The Battle of Grengam (Russian: Гренгамское морское сражение, Swedish: Slaget vid Ledsund or Slaget vid Föglöfjärden1, Finnish: Flisön taistelu) of 1720 was the last major naval battle of the Great Northern War. It took place in Åland, in the Ledsund strait between the island communities of Föglö and Lemland. Russian forces captured four Swedish vessels, and the battle is generally regarded as a Russian victory; however, the extent of Russian losses and the strategic significance of the result have been disputed in later historiography.2345 Russian forces conducted further operations against the Swedish coast in 1721 before the Treaty of Nystad ended the war.6
Location of the battle
The main shipping route between the ports of Stockholm in Sweden and Turku in Finland passes through the Åland Islands. It enters the Ledsund strait from south-west with Föglö on the south-east side and Lemland on the north-west.7 An anchorage (60°0′0″N 20°18′0″E / 60.00000°N 20.30000°E / 60.00000; 20.30000) off the shore of Flisö in Föglö is protected from the prevailing south-westerly winds by two small islands. This anchorage was previously called Granhamn, Swedish for 'Spruce harbor'. On modern maps it is marked as Rödskärs flädan after the larger of the two protecting islands.8 The smaller island is now called Granhamnsholmen ('Granhamn's island'). It should not be confused with the island also named Granhamn in the Stockholm archipelago.
Name
The word Grengam in the name of the battle is a romanization of Гренгам, which is the traditional Russian cyrillization of Gränhamn, an older spelling of Granhamn. The spelling Gränhamn was used on Hans Hansson's map of Åland from about 1650.8 In Sweden the battle is known as the Battle of Ledsund after the Ledsund strait.1 In Finland the name Battle of Flisö (Finnish: Flisön meritaistelu) is used.9
Battle
The surviving Russian and Swedish accounts differ in emphasis and in their assessment of the damage inflicted on the opposing fleet, but allow the general course of the engagement to be reconstructed.
Approach to Grengam
On 26 July 1720 (O.S.), Russian reconnaissance vessels reported a Swedish squadron in the area of Lemland. The Russian force under General Mikhail Golitsyn consisted of a large galley fleet accompanied by smaller rowing craft. The Swedish force commanded by Vice Admiral Carl Georg Siöblad included the ship of the line Pommern, four larger vessels and several smaller craft.104
A strong wind initially made an attack by the Russian rowing fleet impractical. Golitsyn therefore moved his force toward the waters around Granhamn and the entrance to Flisesund, where the numerous skerries, shoals and narrow channels restricted the freedom of manoeuvre of the deeper-draught Swedish sailing ships.1011 According to the Russian reconstruction, the intention was to engage the Swedish force under conditions more favourable to the manoeuvrable rowing vessels rather than fight the Swedish sailing squadron in open water.11
On 27 July, Siöblad moved toward the Russian fleet. Golitsyn initially withdrew deeper toward the skerries, and the Swedish ships followed. The manoeuvre brought the leading Swedish vessels into the restricted waters near Flisö and the approaches to Flisesund.104
Engagement
According to Hornborg's reconstruction of the Swedish sources, Pommern and four accompanying vessels advanced among the Russian galleys while other Swedish light vessels remained farther out. The Swedish ships opened fire with their broadsides, while nearby Russian vessels were also engaged with musket fire.4 Swedish contemporary accounts emphasized the damage caused during this phase of the battle, describing Russian craft as being driven ashore, disabled or sunk.4
The Swedish advance, however, carried the larger sailing ships into increasingly confined and shallow water. Danska Örn was among the first vessels to run aground. Siöblad brought Pommern close to the stranded vessel and continued firing into the Russian galley formation while attempts were made to assist the frigate.4 During the fighting the other Swedish vessels involved in the close action also lost much of their freedom of manoeuvre, either through grounding or damage to their rigging.4
At this point the Russian galleys changed from withdrawal to attack. Rowing vessels approaching from the direction of Flisö closed on the immobilized or slowly moving Swedish ships, while other Russian craft moved behind them and made withdrawal toward open water more difficult.114 The engagement developed into close-range artillery and small-arms fighting followed by boarding actions.
