Surrender of Sveaborg

6 May 1808, Sveaborg (Suomenlinna), Helsinki

Russian success; the fortress and the archipelago fleet surrendered

Sveaborg, the island fortress off Helsinki that held the main base of the Swedish archipelago fleet, was called the Gibraltar of the North. Besieged by a smaller Russian army, and misled by false news and Russian promises, its commander, Vice-Admiral Carl Olof Cronstedt, the victor of Svensksund in 1790, surrendered it with some 6,000 men, more than 700 guns and most of the Swedish archipelago fleet, frozen in the ice. It was one of the great disasters of Swedish history, and it left the Russians free to move along the Finnish coast.