Such being the documents and the information at last available in the matter of the Mönnichhofen and Scottish expeditions of 1612, it is time to narrate briefly why auxiliary troops were at that time wanted in Sweden.
When Gustavus Adolphus, on the 26th December 1611, took into his own hands, at the age of seventeen, the government of Sweden, his first step was to seek the conclusion of peace with Denmark; and with that object he formally surrendered the title of King of the Lapps, the assumption of which by his father had caused so much ill blood between Christian IV. and Charles IX. that it became one of the principal causes of the so-called Calmar War, commenced in the spring of 1611.
The overtures of Sweden and the offered mediation of Great Britain and other powers were rejected by Denmark, and the war was thereupon continued with great vigour, but with varying success on either side. However, in the early summer of 1612 the Danes took the important fortresses of Elfsborg and Gullberg, and having the entire command of the Cattegat and the Belts, cut off Sweden from the sea. Later, the Danish fleet anchored inside the rocks at Stockholm, of which the seizure was averted only by the bold strategy of Gustavus Adolphus.
This abortive attempt on the capital of Sweden practically concluded the war. Peace was ultimately signed at Knäröd, in Halland, January 18, 1613.[15]
During that war the Danish monarch had in his service about eighteen thousand English,[16] French, and German mercenaries; while Gustavus Adolphus, having on his side[17] only one foreign regiment of eight or nine companies, soon found himself "in need of foreign soldiers as well, wherewith to check the attacks of the enemy."[18] Charles IX. had indeed foreseen such a necessity, but no action was apparently taken in that direction until the month of November 1611, when Gustavus Adolphus addressed to Sir James Spens the letter or commission already mentioned, and when also the Queen Dowager of Sweden issued an order[19] for the payment of 10,500 rigsdaller out of a fund at Lübeck to Mönnichhofen, then preparing to proceed to the Netherlands for the enlistment of men, who, according to the letter addressed to Sir James Spens, were to have joined the Scottish auxiliary contingent at Elfsborg. On the 2nd December 1611 Mönnichhofen[20] was appointed commander-in-chief of the Swedish ships-of-war with which he was to have sailed from Elfsborg and brought back his levies. Money being apparently scarce, orders were given that he should be supplied with a certain quantity of ox-hides, for sale on his arrival in Holland, to meet the further expenses of his expedition. But the original plan of fetching and transporting the Netherlands levies in Swedish ships-of-war was ultimately abandoned, and Mönnichhofen reached Holland by another route.
The letters discovered at Stockholm by Dr. Yngvar Nielsen prove that Mönnichhofen had by the 1st June 1612 embarked a force of about twelve hundred men at Amsterdam on board four ships, which were detained for five weeks by contrary winds. Mönnichhofen had, therefore, the Swedish agent writes, incurred "extraordinary expenses, to the extent of at least four thousand thalers, in providing the men in the small ships with food and drink, and had consequently to pledge and mortgage all he possessed." He had "also encountered much difficulty and incurred great expense in keeping his men together even before the ships lay wind-bound."
Although in most Danish and Swedish histories the troops enlisted by Mönnichhofen in Holland are stated to have been Scottish, there is no documentary proof of such having been their nationality. The Netherlands were at the time full of foreign auxiliary troops, the republic having, on the signature of the truce of 17th June 1609, retained in its service 6,000 French, 3,000 English, and 3,000 Germans, but only 2,000 Scots. The absence of all mention of Scottish officers being with Mönnichhofen; the rivalry that existed between the military adventurers of that period; the circumstance that General Halkett,[21] a Scottish officer, was in Amsterdam at about the same period, engaged, not in enlisting Scots, but in hiring a ship to transport levies from Scotland; and more especially the fact that Mönnichhofen had been instructed to procure arms for the men simultaneously levied in Scotland;—all this leads us to infer that Mönnichhofen, himself a Fleming, enlisted Hollanders, and perhaps Germans.
[15] In that treaty of peace, King James I. of England, whose ambassador had assisted at its negotiation, was described as "a friendly broker and negotiator"—a phrase which, slightly varied, Prince Bismarck applied to himself at the late Congress of Berlin. King James I. is mentioned as "the general peace-broker of Europe." (Jahn's "History of the Calmar War.") The king himself aspired to be called "Rex Pacificus."
[16] "His M. doth holde that their are not a thousand strong fighting men of Inglysh soiours heere; and doeth wonder of my Lord Willowbeis staying."—Sir R. Anstruther to King James I., from the "Camp at Golberg," July 5, 1612.
[17] The alien officers were General Rutherford and Lieutenant Learmonth, Captain Wauchope, and Greig, who commanded the artillery—all Scotsmen; also General Due, Caspar Matzen, and Mönnichhofen. (Deposition of Andrew Ramsay and Robert Douglas, Copenhagen, December 19, 1611.) In 1613 Mönnichhofen and Rutherford were employed with Swedish troops in Russia. (Cronholm's "History of Sweden.")
[18] Gustavus Adolphus to Sir James Spens, November 16, 1611.
[19] November 26, 1611.
[20] Johann von Mönnichhofen was an officer of high rank in the Swedish service. In the documents preserved in the Swedish State Archives he is indifferently styled "Quartermaster-General and Chief" and "Chief Quartermaster." Together with the other foreign officers in the pay of Sweden, he was at the siege of Calmar, at which they were all, with the solitary exception of himself, wounded. A Scottish officer deponed at Copenhagen that Mönnichhofen had alone escaped on that occasion "because he surpassed the others in prudence, and knew how to fight from a distance." This disparaging observation may be due to jealousy on the part of his Scottish brethren in arms, for he certainly showed great daring in planning and executing successfully his march through Norway.
[21] Called in some documents "Colonel" and "Lieut.-Colonel."