The Lands of Germany (and Neighbors), 1649 part 2:
In May 1649 Duke Leopold publicly accuses Philip Sigismund of illegal sequestration of princely lands, including although not restricted to Bavaria and Wurttemberg. He demands that a long list of territory be returned to their designated owners, which if followed would completely undermine the Emperor’s efforts both to compensate Rhineland princes for holdings lost to the Triunes and to reward his supporters at the expense of his enemies. Considering that, it is unsurprising that Philip Sigismund categorically rejects Leopold’s demands.
This guaranteed-to-be-ineffectual opening salvo publicly reveals Leopold as coming out against Philip and by definition his patron Henri II, a dangerous gambit at this point as his only serious ally is Elizabeth and her still-distant Russian army. But Leopold still considers the move to have been necessary, in order to establish his legal credentials before moving against the coronated Emperor, as well as to establish himself, not Elizabeth, as the face of German opposition to Philip and Henri. On these tacks, he is entirely successful.
With Leopold now an open enemy, Philip decides to attack Saxony before the Russians can arrive, on the reasonable assumption that Saxons without allies will be an easier target than Saxons with them. However, the optics look bad. Leopold had issued a legal challenge to Philip, and has reinforcements on the way, but within Germany itself Philip looks like an overreacting aggressor, rather than Leopold appearing as a foreign-backed rebel.
The conduct of the actual operation makes the optics even worse. The Imperial expedition is hastily organized and it shows. Logistics are threadbare, with Imperial units having to resort to ‘aggressive foraging’, devastating everyone and everything unfortunate enough to be in the way. Leopold has the disadvantage in overall numbers and firepower (Philip’s units are generously supplied with Triune artillery, including the magnificent 15-pounders now renowned from Portugal to Persia as the best heavy field or light siege cannon in the world) but due to the Imperial need to spread out to forage, he can concentrate for local superiority. Importantly, he is able to drive the Imperial troops out of Saxon territory before the Russians reach his eastern frontier, strongly enhancing his own prestige and seriously weakening Philip’s portrayal of him as a foreign puppet.
Philip’s forces, while repulsed, have not been too badly damaged so he reforms them for another effort, but now there is no chance of avoiding joint Saxon-Russian forces so he requests aid from Henri II. Given his constant criticism of Elizabeth as being in cahoots with foreigners, it is not a good look, but success will cover a multitude of sins. Henri II agrees to grant the aid, hopeful that a major Imperial victory will bolster Philip’s standing enough so that he can then make the concessions that Henri desires.
The main Triune contribution comes from the garrison of Magdeburg, a legacy of the defeat of the Ravens. Drawing supplies from Anhalt, the Imperial-Triune force, numbering about forty thousand, heads south for Leipzig, and is met by the slightly smaller Saxon-Russian army near the village of Breitenfeld. The Lady Elizabeth, although not her son who remains for safety in Moscow (there is some, but inconclusive, evidence that Leopold insisted on that), accompanies the army although she plays no command role.
There is some skirmishing on September 16, but the battle proper begins the next day with an artillery duel in which the Triunes prevail. The Imperials and Triunes then launch an infantry assault, aiming at the juncture between the Saxon and Russian forces. Despite their artillery dominance, the attackers find it tough going, hampered by stout Russian earthen redoubts. Meanwhile two thousand Russians have worked their way around the Imperial-Triune flank, attacking just as the Imperial-Triune assault is stalled. Alarmed, the Imperial-Triune force gives way and retreats, ceding the battlefield to the Saxons and Russians.
It is hardly an overwhelming victory, with casualties relatively light on both sides, although six Triune cannons are captured. The Imperial-Triune army is intact and still capable of combat operations, raiding and harrying western Saxony, and the Saxons and Russians have less success in parrying these operations than they did at Breitenfeld. But as a moral victory it is a massive boost to the winners. It is the first time someone has stood up to Philip Sigismund and Henri II and gotten away with it and so Leopold’s and Elizabeth’s credibility as serious opponents to those two Emperors is greatly strengthened.
Duke Karl of Brandenburg joins the coalition after confirmation of Breitenfeld reaches him, also demanding that the Emperor return the lands of Bavaria and Wurttemberg to Karl Manfred, Elizabeth’s son. Given that example of Philip Sigismund’s willingness to sequester lands, Karl doesn’t trust Philip. The pair have interacted going back as far as the campaigns in Bulgaria, in which both participated, and Karl has always been suspicious.
Adding an Elector is always a useful political gain, especially as it helps to secure Saxony’s northern frontier, but in terms of material gain Karl’s support is not too significant. Of greater potential is King Stephan, but there are issues with him joining a movement led by Duke Leopold of Saxony. Saxony was, briefly, under Bohemian control until it was wrested from Stephan by Philip and Henri, which is how Leopold became Duke of Saxony in the first place.
