Augustus II The Strong - King of Poland For The First Time

King of Poland For The First Time

Following the death of Polish King John III Sobieski and having converted to Catholicism, Augustus was elected King of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth in 1697 with the backing of Imperial Russia and Austria, which financed him through the Jewish banker, Berend Lehmann. At the time, some questioned the legality of Augustus's elevation, since another candidate, François Louis, Prince of Conti, had received more votes. Both candidates, Conti and Augustus, were proclaimed as king by different ecclesiastical authorities (by Primate Michaŀ Radziejowski and Bishop of Kujawy Stanisław Dąmbski, respectively, with Jacob Heinrich von Flemming swearing to the pacta conventa in Augustus's place). However, Augustus hurried to the Commonwealth with a Saxon army, while Conti stayed in France for two months.

Augustus continued the war of the Holy League against Turkey, and after a campaign in Moldavia, his Polish army eventually defeated the Tatar expedition in the Battle of Podhajce in 1698. This victory compelled the Ottoman Empire to sign the Treaty of Karlowitz in 1699. Podolia and Kamieniec Podolski returned to Poland. An ambitious ruler, Augustus hoped to make the Polish throne hereditary within his family, and to use his resources as Elector of Saxony to impose some order on the chaotic Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. He was, however, soon distracted from his internal reform projects by the possibility of external conquest. He formed an alliance with Denmark's Frederick IV and Russia's Peter I to strip Sweden's young King Charles XII (who incidentally was Augustus's cousin) of his possessions. Poland's reward for participation in this Great Northern War was to have been the Swedish territory of Livonia. Charles proved an able military commander, however, quickly forcing the Danes out of the war and then driving back the Russians at Narva, thereby allowing him to focus on the struggle with Augustus. However, this war ultimately proved as disastrous for Sweden as for Poland.

Charles defeated Augustus at Riga on 17 June 1701, forcing the Polish-Saxon army to withdraw from Livonia, and followed this up with an invasion of Poland. He captured Warsaw on 14 May 1702, defeated the Polish-Saxon army again at the Battle of Kliszów, and took Kraków. He defeated another of Augustus's armies under the command of Generalfeldmarschall Adam Heinrich von Steinau at the Battle of Pułtusk in spring 1703, and besieged and captured Thorn (Toruń).

By this time, Augustus was certainly ready for peace, but Charles felt that he would be more secure if he could establish someone more pliable on the Polish throne. In 1704 the Swedes installed Stanisław Leszczyński and tied the commonwealth to Sweden, which compelled Augustus to initiate military operations in Poland alongside Russia (an alliance was concluded in Narva in summer 1704). On 1 September 1706, Charles invaded Saxony, forcing Augustus to yield the Polish throne to Leszczyński by the Treaty of Altranstädt.

Meanwhile Russia's Tsar Peter the Great had reformed his army, and dealt a crippling defeat to the Swedes at the Battle of Poltava. This spelled the end of the Swedish Empire and the rise of the Russian Empire.