Full resolution (JPEG) - On this page / på denna sida - XVIII. Christina's Minority. The Guardians. A.D. 1633—1645
<< prev. page << föreg. sida << >> nästa sida >> next page >>
Below is the raw OCR text
from the above scanned image.
Do you see an error? Proofread the page now!
Här nedan syns maskintolkade texten från faksimilbilden ovan.
Ser du något fel? Korrekturläs sidan nu!
This page has never been proofread. / Denna sida har aldrig korrekturlästs.
320
Naval victorj’.
Peace of Briimsebro. HISTORY OF THE SWEDES. Cefsions by Denmark.
Grants to Oxenstierna. [1645—
Sound, and awaited the Swedish fleet at Calmar.
The combined fleet, of forty-two vessels in all, met
that of Denmark, numbering seventeen ships of
war, between Zealand and Femern, and obtained
over it on the 13th October so complete a victory,
that ten ships were taken, two burned, three driven
on shore, and only two escaped.
The naval war in the following year (1645), with
the exception of the capture of Bornholra by
Wrangel, offers nothing remarkable^, although that
commander was now supported by admiral Erie
Ryning, and a fleet equipped by the States-general
cruised in the Sound. Hence the Dutch commission-
ers, who had attended the negotiation for peace at
Bromsebro, now abandoned their pretended charac-
ter of mediators, and passed over to the Swedes ’.
The peace was mediated by France^. It was con-
cluded after eighteen months’ negotiation, during
which the chancellor, who wrote with his own hand
the larger portion of the notes, had to contend not
only with the enemy and the mediator, but with the
constantly rising opposition, favourable to peace, in
the Swedish council, upon which the queen, now at
the age of nineteen, expressed herself with equal
amiability and frankness. "
Among the causes," she
declares,
" which have moved me to let you come
down by degrees so far (in respect to the conditions
of peace), it is not the least, that I well perceive the
greatest portion of our council of state to be of quite
a different opinion from you and me. 1 will accuse
no one, but yet I surely believe that time will bring
ray words true, and I shall perchance hear more
of it in this commission of the estates. You may
well think how hard it must be for me to lay stress
upon matters, which I know that some would find
it very expedient to remit ; especially as it would
be disavowed perhaps, in case of any ill
success, by
those who ought in fairness to defend counsels
adopted with their own consent. Then would my
innocent youth be subjected to calumny, as having
been incapable of taking wholesome advice, and
6 " The weather this summer has been unfavourable for
the fleet. The design on the islands must be postponed to
a better opportunity. I advise keeping the fleet together,
the more that peace is near." Oxenstierna to C. G. Wrangel,
Siideraker, Aug. 1 and 6, 1645. Correspondence.
7 " I have been advised by the Dutch envoys at the peace-
congress, that they have crossed the border to the Swedes,
and conformably to the orders of their principals, have an-
nounced to the Danish commissaries, that they demand
satisfaction in respect to the complaints of the States-general
touching the tolls in the Sound and in Norway, and that they
will take part with the Swedes." Field-marshal Gustave
Horn to C. G. Wrangel, Fielkinge, May 20, 1645. " The
news is, that the States-general are most firmly resolved to
maintain their interests in commerce against Denmark, and
are now fitting out a fleet of fifty ships of war, with eight
thousand mariners and two thousand soldiers." The Swedish
re.sident Harald Appelbom to C. G. Wrangel, Amsterdam,
March 29, 1645. "To-day the Dutch fleet hopes to set sail,
so that we may soon hear what miracle they will perform in
the Sound. The resolution is to convoy the merchant-sliips
through it, and on the smallest hostility shown by the Danes,
to give them powder and lead to the full." The same to the
same, Amsterdam, June 10, 1645. Letter from the Dutch
admiral Cornelius de Witte to Wrangel (without date), that
he has come with forty-nine shijis of war and three hundred
merchantmen into the Baltic, has stationed ships both in the
Sound and the Belts to protect the Dutch navigation, and is
now in sight of the Danish fleet. C. G. Wrangel’s Cor.
8
Through the ambassador de la Thuillerie. Salvius
writes to John Oxenstierna, Jan. .’;, 1644, "By Rorte and
having committed such errors from the libido domi-
nandi ; since I well foresee it will be my fate that
if I should effect aught with pains-taking and pru-
dence, others will have the honour of it; but where
others neglect what they should take to heed, the
blame must be mine 3."
The peace with Denmark was signed at Bromsebro,
August 1 3, 1645, on the frontier of Bleking and Sma-
land. Sweden obtained the most unrestricted fi-eedom
from tolls in the Sound and Belts i, which was now
also expressly extended to ships of Finland and
Livonia, Pomerania, and Wismar; Denmark ceded
to Sweden the provinces of Jemteland and Herje-
dale, the islands of Gottland and ffisel, with Hal-
land for thirty years, not to be restored even then
without an equivalent. Bremen, taken from king
Christian’s son by Konigsmark (whom Torstenson
had left behind him upon his expedition against
Holstein), remained in the possession of Sweden.
On the chancellor’s return from the peace-con-
gress in Bromsebro, the queen advanced him to be
count of Sodermoere^ ;
a reward that was made
still more flattering by the manner in which it was
conferred. He had been, the queen upon this occa-
sion observed in the council, a great minister to a
great king ;
he had, when God called her father
out of the world, and she was left a child under
age, well warded and instructed her youth; hehad
with his colleagues faithfully served his father-
land, so that she had found all
things in good
order on her accession to the government ;
he had,
although possessing great power, never forgotten
towards her the duty of a subject :
lastly, he had
enhanced his merits towards his country, by having
brought the war with Denmark to a desirable issue,
which she ascribed pre-eminently to his capacity,
skill, and great qualities ^.
This was, without doubt, the moment in the life
of Axel Oxenstierna most full of honour. It was
also the last which was sweetened to hint by the
gratitude of the daughter of Gustavus Adolphus.
St. Romain I remark, that the French are much dissatisfled
with Torstenson’s irruption (into Holstein). The cause
seems partly to be that they would not gladly see Sweden
become too powerful by the occupation of Denmark, or set
up a universal monarchy in the north, as Rorte laughingly
observed. It gives great umbrage that Sweden has now
already occupied all the principal provinces on the Baltic —
Ingermanland, Livonia, Pomerania, Mecklenburg, Holstein,
Jutland—and thus Denmark is as it were blockaded round."
Fant, Handlingar, iv. 96.
9
Arckenholtz, Mem. de Christine, i. 65.
1
The Swedes on their side could not find words enough
to express this freedom. In the answer of the Swedish
council to the Danish, March 2, 1644, it is said, "Her ma-
jesty will permit no limitation of the Swedish freedom of
trade in the Sound, under any interpretation, but will possess
this freedom for herself and her subjects, undisturbed, un-
circumscribed, unlimited, unburdened, unhindered, unob-
structed." Reg.
2 Count’s patent for Axel Oxenstierna over the hundred of
South Mcere in Smaland, for a county, with eleven parishes,
for himself and his heirs, Nov. 19, 1645. Reg. The re-
venues were valued at 15,000 rix-doUars yearly. Aug. 20 of
the same year, tlie chancellor had received a donation of the
manor-house of Kongsberg in the hundred of Aker in
Suthermanland, with several islands in the Ma^Iar, in all
thirty-seven hydes. To these were added on the 10th De-
cember twenty-one and three-quarters hydes more, and the
s.ame day the chancellor received permission to buy the
freehold for ever of all these crown-fiefs. Reg
3
Arckenholtz, 1. c. 70.
<< prev. page << föreg. sida << >> nästa sida >> next page >>
