Uri & Glarus - Suworow's Journey

Our personal travel and photo guide for Switzerland

We were surprised to see a monument built for a Russian General in Switzerland. So what was he doing in Switzerland? We started to do some research and decided to go and explore the areas that were important to his journey and gained an insight of places from a different and historic angle:

Going back in time to the year 1799, monarchy in Europe was the most common form of government. But in France after the French Revolution, their king was killed and a modern republic was created. The aim of the French was to spread the revolutionary ideas across Europe. In this period, Switzerland was already occupied by the French and a Helvetic Republic had just been founded, much to the displeasure of wealthy Zurich.

In June 1799, a new coalition between Austria, Russia and England was created and an army of 63'000 Austrians coming from Germany was sent to Zurich to fight the French. The French positioned 25'000 men at the top of the hills around Zurich - the Käferberg and Zürichberg - after realising that it would be better to retreat towards Aargau. At least for a short period of time they would have been able to enjoy the beautiful view down to Zurich with the lake and Alps in the background.

View from Waid - Zuerich

After the successful capture of Zurich, the coalition decided in August 1799 that a Russian troop with 22'000 soldiers would take over. The aim was to finally defeat the French. They therefore commanded General Suworow, who was then stationed in Northern Italy, to support their forces. He started marching with over 20'000 soldiers but had to wait a while near Lugano in order to obtain more weapons and 5'000 horses.

Their march continued six days later on September 21. First, they had to cross Monte Ceneri and pass Bellinzona. At Airolo they trekked up the Tremola to reach the top of the San Gottardo mountain pass (2'108m) where they came upon the French army for the first time. Standing on top of the pass and looking down to see over 20'000 men and their horses marching up the mountain must have been quite a sight!

They fought and won the terrible and bloody battle with the French in just one day. Many soldiers were killed and injured by the time they reached Andermatt. Here they had to cross a wild river at the narrow gorge of Schöllenen. During the battle at the devil's bridge - where you can find the Russian monument - the French had tried to destroy the bridge. Suworow just about managed to cross it but many more of his soldiers died in the process.

Devil's Bridge - Schöllenenschlucht

Suworow had thought that the path on to Zurich would be easy to reach. But to his surprise the road ended in Flüelen. There was no road to the right nor to the left of the beautiful Vierwaldstättersee encircled by mountains and all the boats had been removed by the French.

Therefore, the only way forward was to for him and his army to climb the Kinzigpass (2'089m) to Muotatal from where they had planned to move on to Schwyz. Only there, the valley's exit was being occupied by the French. In Muotatal the Russian army was informed that Zurich had just been taken by the French during the second battle of Zurich. This resulted in them becoming the hunted and had to flee from the attacking French army.

View from Pragelpass

Their exit plan was to cross the Pragelpass (1550m) towards the canton of Glarus - this being the closest route back in order to save Austria. This area is very interesting and we can highly recommend climbing Mt. Silberen - a unique mountain with great views and a karstic plateau with the biggest cave system in Switzerland (Höllloch). But Suworow's soldiers ended up taking the direct path towards the city of Glarus along the lovely Klöntalersee.

In Glarus the situation became even more desperate. The road out of the Glarner valley was once again occupied. After having spent five days in Glarus the General decided to take the opposite direction towards Elm. Here he just missed the bi-yearly natural spectacle by a few days when the sun shines through a hole in the mountain called Martinsloch.

The only remaining way out was to cross the 2407m high Panixerpass which meant an arduous climb of another 1'500 m from Elm. As they reached the top, they met with very bad weather conditions: deep fresh snow had fallen unexpectedly. This photo was taken in September 2020 just after a similar weather pattern. Looking up the mountain and seeing the strong icy winds and the rough scenery gave us a good impression of how bad the situation must have been for them then.

Without proper shoes and clothing the Russians suffered many casualties. When they arrived in the Rhine valley of Graubünden, one third of Suworow's army had been lost in the battles, had starved or frozen to death. Still, the journey had to be continued towards Chur. We hope that they had the chance to see the beautiful lakes Cauma or Cresta near Flims on their way. Even though Suworow had lost all his supplies and artillery, he had kept over 1'400 French prisoners alive when he met his Austrians allies in Chur.

Caumasee

Finally, at Sargans the Rhine flows through a narrow section which was occupied by the French and is best seen from the mountain area of Pizol. As a last move, Suworow decided to circumvent yet another battle and made a final ascent in Switzerland at St. Luzisteig (on the right of the picture below) to finally arrive in Austria.

View from Schwarzbüel - Pizol

After 21 days, 300 kilometres and 10'000 metres altitude, 69 year old Suworow arrived in Austria on October 12, 1799. Ten days later he and his people were ordered back to Russia. Suworow returned home without ever having lost a battle in all his years as a General. But this was his last crusade: shortly after, Suworow died in Sankt Petersburg.

Weg durch die Schweiz der russischen Truppen von General Suworow 1799. Grafik: Schweizerisches Nationalmuseum / Passaport

https://blog.nationalmuseum.ch/2018/05/general-suworow-und-sein-feldzug-durch-die-schweiz/

Our other blogs cover the following areas (with links):

Part 1: Berner Oberland

Part 2: Jura

Part 3: Lake Luzern

Part 4: Engadin

Part 5: Appenzell

Part 6: Aargau

Part 7: Emmental

Part 8: Romandie

Part 9: Valais

Part 10: Uri, Schwyz, Glarus

Part 11: Rhein

Part 12: Zürich

"One crowded hour of glorious life is worth an age without a name"

(The Call - Thomas Osbert Morsdaunt, 1730-1809)

Travel blog and travel guide by Aaron Matzinger & Clare Walker

© Aaron Matzinger & Clare Walker

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