Krotov's examination of the surviving Russian documentation gives some indication of the intensity of the close action. The records state that the Russian troops expended 31,506 musket cartridges and threw 546 hand grenades during the battle.11 Russian galleys carried large numbers of soldiers in addition to their crews, giving Golitsyn a substantial concentration of men for boarding once the Swedish vessels could no longer freely manoeuvre.11
Four Swedish vessels were eventually boarded and captured: the 34-gun Stor Phoenix, the 30-gun Vainqueur, the 22-gun Kiskin and the 18-gun Danska Örn. Siöblad's Pommern continued to engage the Russian force while the captured vessels were being overwhelmed and was itself exposed to close fighting, but the ship ultimately succeeded in disengaging and reaching the more open waters outside the skerries.412
Hornborg describes Siöblad's escape as requiring a difficult manoeuvre after Pommern found itself with shoal water to leeward. The flagship eventually turned away, abandoned an anchor in the process, and sailed out toward the open fjord.4 The remaining Swedish vessels outside the immediate close action also withdrew.
Immediate losses
The first Russian report listed 103 Swedish personnel killed and 407 captured aboard the four seized vessels, together with 104 captured guns.13 A later corrected Russian return increased the number of prisoners to 411, eight of whom had subsequently died of their wounds.5
The Russian rowing fleet also sustained considerable damage. The contemporary Russian damage return listed 43 damaged galleys: 13 in the vanguard, 17 in the centre and 13 in the rear guard. One 30-oared galley, Wesfish, was specifically recorded as having sunk near the shore and subsequently been burned after its stores had been removed.1311 The interpretation of the figure of 43 damaged galleys became the subject of a later historiographical dispute, discussed in the aftermath section.
The contemporary Russian personnel return recorded 82 killed, 203 wounded and another 43 men in the separate category opaleno (опалено, "scorched" or burned), giving a total of 328 casualties.135
Aftermath
Both Russian and Swedish accounts presented the outcome of the battle favourably to their own side, although they differed substantially in their assessment of Russian losses. The clearest material result was the Russian capture of four Swedish vessels: the 34-gun Stor Phoenix, the 30-gun Vainqueur, the 22-gun Kiskin and the 18-gun Danska Örn.23 This material result is generally treated as a Russian victory, while the damage suffered by the Russian galley fleet and its effect on subsequent operations have produced differing assessments of the scale and strategic value of that victory.45 No naval battle of a similar scale took place between the Russian and Swedish navies after Grengam before the war ended with the Treaty of Nystad in 1721.
Contemporary Russian records
The initial Russian returns accompanying General Mikhail Golitsyn's report of 31 July 1720 listed Swedish losses on the four captured vessels as 103 killed and 407 captured. Historian Pavel Krotov notes that a subsequent corrected return increased the number captured to 411, eight of whom had died of their wounds by the time the document was compiled; losses aboard the Swedish vessels which escaped were not completely recorded.5
The published Russian casualty return, reproduced in the 1865 documentary collection Materials for the History of the Russian Fleet, recorded 82 killed, 203 wounded and a separate category of 43 men described as opaleno (опалено, "scorched" or burned), for a total of 328 casualties.13 Krotov identifies the 43 men in the last category as having suffered burns in a powder explosion.5 The frequently quoted figure of 82 killed and 246 wounded combines the 203 wounded with these 43 separately recorded burn casualties.134
The same 1865 collection reproduces a return explicitly headed "Statement of the number of damaged Russian galleys during the capture of the Swedish frigates". It lists 13 damaged galleys in the vanguard, 17 in the centre and 13 in the rear guard, or 43 in total. Of these, one 30-oared galley, Wesfish, is specifically recorded as having sunk and subsequently been burned near the shore.13 On the basis of the surviving archival damage return, Krotov likewise concludes that Wesfish was the only Russian galley put out of action, while the remaining vessels listed in the return had sustained varying degrees of damage.5
Swedish accounts and later historiography
Contemporary Swedish narratives reported inflicting heavy damage on the Russian rowing fleet and described Russian vessels as being sunk, run down or driven ashore.4 The specific claim that 43 Russian galleys were destroyed or so severely damaged that they were subsequently burned, however, became prominent in later historiography through the nineteenth-century Russian naval historian Feodosii Veselago.
