On 11 June 1709, at a military meeting in the village of Krutyi Bereh, the Moscow command decided to provide assistance to the garrison blockaded in the fortress of Poltava. It was decided to launch a combined attack on the allied forces near Poltava.
On the night of 13-14 June, Moscow units struck at the enemy, but failed to cross the Vorskla River. Clashes between the armies continued constantly.
On the night of 20 June, Peter the 1st’s army crossed the Vorskla and encamped near the village of Semenivka (modern Semianivka). On 25 June, the Muscovites approached Poltava near the village of Yakivtsi, set up a new camp between the Yakivchansky and Malobudyshchansky forests to protect infantry and deploy artillery, and surrounded it with ditches and ramparts. The general line of these fortifications was not continuous, but was broken at certain intervals. The 16 exits made it possible to quickly leave the camp. The camp was supposed to be fortified on three sides (however, due to lack of time, Muscovites managed to raise only eastern fortified line), and from the rear, the plain was bounded by the steep bank of the Vorskla River, which flowed 60 metres below. To protect the cavalry, a system of redoubts was built on a 1,500-metre-wide gap, tied to the terrain. Second redoubt line was supposed to block exits from ravines and roads leading from the Poltava fortress to Semenivka and Petrivka, but Muscovites didn’t manage to complete them all in time as well. A redoubt is a closed earthen fortification in which an infantry battalion with artillery was able to hold position. These fortifications were supposed to limit the enemy’s freedom of action and narrow the space for manoeuvre.
The Moscow army consisted of 33,000 infantry, 21,000 cavalry (54,000 regular troops in total), and 23,000 irregular units (Kalmyks, Don and Ural Cossacks, and 8,000 Ukrainian Cossacks of Ivan Skoropadsky). According to the estimates of contemporary Russian historian P. Krotov, the artillery consisted of 302 cannons, mortars and howitzers. The Swedish army selected for the battle by Charles XII consisted of about 17,000 soldiers (8,170 infantry, 7,800 cavalry, 1,000 Wallachians) and 5,000 irregular units (Zaporozhzhians and Cossacks of Hetman Ivan Mazepa).
The final battle, which took place on 27 June 1709 was divided into 2 stages:
The first was the battle near the redoubts, which began at about 4 a.m. and was characterised by the Swedish infantry storming the redoubts and a clash between the opposing cavalry units;
The second consisted of line-on-line confrontation, where weathered and numerically lacking Swedish line wasn’t able to overpower fully-deployed Moscow forces.
The 2nd – from 9 a.m., a battle on the plain between the Malobudyshchansky and Yakivchansky forests in front of the Moscow camp. Swedish sources record an unsuccessful attempt by a part of I. Skoropadskyi’s Cossacks to unite with the allied Swedish-Ukrainian army. By 11 o’clock, the battle ended with the Swedes and their Cossack allies completely driven off the field.
In the afternoon, the Moscow army celebrated its victory on the battlefield, while the Swedish-Ukrainian units, having retreated to Pushkarivka, began an organised retreat along the Vorskla River towards the Dnipro.
On the evening of 27 June, after the celebration, Peter I ordered the pursuit of the enemy, who had already abandoned their positions near Poltava.
Modern Ukrainian, Swedish, and Russian historians estimate that the bloody battle resulted in the following casualties:
Moscow side: 1650 killed; 3290 wounded
Swedish side: 6900 – killed; 2800 – wounded
There is no accurate information about the losses of Ukrainian Cossacks on the battlefield.
The hall exhibits drawings of soldiers’ uniforms and a diorama by the M. Grekov studio. Peter the 1st’s view of the Battle of Poltava is represented by a masterpiece by Denis Marten the Younger, created in the first quarter of the eighteenth century and commissioned by the Tsar himself. Engravings by N. Larmessen and S. Simoneau (first quarter of the 18th century) are among the famous works of the battle genre. The hall also houses weapons, uniforms, and equipment of soldiers of the early eighteenth century. The information and exhibition project “Mazepa. Charles XII. Peter I. Top 10 myths of russian propaganda”(created jointly with the Ukrainian Institute of National Remembrance, Kyiv) busts the most common myths about the Great Northern War in Ukraine and the Battle of Poltava. The information and exhibition project “Battle of Poltava: The True History” shows the inconsistency of historical truth with the plots of artworks created according to the narratives of Soviet historians.