting from his saddle, was carried to bed and developed a fever. In an anguish of guilt, Charles visited him every day.

  Sometimes the mock battles took place at sea. The royal yacht and other ships in Stockholm harbor were rigged with fire pumps and hoses to serve as cannon and maneuvered as if in battle. On one of these occasions, Horn stripped off most of his clothes and jumped from his yacht into a rowboat, rowing vigorously straight at the King. He was repelled by powerful jets of water from Charles' ship which soon filled Horn's small dinghy so that it began to sink. Horn leaped into the water and calmly swam around to the other side of the royal ship. Charles, leaning over the rail, shouted down to ask his friend whether swimming was difficult. "No," cried Horn, "not as long as you are not afraid."

  Stung by the challenge, Charles immediately leaped into the water. Unfortunately, he did not know how to swim. He was thrashing violently but sinking when Horn grabbed him by his clothes and towed him ashore.

  To his elders, the King's behavior seemed recklessly dangerous, but Charles in fact was teaching himself the lessons of war. He set out deliberately to harden himself and to increase his resistance to fatigue. Having slept half the night in bed, he would rise and spend the rest of the night half naked on the bare floor. One week in winter, he slept three nights without undressing in a freezing stable, covered by hay. He was ashamed of any sign of weakness. He considered his delicate, fair skin to be effeminate and tried to darken it in the sun. He wore the traditional wig only until he began his first campaign against Denmark, t
hen he threw it away and never wore another.

  His older sister, Hedwig Sophia, was his closest friend as a child, but Charles saw no other girls and came to dislike the society of women. He was cold, arrogant and violent, and there was nothing warm or inviting about his personality to attract the opposite sex—except his rank. As sovereign of the leading state in Northern Europe, Charles was of great interest to. monarchs and foreign ministers eager to make alliances through royal marriages. Even in his early years, six different princesses were proposed to him. Nothing came of it, and for a long time even the mention of marriage distressed him. The only serious candidate was Princess Sophia of Denmark, five years older than Charles, who could not be considered after the Great Northern War began and Denmark became one of his enemies.

  In 1698, a different impending marriage brought him a new companion when his cousin Frederick IV, Duke of Holstein-Gottorp, arrived in Stockholm to marry Hedwig Sophia. The Duke was six years older than Charles, and even more frenetically madcap. From April to August, he egged Charles into a spate of wild behavior which came in Sweden to be known as "the Gottorp Fury." Together with a suite of high-spirited young men who accompanied the Duke, the two cousins competed in wild and dangerous pranks. They raced their horses until the exhausted animals collapsed foaming to the ground. They chased a wild hare around the gallery of the Parliament building. They shattered palace windows with pistol balls and threw tables and chairs down into the palace courtyard. At dinner, it was said, they threw cherry pits in the faces of the King's ministers and knocked dishes from the servants! hands. In broad daylight, they galloped through the streets, waving naked swords and jerking hats and wigs from the heads of anyone within reach. In the middle of the night, when they came back from their little rides, galloping and shouting through the silent streets, townspeople who stumbled to their windows saw their King, his shirttails flying, riding after the Duke. Once, the King even led his Holstein comrades on horseback into a room where his grandmother, the Dowager Queen, was playing cards. The old lady collapsed in fright.