The Swedish Flagship Stora Kronan (Great Crown in English) was the mightiest warship ever built by the Swedish Empire and a floating palace - no expense was spared in building her - the 3rd largest ship ever built at the time. She had been designed to scare of the Danes and Dutch as well as impress - built by the top English ship builder Francis Sheldon. As a state of the art Ship of the Line, she had 3 gundecks designed for 126 cannons - mostly large 24 pounders and above, making her one of the deadliest and heaviest armed ships ever made. With fresh memories of its predecessor, the ill-fated infamous warship Vasa which sunk just 50 years earlier on its maiden voyage, the Stora Kronan was constructed with a deep hull to sail and when properly ballasted not be top-heavy in open sea. She was about twice as large as the Vasa shown here in this video with twice as many cannons - but in terms of luxury was built to the highest standard. The Vasa is the worlds only preserved 17th century ship - which can be visited today in Stockholm.

The Stora Kronan launched in the year 1672 during the peak of the Swedish Empire after the great King Charles X had died. Sweden was ruled by a regency council led by the former Queen, until the young Charles XI was old enough to assume power the same year. Sweden was indeed at its height as a European power - it had finally defeated Denmark, one of its main rivals for hegemony in the Baltic, and had expanded into Norway, Livonia, Ingria, Karelia and parts of the Holy Roman Empire including Bremen. Also in 1672 Louis XIV of France attacked the Dutch Republic and allied with Sweden - pressuring it to attack northern Germany and invade Brandenburg. Sweden and France were now at war with the Holy Roman Empire, the Dutch Republic and Denmark. The seemingly invincible Swedish army suffered an unexpected defeat in Brandenburg at the Battle of Fehrbellin.

A great fleet was then assembled to support troop transports to reinforce Swedish Pomerania - this included large ships of the line including the Svärdet (sword), Äpplet (orb), Nyckeln (key) and the mighty flagship Stora Kronan. Sweden had rarely fought in naval engagements - and with very few victories. Swedish crews lacked the professionailsm of Danish and Norwegian sailors and there was an overall lack of professional officers. The Stora Kronan had over 800 people onboard including 500 sailors and 300 soldiers who came from all parts of the Swedish Empire. Admiral Gustaf Otto Stenbock was in charge but after reaching Gotland decided it was too cold and stormy and headed back towards Stockholm. King Charles was furious and replaced the famed Admiral with the treasury official Lorentz Creutz who came from a Swedish noble family with roots in Finland. Creutz lacked any naval or military expertise - he had spent the previous years as a commisioner of witchcraft in Dalarna - which was the hillbilly country of Sweden. He had conducted trials for witchcraft leading to the deaths of 20 women burned at the stake.

It is not known why Creutz accepted the role as Admiral of the fleet, but nonetheless his crew was not impressed. The sea around Stockholm froze leaving the Stora Kronan unable to depart southwards to face the Danish fleet until Spring when they encountered a joint Danish Dutch fleet. Unfortunately for the Dutch, their own flagship pulled up beside the Stora Kronan which then opened fire with its massive cannon broadsides. The cannons were loaded with barshot which shredded the Dutch ship into pieces - leaving holes large enough to drive a wagon through. The fleets disengaged and back to port for resupplying. The Stora Kronan departed Stockholm fully loaded but without enough ballast. separated but the Danes were able to track the Swedes off the coast of the island Öland and re-engaged. Creutz told his sailmasters they had to shut the gunports and lash the guns, or their ship would suffer the fate of the ship Vasa - as fate had it this is exactly what occured as battle commenced. The flagship fell to its side and a heavy wind capsized her. Water gushed in and men were trapped like rats in the decks whipped by loose cannons. A single lantern fell on the ground and a fire ignited the gunpowder - the ship exploded in a massive fireball as shown here.

Within minutes 800 men had lost their lives - 40 men survived the sinking by falling into the sea before the explosion. One lieutenant miraculously survived by being blasted by the explosion into the rigging of the nearby ship Dragon. Lorentz Creutz was not amongst the survivors - his body was taken back to Finland and buried in a family grave. The sea battle continued but ended up in a major loss - the costliest naval defeat in Swedish history. They had lost the most expensive warship ever built as well as the war chests full of coin now at the bottom of the sea. The furious king Charles XI began an inquiry to find out who was responsible for the loss of the ship - three of the 40 survivors were charged but later acquited. The Danes and Dutch made landfall and attacked and burned the Swedish countryside. Fortunately for Sweden, it turned out Charles XI was an exceptionally good commander on land - he won a decisive victory at Lund - where 40% of the combatants perished - one of the bloodiest battles per capita on European soil ever. As early as 1679 Sweden used diving bells to recover some of the cannons from the wreck. Remains of the men who perished are still being found as shown in this photo. The sailors in this spotlight are from the wreck - are you related?