Battle of Copenhagen (1807)


The Battle of Copenhagen was a British bombardment of the Danish capital, Copenhagen, in order to capture or destroy the Royal Dano-Norwegian Navy during the Napoleonic Wars. The incident led to the outbreak of the Anglo-Russian War of 1807, which ended with the Treaty of Örebro in 1812. The attack on Denmark, a neutral country, was heavily criticised in Danish sources.
Britain's response to Napoleon's Continental System was to launch a naval attack on Denmark who had been breaking the blockade against Napoleon’s regime. Although neutral, Denmark continued to use their navy to trade under blockade and were under pressure to pledge its fleet to Napoleon. In September 1807, the Royal Navy bombarded Copenhagen, seizing the Danish fleet and assured use of the sea lanes in the North Sea and Baltic Sea for the British merchant fleet and reduced Napoleon’s influence in the Baltic. A consequence of the attack was that Denmark did join the Continental System and the war on the side of France, but without a fleet it had little to offer.
The attack gave rise to the term to Copenhagenize as a reference to the pre-emptive seizure of a nation's fleet while it was anchored.

Background

Despite the defeat and loss of many ships in the first Battle of Copenhagen in 1801, Denmark-Norway still maintained a considerable navy. The majority of the Danish Army, under the Crown Prince, was at this time defending the southern border against possible attack from the French.
There was concern in Britain that Napoleon might try to force Denmark to close the Baltic Sea to British ships, perhaps by marching French troops into Zealand. The British believed that access to the Baltic was "vitally important to Britain" for trade as well as a major source of necessary raw materials for building and maintaining warships and that it gave the Royal Navy access to help Britain's allies Sweden and Russia against France. The British thought that after Prussia had been defeated in December 1806, Denmark's independence looked increasingly under threat from France. George Canning's predecessor as Foreign Secretary, Lord Howick, had tried unsuccessfully to persuade Denmark into a secret alliance with Britain and Sweden.
On 21 January 1807, Lord Hawkesbury told the House of Lords that he had received information from someone on the Continent "that there were secret engagements in the Treaty of Tilsit to employ the navies of Denmark and Portugal against this country". He refused to publish the source because he said it would endanger their lives.
The reports of French diplomats and merchants in northern Europe made the British government uneasy, and by mid-July, the British believed that the French intended to invade Holstein in order to use Denmark against Britain. Some reports suggested that the Danes had secretly agreed to this. The Cabinet decided to act, and on 14 July Lord Mulgrave obtained from the King permission to send a naval force of 21 to 22 ships to the Kattegat for surveillance of the Danish navy in order to pursue "prompt and vigorous operations" if that seemed necessary. The Cabinet decided on 18 July to send Francis Jackson on a secret mission to Copenhagen to persuade Denmark to give its fleet to Britain. That same day, the Admiralty issued an order for more than 50 ships to sail for "particular service" under Admiral James Gambier. On 19 July, Lord Castlereagh, the Secretary of State for War and the Colonies, ordered General Lord Cathcart at Stralsund to go with his troops to the Sound where they would get reinforcements.
During the night of 21/22 July, Canning received intelligence from Tilsit that Napoleon had tried to persuade Alexander I of Russia to form a maritime league with Denmark and Portugal against Britain. Spencer Perceval, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, wrote a memorandum setting out the government's case for sending forces to Copenhagen: "The intelligence from so many and such various sources" that Napoleon's intent was to force Denmark into war against Britain could not be doubted. "Nay, the fact that he has openly avowed such intention in an interview with the Emperor of Russia is brought to this country in such a way as it cannot be doubted. Under such circumstances it would be madness, it would be idiotic... to wait for an overt act". Historian Hilary Barnes notes that Canning had no knowledge of the secret articles of the Treaty of Tilsit. He argues that Canning's decision was "rash, calamitous, and lacking in understanding of the Danes and of Danish foreign policy."
The British assembled a force of 25,000 troops, and the vanguard sailed on 30 July; Jackson set out the next day. Canning offered Denmark a treaty of alliance and mutual defence, with a convention signed for the return of the fleet after the war, the protection of 21 British warships and a subsidy for how many soldiers Denmark kept standing. On 31 July, Napoleon ordered Talleyrand to tell Denmark to prepare for war against Britain or else Jean-Baptiste Bernadotte would invade Holstein. Neither Talleyrand nor Jackson persuaded the Danes to end their neutrality, so Jackson went back to the British fleet assembled in the Sound on 15 August. The British published a proclamation demanding the deposit of the Danish fleet; the Danes responded with "what amounted to a declaration of war".
As the first move in the campaign a division of twenty-nine vessels under Commodore Richard Goodwin Keats was detached to the great belt with instructions to seal the island of Zealand off from Funen and the west. Within a week some 200 miles of coast had been secured and the Danish army in Holstein prevented from passing into Zealand to lend support. The city of Copenhagen was left to its own resources to defend itself from a British force of 25,000.
On 12 August, the 32-gun Danish frigate Friderichsværn sailed for Norway from Elsinore. Admiral Lord Gambier sent the 74-gun third-rate and the 22-gun sixth-rate after her, even though war had not yet been declared. Comus was much faster than Defence in the light winds and so outdistanced her. On 15 August, Comus caught Friderichsværn off Marstrand and captured her. The British took her into service as HMS Frederikscoarn.

