Bavarian campaign (1646–1647)

Background

In 1645 Sweden could not remove Emperor Ferdinand III from the war despite a victory at Jankau in Bohemia and an invasion of his hereditary lands. In January 1646 Imperial Generalissimo Leopold William, aided by Bavarian troops, drove the Swedes out of Bohemia. The Swedish command then decided to unite with France to attack Bavaria, the Emperor's most important remaining ally. In April 1646 Carl Gustaf Wrangel, successor to Lennart Torstensson as overall commander of Swedish forces in Germany, marched into Westphalia to approach the French army.

Torstensson had been allowed to return home but not to retire, as senior leaders and Axel Oxenstierna and the Queen regularly consulted him on German affairs. The Swedish army captured Höxter and Paderborn, giving them to Hesse-Kassel, then moved with 15,000 infantry and 8,000 cavalry into the Landgraviate to wait for Turenne. Wrangel's position was threatened by an approaching Imperial army of 30,000 men. Wrangel entrenched at Kirchhain, received reinforcements from Hans Christoff von Königsmarck, and the Imperials withdrew in late July when an epidemic struck their horses.

Campaign

On August 10, the French and Swedish forces joined together at Wetzlar without interference. Their next move was into Bavaria, following orders for Wrangel to devastate the region and push Bavaria out of the war. The Imperial-Bavarian army dug in along the Main and Nidda rivers to block them, but the allies simply went around these defenses and headed toward the Danube through Heilbronn. Leopold William had to take a safer route through Franconia, which left western Bavaria open.

Cooperation between the French and Swedes had its rough patches, but Wrangel and Turenne smoothed things over by taking turns commanding the combined army each week. They captured Rain-am-Lech early in October. Wrangel thought Augsburg might surrender like it had to Gustavus Adolphus years before, but the town refused both him and Turenne. The allies started a siege, but after a failed assault and word that Archduke Leopold William was coming with an Imperial army, they quickly gave up.

The allies withdrew into Swabia with the Imperials on their tail, but after some maneuvers they slipped away and invaded Bavaria again, laying waste to the countryside all the way to Munich. Wrangel wanted to set up winter quarters deep in Bavaria, but the French refused to keep going. Then news came that France had agreed to a truce with Bavaria, meaning Turenne could not advance any farther. France had decided the joint campaign risked making Sweden too strong.

Maximillian of Bavaria, more worried about a peasant uprising than the Swedish army, would not arm his people. Instead, he ordered a scorched earth policy, destroying mills and storehouses to starve the Swedes—and his own subjects as well. Turenne and the French army left to winter near Donau in Swabia, while Wrangel moved to the unplundered lands around Lake Constance on the Swiss border.

Did You Know?

• In spring 1647 Maximilian of Bavaria asked for a truce and in March signed the Truce of Ulm with Sweden, France, and Hesse–Kessel.
• The Elector of Cologne also signed the Truce of Ulm in March 1647.