Tuesday, 29 November 2016
Launch of the Cavalry Book — 25 November 2016
A report on the launch event for Finnish Cavalry in the Swedish Era at Virrat city library on 25 November 2016 — the book's origins, its three intended audiences, and the research behind it.
The Virrat City Library kindly provided the venue for the launch and even laid on coffee. Many thanks. My profession as a genealogist in Virrat would not have been possible without the library’s excellent services, including its researcher room. Now, in the age of digital archives, location matters less.
Nearly 20 people were present. Only one journalist had made the effort to attend. The library director opened the proceedings, after which I gave a presentation on the book, lasting about half an hour. I spoke freely from a small prompt card. The key points of my talk follow.
I began with the book’s origins. The idea of studying Finnish cavalry in the Swedish era arose about ten years ago during a non-fiction writing course at Orivesi College. I assembled a long article on the subject in 2010 (around a hundred pages A4) but could not get it published. A couple of articles on the theme appeared in the Sotahistoriallinen aikakauskirja (Journal of Military History) and a short overview in the book Suomalainen sotilas 2. After retiring, so to speak, from professional genealogy work and completing the larger projects I had committed to, I began planning the cavalry book. The subject expanded like rising dough. It was enormously difficult to fit almost everything in and keep the page count within the print-sheet limit of 792. The book has many pages, and every page is dense with information. It is not a book of poetry.
The book is intended for three types of reader. First, it has been written to the standards that trained researchers expect. The source references should satisfy rigorous requirements in that regard — even though professional historians will largely be free riders when it comes to buying it. I believe both the presentation and the content are of high quality, rich and concentrated.
The second group, who will perhaps approach the book with more sympathy, are enthusiast researchers such as genealogists and local historians. I believe they will benefit greatly from the carefully marked source citations, the extensive bibliography and the detailed text. My Great Northern War book received criticism for having too few footnotes (it had slightly under 500). This book will not fall into that trap: it has over a thousand more.
The third group I hope will find the book are those interested in historical non-fiction — especially readers who are drawn to history predating living memory. These readers can skip the footnotes and the more list-like sections. There is still plenty to read even if they skip two hundred pages. I describe the book as a “what, where and when” type that can be read one chapter at a time and not necessarily in chronological order. In that sense it is a reference work that I hope will find a place in the library of anyone interested in the period.
I have been studying the sources for this book for at least twenty years, long before there was any plan for a cavalry book. When I decided to write it, the 17th century remained largely unexplored. The main sources for that century were in SVAR (Swedish National Archives) and mostly available digitally. I worked through the catalogue carefully and sifted out the sections relating to Finnish cavalry. Studying these year by year — and in two and a half centuries there are many years — I decided which sources needed to be read more closely. These were retrieved as images, run through image processing and stored to disk. Most were then transcribed into text; summaries were made by company and combined into squadron or regimental overviews. The single most important source series was the muster rolls.
A second level of analysis came from the literature, much of it in Swedish: the broader context of events, in so far as Finns were involved. This general framework was then combined with the ground-level picture derived from the muster rolls, year by year and unit by unit.
During the Swedish era there were many wars, and each was shaped by the character of the reigning king. How can one keep track of them all? This book can serve as a useful reference. The chronological structure of the content follows the main war periods: from the long struggles at the end of the 16th century and the wars against Russia and Poland-Lithuania, through the Thirty Years’ War, to the three Northern Wars.
I also spoke a little about terminology — what was meant by cuirassiers, cavalrymen or dragoons, and the special place of the Life Guard Dragoon Regiment in the book. I also touched on tactics and horses. I will not repeat all that here but refer you to the book.
For my closing words I had chosen those of a wise countryman — my maternal grandmother’s father, a Virrat farmer from Vaskivesi: Let him who says it know it, and let him who knows it say it.