Biography - Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden

Hello everyone, this is 3 years history and today I will do a biography on Gustavus Adolphus. Gustav II Adolf, or Gustavus Adolphus in latin, was the king of Sweden from 1611 to his death in 1630 and was the founder of the Swedish Empire. He was born on December 9th, 1594 as the first son of Charles IX and Christina of Holstein-Tottorp. When he was born, the king of Sweden was Sigismund and he was also the king of Poland. Between Gustav Adolf and the throne was a little line of princes who all had a right to be king before him if everything was going to go as planned, but it didn't. His father took power and put himself on the throne. When Gustav Adolf was 12, he became crown prince. In 1620, Gustav Adolf married Maria Eleonora of Brandenburg. They had two children, two girls. The other girl died and the other child lived to be queen Christina. Gustav Adolf was only 16 when his father died and he became king and Sweden was when Gustav Adolf became king at war with Denmark, Russia and Poland. The war with Denmark was a bloody one and Gustav Adolf took part in the war and he was very close to be killed when his horse fell through the ice, but he escaped in time. Sweden had very few successes in that war and when peace resigned, there were no territorial change for both sides for now. The war with Russia had already been going on for a few years when Gustav Adolf became king. During this time, it was a time of troubles in Russia when several persons called themselves czar. Sweden supported one of these persons, Jakob Delegardy. He captured Moscow to play a Swedish candidate on the Russian throne. Delegardy was later forced to leave Moscow and he captured Novgorod and there he managed to get a part of the Russians to make Gustav Adolf's brother Carl Philipp the new czar in Russia. A Russian delegation arrived in Sweden to take home the new czar, but in Vyborg they heard that the Russians had united and elected another candidate, Mikhail Romanov. It was very close that Russia would have a czar named Vasa. Gustav Adolf was at the Russian front two times and when he was in Helsinki, he got the Finns to take part in the war against Russia and with troops from France, Scotland, Germany and Ireland won Sweden huge military successes who led to the peace at Stolbova. Sweden got Karelia and Inria from Russia and now Russia was landlocked from the Baltic Sea for over 100 years. The Polish war was about the Baltic and Gustav Adolf and his brother took part in the campaign. In 1621, Riga was captured and after a few more successes, Sweden had now Estonia, Latvia and a part of Lithuania. The Swedish warship Vasa is a good example how fast Sweden wanted to But it's a fact that Sweden at that time had Europe's modern, best trained and well working army. The Swedish soldiers could load and fire their muskets three times faster than the enemy and the Swedish cannons were much lighter. The cannons could be moved by two horses or four men in battle, while the enemy needed four horses to move their cannons. He also made improvements in the cavalry tactics. Before, the cavalry had to come as close as possible to the enemy to shoot off their pistols and turn back. The new tactic was when the cavalry had shot off their pistols instead of turning back, they took off their swords and stabbed the enemy. It was Gustav Adolf's own ideas and innovations who led to the modernization of the Swedish army and the art of war. Due to these innovations and the new tactics, the war against Poland was going very well for Sweden and they were winning almost every battle they fought. Peace was signed with Poland in 1629. In October and November in 1629 in Uppsala castle was held a historic meeting, there the king and the council was going to decide if Sweden was going to enter the 30 years war. The 30 years war was a conflict who already had been going on for 11 years. The king and the council decided that Sweden was going to enter the 30 years war and that is the most important decision that any Swedish government has ever made. Gustav Adolf's reason to enter the war was not only to protect the Lutheran faith and the protestant countries, he also wanted to expand Sweden's borders and conquer new harbors on the continent to expand his own power. By spring 1630 everything was ready to go to war. Thousands of soldiers have been trained and several thousand foreign troops have been recruited in Europe. Cannons have been cast and muskets have been made. In May 1630 Gustav Adolf assembled the estates in the hollow states in Stockholm's castle he held his three-year-old daughter