Bombardment

The British troops under General Lord Cathcart were organised as follows:
  • Cavalry Brigade: Major General Charles, Baron Linsingen, 1st, 2nd, 3rd Light Dragoons King's German Legion
  • Artillery & Engineers: Major General Thomas Blomefield, 84 field guns and 101 siege guns
  • * John May's Company, 1st Battalion, Royal Artillery
  • * James Cockburn's Company, 1st Battalion, Royal Artillery
  • * Robert Birch's Company, 2nd Battalion, Royal Artillery
  • * John Taylor's Company, 3rd Battalion, Royal Artillery
  • * Charles Younghusband's Company, 3rd Battalion, Royal Artillery
  • * John Kattlewell's Company, 3rd Battalion, Royal Artillery
  • * Peter Fyers' Company, 3rd Battalion, Royal Artillery
  • * P. Meadow's Company, 8th Battalion, Royal Artillery
  • First Division: Lieutenant General Sir George Ludlow
  • * Guards Brigade: Major General Edward Finch, 1/Coldstream Regiment of Foot Guards, 1/3rd Regiment of Foot Guards
  • * 1st Brigade: Brigadier General Henry Warde, 1/28th Regiment of Foot, 1/79th Regiment of Foot
  • Second Division: Lieutenant General Sir David Baird
  • * 2nd Brigade: Major General Thomas Grosvenor, 1/4th Regiment of Foot, 1/23rd Regiment of Foot
  • * 3rd Brigade: Major General Brent Spencer, 1/32nd Regiment of Foot, 1/50th Regiment of Foot, 1/82nd Regiment of Foot
  • * 4th Brigade: Colonel Robert Henry MacFarlane, 1/7th Regiment of Foot, 1/8th Regiment of Foot
  • Reserve: Major General Sir Arthur Wellesley
  • * Colonel Richard Stewart, 1/43rd Regiment of Foot, 2/52nd Regiment of Foot, 1/92nd Regiment of Foot, 5 coys. 1/95th Rifles, 2/95th Rifles
  • KGL Division: Major General Frederick, Baron Dreschel
  • * 1st Brigade: Colonel Peter du Plat, 6th, 7th, 8th Line Batts.
  • * 2nd Brigade: Colonel George de Drieburg, 3rd, 4th, 5th Line Batts.
  • * 3rd Brigade: Colonel Adolphus, Baron Barsse, 1st and 2nd Line Batts.
  • * 4th Brigade: Colonel Charles, Baron Alten, 1st and 2nd Light Batts.
The Danish forces in the city amounted to 5,000 regular troops and a similar number of militias. Most of the civilian inhabitants of Copenhagen were evacuated in the few days before Copenhagen was completely invaded.
On 26 August, General Wellesley was detached with his reserve and two light brigades of British artillery, as well as one battalion, eight squadrons and one troop of horse artillery from the King's German Legion to disperse a force which had been sent to relieve the beleaguered city. On 29 August, at the rivulet of Køge, this significant British force swiftly overpowered the Danish troops, which amounted to only three or four regular battalions and some cavalry.
The Danes rejected British demands, so the Royal Navy fleet under the command of Admiral Gambier bombarded the city from 2 to 5 September. In addition to the military casualties incurred by the Danish army, the bombardment killed roughly 195 civilians and injured 768.
The bombardment included 300 Congreve rockets, which caused fires. Due to the civilian evacuation, the normal firefighting arrangements were ineffective; over a thousand buildings were burned.
On 5 September, the Danes sued for peace, and the capitulation was signed on 7 September. Denmark agreed to surrender its navy and its naval stores. In return, the British undertook to leave Copenhagen within six weeks.
Ernst Peymann, the Danish Commander, had been under orders from the Crown Prince to burn the Danish fleet, which he failed to do, though the reason for his failure is unknown.
Thus, on 7 September Peymann surrendered the fleet. In addition, the British broke up or destroyed three 74-gun ships of the line on the stocks, along with two of the ships-of-the-fleet and two elderly frigates.
After her capture, one ex-Danish ship of the line, Neptunos, ran aground and was burnt on or near the island of Hven. Then, when a storm arose in the Kattegat, the British destroyed or abandoned twenty-three of the captured gunboats. The British added the fifteen captured ships of the line that reached Britain to the British Navy but only four—Christian VII 80, Dannemark 74, Norge 74 and Princess Carolina 74—saw subsequent active service.
On 21 October, the British fleet left Copenhagen for the United Kingdom. However, the war continued until 1814, when the Treaty of Kiel was signed.