After making all his preparations to storm the strong fort and town of Fredericksham, which had been ceded to the Empress Elizabeth in 1743, and the repossession of which would have opened to him the gates of the Russian capital, his officers, and chiefly those of the Finnish Regiment of Abo, flatly refused to pass the frontier, alleging as a reason, "that the constitution of the Swedish kingdom would not permit them to be accessory to foreign war which the nation had not sanctioned."
This put an end to what was named the Finland Expedition; it gave the enemy time to put themselves in a perfect state of defence, and filled Gustavus with fresh fury; but despite the attempts of the Russians to intercept him, he reached Borgo, an old seaport in the district of Nyeland, where he established his headquarters, and where his first act was to assemble the whole Swedish Army, under arms, on the 8th of June, 1789, in front of the town, and along the margin of the river, which there flows into the Gulf of Finland.
A hollow square of contiguous close columns of Horse, Dragoons and Infantry was then formed; the whole were ordered to prime and load with ball-cartridge. The Artillery were unlimbered and loaded with round and cannister shot, in case of resistance, though none, save a very few, knew precisely what was about to ensue.
Then the fated Regiment of Abo, which had taken so marked a part in the defection before Fredericksham, was marched in a solid close column of companies into the centre of this vast hollow square, with its colours flying; and a hum of expectation and surprise, not unmixed with dismay, pervaded the whole assembled masses.
By Gustavus, a king whose ruling passions were heroism and selfishness, vanity and ambition, they were ordered to "ground their arms," which were at once taken away, with all their swords, bayonets, and accoutrements.
They were then ordered to strip off their regimental coats, and appear in their shirts and breeches. The officers were deprived of their epaulettes and commissions, and were cashiered on the spot.
Their colours were then rent from the poles and torn to pieces, the poles being broken under foot, while the drums were defaced by persons appointed to do so.
The whole battalion then passed from the right of companies out of the hollow square by single files, while a general hiss was maintained by the whole army until the last man had quitted it; and the united sound of this unpleasant expression of contempt rising into the still air, by the sea-shore, is said to have had a very singular and remarkable effect on those who heard it.
Though thus broken up and disbanded, the Corps was not set adrift; for the whole of the privates were drafted into the different battalions of the Artillery, and long after the fiery Gustavus had perished by the hand of the regicide Ankerström, it was a bitter taunt in the Swedish army to have belonged to "the degraded Regiment of Abo."