Kristina in his arms. The estates promised if something was going to happen to the king Kristina would inherit the throne. Then Gustav Adolf held the speech. The king and a fleet of 120 ships set sail on to Germany and on June the 25th 1630 they arrived outside the region's coast and on the next day Gustav Adolf went ashore. He fell on his knees and said a prayer. The day after that the rest of the army went ashore but it would take many days before every soldier, every horse and every cannon had come ashore. Soon Gustav Adolf had 36 000 troops to put in battle. The majority of the troops were foreign but they fought under Swedish banners, command and Swedish law of war. This was the perfect time for Gustav Adolf to enter the war because the Catholic commander-in-chief Wallenstein and the emperor had not get along together. Wallenstein was fired and the Swedish army was far away from the Swedish. The protestant population in northern Germany saw Gustav Adolf as their liberator. Gustav Adolf needed allies and they got an ally from an unrespected country. France saw that they could use Gustav Adolf in their own conflict with the Habsburgs and the Frenchman said what is bad for France's enemies is good for France. A document was signed and they decided that Sweden was going to get 400 000 Riksdaler every year in six years time if Gustav Adolf had 36 000 men in the war against the emperor. Now the Swedish troops could spread around Mecklenburg and in Pomerania. City after city fell to the Swedes. Husseholm, Voldin and Volgast fell pretty easy. Then they took Stettin and a few weeks later they captured Frankfurt under order. The most cities that fell to the Swedes were the garrisons of Adolf's army because the soldiers in the captured cities went over to the Swedish army because everyone wanted to join a victor. In Breitenfeld in Saxony, It was in December 1641. On the Swedish side was over 28 000 men and on the Catholic side was also 28 000 men. It became a very bloody battle and Gustav Adolf's international breakthrough as great commander because under the battle the Saxon forces just fled and they took with them the Swedish troops. Despite this they succeeded Gustav Adolf's more modern and effective army to turn this to a great victory. It was a total success for the Swedes and Gustav Adolf but more than 4 000 soldiers were killed on Gustav Adolf's side but the Catholic casualties were much bigger. 7 000 killed more than 6 000 captured. Only under a few hours did the Swedes wipe out more than 70 percent of the imperial army. The news of the battle spread cheers and joy among the Protestants in Europe and fear among the Catholics in Europe and many said had God become Protestant? His involvement in the third year's war gave the rise of his nickname the Lion of the North now to the Swedish part of the third year's war had ended because Gustav Adolf had achieved all he had come to do. He had liberated the Protestant countries, he had ended the Catholic counter-reformation and he had destroyed the imperial army. But Gustav Adolf continues and the Swedish army don't want to stop now when everything is going so well. By spring Gustav Adolf and the army moved south and the reputation of the victorious Swedish army spread quickly through Germany and city after city fell voluntarily for the Swedes. The soldiers in the captured cities went over to Gustav Adolf's army because that meant high pay. He said that it was going to be religious freedom in the captured areas because soon the third year's war started to be a religious war. Now it became a continental and political war. The rich and important city Frankfurt fell without resistance and soon after Mainz fell to Gustav Adolf. Gustav Adolf was now 37 years old and on the top of his military successes. 140 German cities had fell to the Swedes. It was more than half of Germany. It commanded an army of 150 000 men. That was the biggest army Europe had ever seen. In spring 1632 the Swedes continued their advance. The people of Nuremberg greeted Gustav Adolf as their liberator. The army continued to Donau and the city fell pretty easily and the army continued to the river Lech but there they stopped. Now happened something that would go down in European history because there Gustav Adolf showed what a great commander he was and how he could coordinate the various weapon branches in a whole new way. The Catholics was on the other side of the river with a big army under Count Tilly. Under heavy fire from the Catholics decided Gustav Adolf to build a bridge over the river. To cover what they were doing Gustav Adolf ordered to lay smoke and fog over the river. They