Battle of Vyborg Bay

3–4 July 1790, Vyborg Bay, Gulf of Finland

Swedish fleet broke out with heavy losses

For a month the whole Swedish navy, the battle fleet and the archipelago fleet with the king himself, lay trapped in Vyborg Bay, blockaded by Chichagov and Cruys with some fifty ships, running short of food and water. When the wind turned in their favour Gustav ordered a breakout to the west. Led by Colonel Johan Puke, the battle line ran along the narrow western channel past the Salvors shallows, straight through the anchored Russian blockading ships, with the galleys and gunboats following inshore; the Russian ships at that end fired into each Swedish ship as it passed. The worst came when the fireship Postiljonen, lit too soon, drifted into Enigheten and the frigate Zemire, and all three blew up. In the smoke, several ships ran aground on the shallows at Passaloda and Pensar. Robert Crown's frigates chased the slower ships out to sea and took several. Most of both Swedish fleets got out, the battle fleet to Sveaborg and the archipelago fleet to Svensksund, but Sweden lost seven ships of the line, three frigates and thousands of men, most of them taken prisoner.