The Thirty Years War: The Battle Of White Mountain

The Thirty Years War was a series of battles that were fought primarily on German soil but also in Central Europe. Thirty Years War began 1618 and over the course of thirty years, it ended in 1648. The war started out as the Bohemian phase and lasted until 1621. The most important battle of this period was the Battle of White Mountain. Ferdinand II became King in 1617 and because they feared he would re-enforce Catholicism on them, they got rid of him and offered the crown to Frederick V. On November 4, 1619 Frederick became King and the war shifted into the Holy Roman Empire. A year and four days later, the battle of White Mountain broke out and the Protestant Union under Frederick now faced the Catholic League under Ferdinand. The Battle
ended with a devastating loss for the Protestants.
The war then shifted into the Palatinate phase that started in 1621 and ended 1624. Frederick V and other Protestant rulers wanted to regain the Rhenish Palatinate from the Spanish and the Catholic League. But since Frederick V lost the Bohemian Revolt, George Friedrich attempted to prevent the Spanish Imperial army from coming together with the Catholic League. To do that, they set up a block but were soon attacked by Tilly’s Catholic League in the Battle of Mingolsheim. However, Tilly ended up with the Spanish army anyways. The success was short lived when the Protestant defeat at Stadtholn on August 6, 1623 marked the end of the Palatinate phase. The war now moved into the Danish phase which covered the years of 1625 through 1629.
The war was now seen as an international conflict. Christian IV raised 34,000 men but lacked the resources to keep them for very long. It was at this point that Wallenstein emerged to lead the Imperial army. On July 28, 1625 Tilly crossed the Weser River officially beginning the Danish Phase. Tilly’s troops ravaged the area around Brunswick and Christian withdrew to Verden. Wallensteain took his army of 20,000 to occupy Magdeburg and set up his headquarters. Mansfeld tried to attack over the bridge at Dessau on April 25, 1626 but faced a devastating loss. In July, Wallenstein spilt his army up by sending part of them to Tilly and taking the rest in pursuit of Mansfeld. Tilly caught up with Christian in the Village of Lutter where he was then defeated. The Danish army was broken and the Hungarian campaign came to nothing. Bethlen Gabor and Wallenstein signed a truce and it was later that Mansfeld fell ill and died. On March 6, 1629 the Edict of Restitution was put in place. All properties seized by Protestants since 1552 were to be returned and a special commission was created to oversee the process. The Edict also permitted the expulsion of Protestants from Catholic lands. No Calvinist state would be tolerated and the commissioners had the right to raise troops to enforce their rulings. Thousands of Protestants were driven to exile or were forced to
convert.
The fourth phase of the war was the Swedish phase that was from 1630 till 1635. The war was resumed when King Gustavus II Adolphus of Sweden arrived with an army, marking the start of the Swedish phase of the war. Gustavus refused to accept the Treaty of Lubeck and wanted to take territory in Pomerania and other north German coastal areas to secure his previously won acquisitions in Finland and the Baltic Sea. In 1631, on May 20th, Tilly defeated Germ an forces and seized Magdeburg, but the Imperial army was defeated by Gustavus, at the Battle of Breitenfeld, on September 17, 1631. In 1632, Tilly died and Gustavus was killed during a battle of Lützen on November 16, 1632. Axel Oxenstierna, the Swedish chancellor, assumed command of the Swedish army and continued receiving the military assistance of Bernard. Axel recognized the vulnerability of the Swedish position near the Danube River, so he initiated contact with the French chief minister, Cardinal de Richelieu, which resulted eventually in transforming this original religious war to a modern political struggle. Wallenstein, who had alienated many of his officers and troops through his Catholic radicalism, was assassinated on February 25, 1634. Later that year, the Imperial armies under Ferdinand scored a major victory over the Swedish-German army at a battle on September 6, 1634. By that time, both sides were exhausted and both Catholic and Protestants strived for peace. The Peace of Prague on May 30, 1635 over powered the Edict of Restitution and returned some lands to Protestant leaders.
The last phase of the war is the French phase. Cardinal de Richelieu, chief minister to King Louis XIII of France, attacked Spain in May, 1635. Spain had been held by the Habsburgs, and Cardinal believed that French security required the defeat and containment of the Habsburgs. France went to war with the Habsburgs--in Spain and in Central Europe. There was some realignment of allies. Christian IV of Denmark became an ally of the Habsburgs and was defeated during a two-year Swedish-Danish War from 1643-1645. Despite occasional setbacks, such as the defeat on November 24-25, 1643, French forces were ultimately successful. The Swedish won at the Second Battle of Breitenfeld on November 2, 1642. The Habsburgs lost their Bavarian ally when it entered a separate peace with France and Sweden on March 14, 1647, but within six months Bavaria had reentered the war. Ferdinand III continued the war until the Habsburgs were defeated on May 17, 1648, and on August 20, 1648. During September and October, Emperor Ferdinand III moved toward accepting the terms of the peace treaty that had been developed.
In 1648 the Peace of Westphalia was signed, officially ending the Thirty Years War. Many things came as a result of the Peace of Westphalia. Mainly, German states were able to determine their own religion, the United Provinces of Netherlands and the Swiss Confederation were recognized as independent states, Sweden gained control of the Baltic Sea, Netherlands gained independence from Spain, and France was acknowledged as the preeminent western power.

Works Cited

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