succeeded to put the bridge together and attacked the Catholics who were retreating and they took with them Count Tilly who had been badly wounded during the battle. Now Gustav Adolf entered Bavaria. The city Augsburg was liberated under cheers and tears of joy. Because it was in Augsburg the Protestants had signed their confession of faith. When Gustav Adolf and the Swedish army laid siege to Ingolstadt died Count Tilly inside Ingolstadt of the wounds that he got at Lech. Now the Swedish successes had been too big and had gone on for so long that the imperial side was forced to make one last big attack. The emperor's life was now in danger because Gustav Adolf was now 10 miles from the border to Austria and 20 miles from the emperor's palace in Vienna. In that moment is the feared field marshal Albrecht von Wallenstein called back into action. He puts up a new big army and that army meets Gustav Adolf at Nuremberg and that battle lost Gustav Adolf. Wallenstein moved north and Gustav Adolf was forced to follow him. The king gave order to move north and that became a march of 60 miles to Saxony. In the city Erfurt met Gustav Adolf his wife Queen Maria Eleonora and that was going to be their last meeting. Gustav Adolf continued to the town Nuremberg in Saxony near Leipzig and near was Wallenstein with his army. Wallenstein waited for 14 days for the Swedes to attack but no attack came and Wallenstein thought that the war was over for the season and he went into winter mode. He sent away Field Marshal Papenheim with half his army and Wallenstein settled in the castle in Lutzen. This was probably his biggest mistake and Gustav Adolf got news that Papenheim and half the army was three miles away and Wallenstein had gone into winter mode because he suffered from gout and rheumatism. Gustav Adolf ordered that the army November the 5th was going to march to Lutzen and they arrived outside Lutzen the same day. The roads and the fields were covered in mud so Gustav Adolf and the army could not walk very fast and at dawn they had five kilometers left to Lutzen. But everyone was very tired and exhausted and the army stopped. Now Wallenstein had been warned and he sent a message to Papenheim who had gone to winter mode a few miles away. Under the same night saw the Swedes torchlight how Wallenstein's troops prepared themselves. They are only 12 000 men. On the Swedish side is 20 000 men and the Swedes are twice as many as them only until Papenheim arrives. The Swedish must go to attack as fast as possible. In the early morning lights of November the 6th 1632 is the Swedish prepared but a fog comes over the field and the fog thickens of smoke because Wallenstein have put Lutzen on fire. The Swedes have to wait but longer they wait the closer comes Papenheim. Not until 11 o'clock had the fog cleared and now can the Swedish army go to attack. The Swedish goes to attack and Wallenstein's artillery open fires and the first musket bullets comes in to the Swedish lines. It's only 1000 meters between the Swedes and the imperial army. Gustav Adolf rides on the right flank and Wallenstein had all morning been carried in a chair and he now gets up on his horse. The Swedish troops moves forward to the cannon fire and the Swedes answer with their own cannon fire. Now the battle begins. Gustav Adolf leads the main force of the cavalry and behind the king rides colonel Stolhanske from Finland. At one o'clock had they come over the road and Wallenstein was pulled back and then Papenheim arrives with 2000 men of his cavalry force. They fire the pistols and then stabs the Swedes with the swords. Papenheim's attack is where Gustav Adolf is and Papenheim's cavalry push back the Swedes but the king sends forward colonel Stolhanske's cavalry force and they stop Papenheim's attack. Papenheim is during the fight shot and he dies soon later. The fog thickens by the gunpowder smoke and sometimes the troops could only see four steps in front of them. But where is the king Gustav Adolf? He had the morning got a new horse, Streif. It was a young and strong horse that Gustav Adolf had never ride before and that was probably the problem. Gustav Adolf was there where he most was needed and suddenly he saw the small landers falling back. Gustav Adolf rides to them and leads them to a new attack but the horse Streif is too fast. He rides too far forward and he comes into the Austrian lines and they saw that there comes a higher ranking man and they shoot at him and Gustav Adolf is hit in his left arm. He gets a bandage over his wound but now he can only ride the horse with one arm. The horse gets hit and it's hard to control and Gustav Adolf