In his 1944 study of the battle, Swedish naval historian Eirik Hornborg explicitly attributed the figure to Veselago, writing that Veselago, who had used contemporary Russian source material, stated that 43 of the 61 Russian galleys had been destroyed or damaged so badly that the Russians burned them after the battle.4 Veselago had written in 1875 that Swedish artillery had damaged 43 of the 61 galleys to such an extent that they subsequently had to be burned.14
Accepting this interpretation, Hornborg reasoned that the reported Russian personnel losses of 328 could not represent the total casualties of the fleet. Since he believed that more than 70 per cent of the Russian galleys had been destroyed, and noted that their troops and rowers were densely concentrated on exposed decks, he argued that the actual Russian losses must have been substantially greater. He therefore proposed that the reported 328 casualties represented only the losses aboard the surviving galleys involved in the capture of the four Swedish vessels.4 Helmer Tegengren had similarly questioned the official Russian casualty figures on the assumption that 43 Russian galleys had been destroyed.5
Krotov later challenged the basis of this interpretation by comparing the later accounts with the surviving Russian damage documentation. He argued that Veselago had misinterpreted the return of 43 damaged galleys as meaning that all 43 were subsequently destroyed or burned. The published return itself distinguishes between the 43 vessels recorded as damaged and the single galley, Wesfish, specifically recorded as having sunk and been burned.135 Krotov consequently rejected the higher estimates of Russian personnel losses advanced by Tegengren and Hornborg, since these estimates were reconstructions based principally on the assumed destruction of 43 galleys rather than independent contemporary casualty counts.5
Hornborg himself also noted that another claim repeated in several later Swedish narratives—that two Russian galleys had been sunk at the beginning of the battle—could not be found in any contemporary document known to him.4 The scale of Russian losses at Grengam has therefore been the subject of considerable historiographical disagreement, and higher estimates based on the supposed destruction of 43 galleys should be distinguished from the figures recorded in the contemporary casualty and damage returns.
Commemoration
The Battle of Grengam, like the earlier Battle of Gangut in 1714, was fought on 27 July (Old Style), the feast day of Saint Panteleimon. The coincidence of the two Russian naval victories with the saint's feast day led to his commemoration becoming closely associated with both battles in Saint Petersburg.15 The Battle of Grengam, like the earlier Battle of Gangut in 1714, was fought on 27 July (Old Style), the feast day of Saint Panteleimon. The coincidence of the two Russian naval victories with the saint's feast day led to his commemoration becoming closely associated with both battles in Saint Petersburg.15
A chapel dedicated to Saint Panteleimon had been erected in 1718 for the workers of the Particular Shipyard, a shipyard for civilian vessels situated on the Fontanka opposite the Summer Garden. Following the victory at Grengam, a church dedicated to the same saint was consecrated there in 1722. The present Church of St. Panteleimon was subsequently built on the site in 1735–1739 to a design by Ivan Korobov, an architect of the Admiralty. The single-domed church and its bell tower were constructed in the Petrine Baroque style.15
The church developed into a memorial associated with the Russian Navy's victories at both Gangut and Grengam. In 1914, on the initiative of the Imperial Russian Military Historical Society, marble memorial plaques were installed on its façades listing the regiments and ships that had taken part in the two battles.15 The building was closed as a church in the Soviet period, and in 1980 it was transferred to the Museum of the History of Leningrad for an exhibition known as the Gangut Memorial, preserving its association with the naval victories of the Great Northern War.15
Sources
- Wilson, Alastair, Callo, Joseph F., Who's who in Naval History: From 1550 to the Present, Routledge, 2004 ISBN 0-415-30828-3
- Morfill, William Richard, A History of Russia: From the Birth of Peter the Great to Nicholas II, James Pott Publisher, London, 1902 OCLC 187203793
- George Bruce. Harbottle's Dictionary of Battles. Van Nostrand Reinhold, 1981 ISBN 0-442-22336-6
- (in Swedish) Gunnar Unger (1923). Illustrerad svensk sjökrigshistoria, omfattande tiden 1680–1814. Albert Bonniers Förlag, Stockholm. OCLC 464453197
- (in Swedish) Magnus Ullman, Rysshärjningarna på Ostkusten sommaren 1719 ISBN 9789163176029
Notes