Stephan does not expect to get all of Saxony back, but he does want some sweetener for his support. The haggling goes back and forth for some weeks at the end of 1649, but eventually Leopold agrees that the revenues from several monastic holdings in Saxony will go to the Bohemian crown for Stephan’s lifetime. It is the classic case of a compromise that annoys everyone.
Stephan feels that this really isn’t enough, especially since he needs to sell this war with his Bohemian, Austrian, and Hungarian subjects. They are concerned about another Triune offensive like the one narrowly averted with the cession of Saxony. And even if the Triunes and Philip can be held at bay, there is concern especially in Vienna and Buda that this might trigger a Roman intervention from the other side. They certainly don’t want that. Meanwhile Leopold is irritated by the loss of those incomes, which he especially needs to help fund an army considering the enemies he has just made.
Despite the glad tidings with which news of Breitenfeld is received throughout most of the Holy Roman Empire, Karl and Stephan are the only princes that join with Leopold and Elizabeth at this juncture. This is a coalition of a few large eastern princes. The rest of the Imperial principalities, smaller and within closer striking distance of Imperial and Triune power, are not willing to come off the fence just yet. Breitenfeld was a victory, but a defensive one, and achieved over a fraction of the foe’s might. There were about 15,000 Triune troops on the field that day, but fifteen years earlier three Triune field armies that combined were ten times that size had overrun the Rhineland.
It is possible that now, with the Dukes of Saxony and Brandenburg there to give a masculine German face to the enterprise, more Russian aid would’ve convinced the fence-sitters to come down. But that is not forthcoming. For starters, Elizabeth’s initial success had been based on personal contact and she is now in Dresden, not Moscow. Long-distance charm offensives are rarely as effective. Some have criticized Elizabeth for traveling with the Russian army to Saxony rather than remaining in Moscow for this reason, but she feared that if she were not present in Germany, Leopold might hijack the mission and forgo the goals for which Elizabeth is fighting, the return of Bavaria (especially) and Wurttemberg to the House of Wittelsbach. She absolutely can’t do that from Moscow.
She did leave Karl Manfred behind in Moscow, and in a probably unique turn of events, the climate seems to do him good. Perhaps it is the fact that after the promise of Russian aid, he has been living as an honored guest with the Tsar and his family. Well treated and well fed, probably feeling safe and secure for the first time he can remember, he grows and matures marvelously, starting to physically look his age by the beginning of 1650. He especially gets along well with the two princesses, Ekaterina and Yevgenia, who are around his age.
Karl Manfred couldn’t ask for better treatment, but while the Russians are willing to aid his and his mother’s cause, it is clear they have other priorities. After the initial dispatch, a trickle of Russian reinforcements has gone west, but they serve to make up for losses rather than enlarging the expedition. If the Germans want to expel the Triunes from Germany, they’re going to have to do most of the work themselves.
The twenty thousand Russians in Saxony contrast strongly with the sixty thousand Russians put into the field at the same time, but in a different theater. Most are besieging St. Petersburg, but ten thousand have reinforced the Prussians, who have joined with the Russians in attacking Scandinavia in the hopes of retaking Reval. [1] Both are legacy Scandinavian conquests from the Great Northern War, the former having been built by the Scandinavians to secure said conquests. These two cities are the unfinished business, and the Russians are determined that this time, unlike in the 1630s, they will finish it.
Despite the outlay of troops, the Russians don’t finish this in 1649. The Scandinavians have complete control of the sea so a blockade is impossible. Russian gun emplacements and mining efforts hammer at the landward defenses with devastating but not quite decisive results. Meanwhile the Scandinavians retaliate with coastal raids and sallies from garrisons in Finland, but while annoying and locally destructive, these are little more than pinpricks from the Russian perspective.
Fending off the Russians will require the full strength of Scandinavia, so they can be of no assistance to Henri II, much to his irritation. The reason why he’d supported their seizure of Schleswig-Holstein a decade earlier was so that they could be a flank threat to any of his German opponents. Instead in the winter he gets constant intelligence reports that the coalition is stirring up the Pomeranian countryside with the goal of restoring Duke Wartislaw. With Scandinavian garrisons there being drawn down to be sent to Estonia, these efforts have a good chance of success.
Still, the loss of Scandinavian support is just annoying, hardly a fatal wound. Breitenfeld saw the loss of some face, but not much else. The power of the Triple Monarchy is not so easily undone.
[1] The existence of the Kingdom of Prussia itself is another legacy of the Great Northern War, with a united Russia a clear danger to Prussia if revanchism should take hold in Moscow. To avert that, Prussian policy is to stay on as good as terms as possible with Russia. But even if that were not so, taking Reval from the Scandinavians would be to Prussia’s benefit.