gets surrounded again and gets shot in his back by Moritz von Falkenberg. Gustav Adolf becomes seriously wounded and his horse gets shot again and rides away in a very fast speed. Next to his side has Gustav Adolf, the prince of Saxe-Lauenburg who tries to hold him up. New mustard bullets comes in and the prince has to ride away and Gustav Adolf falls off his horse. His aide is with him and he tries to get the king up on another horse but Gustav Adolf is very heavy and then comes Austrian horseman and he asks the aide who this man is and he says he's an officer. Then the Austrians ask the king who are you and the king says I'm the king of Sweden. The Austrians tries to take him as prisoner but they can't get him up so they stab Gustav Adolf in the heart with a pike and they kill his aide and rides away. Gustav Adolf is still alive and then comes the Italian commander Piccolomini and he recognizes the king. He gets off his horse and walks to the king. They take some of his clothes and stabs him and leave him with the nose to the ground. Now nobody knows that the king is dead. The battle still continues and then comes Gustav Adolf's horse running in panic to the Swedish lines and everybody knows that something bad has happened. Now Prince Bernhard of Saxe-Weimar takes over command of the Swedish army and Colonel Stolhanske and Prince Bernhard goes for another attack on Wallenstein. Gustav Adolf is now dead. The Swedes have lost many thousand men but they attack again. Now at that time comes the dead field marshal Pappenheim's infantry to Lutzen. But Wallenstein has the command and he thinks that the losses has been too big and he orders a retreat. At six o'clock is the Swedish army to the big surprise alone on the battlefield and the Swedish has won the battle. The king is dead but no one is bothered to follow the enemy. In torchlight they found Gustav Adolf's body. Between 4 000 and 5 000 soldiers was killed on Gustav Adolf's side under the seven hours the battle lasted. At least as many was killed on the imperial side. The king's body was moved to Weissenfeld. Gustav Adolf's widow Queen Maria Eleonora received news of his death at Erfurt and came to Weissenfeld. Gustav Adolf was transferred through Germany to Swedish Pomerania and there was put on a Swedish warship in Wolgast and the coffin was transferred to Nyköpingshus where he had grown up. The coffin had to wait there for over a year to be buried. Gustav Adolf was buried June 22nd 1642, one year and six months after Lutzen. The Gustav Adolf warship had now begun in Germany. In 300 years people had come to Lutzen to praise Gustav Adolf. The Gustavus Adolphus college in the United States is named after Gustav Adolf. His memory and name is being held alive in Germany in many ways. He stands statue on many places. Stuyves and Stuyves is named after him. The war didn't end with Gustav Adolf's death. The Swedish part of the 30 years war continued for 16 years after his death to 1648. During his lifetime he made Sweden one of Europe's great powers and because of his innovative tactics on the battlefield he is considered by many to be the father of modern and the first great modern general and this has led him as the only Swedish king and commander in international war history. Napoleon said that he admired five commanders in history and Gustav Adolf was one of them. A sentiment agreed by George S. Patton, Gustav Adolf is regarded as one of the greatest commanders in history. In 1643 the Swedish parliament decided for internal time that Gustav Adolf should be named Gustav Adolf the Great. He is the only king in Swedish history to receive this title. Thank you for watching, don't forget to subscribe, like or leave a comment if you have an idea for another video. Be sure to check out my friend's channel. I will put a link to his channel in the description below for you to check out. Thank you for watching, see you next time. The war with Russia had already been going on for a few years when Gustav Adolf became king. During this time it was a time of troubles in Russia when several persons called themselves czar. Sweden supported one of these persons, Jakob Delagarde. He captured Moscow to place Sweden's candidate on the Russian throne. Delagarde was later forced to leave Moscow and he captured Novgorod and there he managed to get a part of the Russians to make Gustav Adolf's brother Karl Philipp the new czar in Russia. A Russian delegation arrived in Sweden to take home the new czar, but in Vyborg they heard that the Russians had united and elected another candidate, Mikhail Romanov. It was very close that Russia would have a czar named Vasa. Gustav Adolf