| Battle of Wismar | |||||||
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| Timeline: | 1632 series | ||||||
| Part of The Ostend War | |||||||
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| Belligerents | |||||||
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particularly Danish naval forces | ||||||
| Commanders and leaders | |||||||
| Jesse Wood Eddie Cantrell |
Tesdorf Vadgaard | ||||||
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The Battle of Wismar (or Battle of Wismar Bay, or Battle of Wismar and Rostock) was a combined sea-air defense of the Bay of Wismar arm of the Bay of Mecklenburg. It was an ad-hoc and somewhat desperate defense against a surprise invasion fleet sent by the League of Ostend powers of France, Denmark and England which was intended to take and occupy the ports of Wismar and Rostock and thus cut off Gustavus Adolphus from his supply lines to Sweden. The attack was intended as a masterstroke inspired by the plotting of Cardinal Richelieu, with the further intention of investing Swedish ports, once it had landed expeditionary forces and flanked Gustavus's army, which was being pressed on all fronts — and in particular, being pinned by the overland attack by the French and Danes at the Siege of Luebeck.
The defense was based around three high-power speedboats that had rocket launchers and what were then the only two airplanes in existence. It was successful largely due to surprise and psychological impact. Tesdorf Vadgaard, the Danish commander, had discounted the reports of airplanes until he saw one, and the speedboats were completely outside his range of experience. He had also assumed that the reports of rockets' effects had been exaggerated. On top of that, it had been assumed that Wismar was completely undefended.
The rockets were effective because 17th century ships were extremely vulnerable to fire. Also, Eddie Cantrell was able to get their inaccuracy to work for him; the one salvo he fired hit and destroyed two transports as well as the warship he was aiming at. However, this required getting within range of the Danish flagship's guns, and a lucky shot hit his boat, killing Larry Wild and Bjorn Svedberg, and taking off Eddie's left foot. The out-of-control speedboat collided with a second Danish warship, destroying it completely. It was initially believed that Eddie had died in the collision, but he was either thrown clear or managed to jump clear, and was rescued.
Hans Richter, who was flying overhead, noticed this, and decided to attack the ship that had killed his friends. Only three of his four rockets fired, only two hit, and only one exploded, so the Danish flagship was only damaged, not destroyed. However, being able to do that much meant coming within musket range, and both Hans and his plane were hit. Realizing that he would not survive long enough to land, he crashed his plane into a previously-undamaged Danish warship, causing its destruction. This broke the Danes' will to fight, and the remainder of the fleet withdrew.