was at the Russian front two times and when he was in Helsinki he got the Finns to take part in the war against Russia. And with troops from France, Scotland, Germany and Ireland Hello everyone, this is 3 years history and today I will do a biography on Gustavus Adolfus. Gustav II Adolf or Gustavus Adolfus in Latin was the king of Sweden from 1611 to his death in 1630 and was the founder of the Swedish Empire. He was born on December 9, 1594 as the first son of Charles IX and Kristina of Holstein-Tottorp. When he was born, the king of Sweden was Sigismund and he was also the king of Poland. Between Gustav Adolf and the throne was a little line of princes who all had right to be king before him if everything was going to go as planned. But it didn't. His father took power and put himself on the throne. When Gustav Adolf was 12 he became crown prince. In 1620 Gustav Adolf married Maria Eleonora of Brandenburg. They had two children, two girls. The other girl died and the other child lived to be queen Kristina. Gustav Adolf was only 16 when his father died and he became king and Sweden was when Gustav Adolf became king at war with Denmark, Russia and Poland. The war with Denmark was a bloody one. Gustav Adolf assembled the estates in the hollow states in Stockholm's castle Fridtjärns. He held his three-year-old daughter Kristina in his arms. The estates promised if something was going to happen to the king, Kristina would inherit the throne. Then Gustav Adolf held a speech. The king and a fleet of 120 ships set sail on to Germany and on June the 25th 1630 they arrived outside the region's coast and on the next day Gustav Adolf went ashore. He fell on his knees and said a prayer. The day after that the rest of the army went ashore but it would take many days before every soldier, every horse and every cannon had come ashore. Soon Gustav Adolf had 36 000 troops to put in battle. The majority of the troops were foreign but they fought on the swedish banner's command and swedish law of war. This was the perfect time for Gustav Adolf to enter the war because the catholic commander-in-chief Wallenstein and the emperor had not get along together. Wallenstein was fired and his big army was far away from the swedish. The protestant population in northern Germany saw Gustav Adolf as their liberator. Gustav Adolf needed allies and he got an ally from an unexpected country. France had huge military successes who led to the peace at Stolbova. Sweden got Karelia and Ingria from Russia and now Russia was landlocked from the Baltic Sea for over 100 years. The Polish war was about the Baltic and Gustav Adolf and his brother took part in the campaign. In 1621 Riga was captured and after a few more successes Sweden had now Estonia, Latvia and a part of Lithuania. The swedish warship Vasa is a good example of how fast Sweden wanted to be a military power. But it's a fact that Sweden at that time had Europe's modern best trained and well working army. The swedish soldiers could load and fire their muskets three times faster than the enemy and the swedish cannons were much lighter. The cannons could be moved by two horses or four men in battle while the enemy needed four horses to move their cannons. He also made improvements in the cavalry tactics. Before the cavalry had to come as close as possible to the enemy to shoot off the pistols and turn back. The new tactic was when the cavalry had shot off the pistols instead of turning back they took up their swords and stabbed the enemy. It was Gustav Adolf's own ideas and innovations who led to the modernization of the swedish army and the art of war. Due to these innovations and the new tactics the war against Poland was going very well for Sweden and they were winning almost every battle they fought. Peace was signed with Poland in 1629. In October and November in 1629 in Uppsala castle was held a historic meeting. There the king and the council was going to decide if Sweden was going to enter the 30 years war. The 30 years war was a conflict who already had been going on for 11 years. The king and the council decided that Sweden was going to enter the 30 years war and that is the most important decision that any swedish government has ever made. Gustav Adolf's reason to enter the war was not only to protect the Lutheran faith and the protestant countries. He also wanted to expand Sweden's borders and conquer new harbors on the continent to expand his own power. By spring 1630 everything was ready to go to war. Thousands of soldiers have been trained and several thousand foreign troops have been recruited in Europe. Cannons have been and muskets have been made in May 1630.