The Battle of Vilnius was the first time a foreign power managed to capture a group of cultural, and historic structures on the left bank of what river?
Battle of Vilnius (1655) The Battle of Vilnius, Wilno, or Vilna was an attack by Russian and Cossack forces on Vilnius (Wilno), the capital of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania within the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, that occurred on 8 August 1655 during the Russo-Polish War (1654–67). The Polish–Lithuanian forces under the leadership of hetman Janusz Radziwiłł were defeated by the Russian army of Alexis of Russia. It was the first time that a foreign power managed to capture the Vilnius Castle Complex. The six-year Muscovite occupation that followed resulted in a major depopulation and a decline of the city for many years to come. The defeat was one of the reasons Janusz Radziwiłł and several other Lithuanian magnates surrendered the Grand Duchy to Sweden at the Union of Kėdainiai.
Siege of Smolensk (1654) The Siege of Smolensk was one of the first great events of the Russo-Polish War (1654–67). Smolensk (pl. "Smoleńsk"), which had been under the rule of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth during 1404–1514 and since 1611, was besieged by a Russian army in June 1654. The Polish garrison of the city (under the chairmanship of Smolensk Voivode Filip Obuchowicz) hoped to get reinforcements from the army of Janusz Radziwiłł (1612–55), stationed in Orsha. Its situation worsened when Radziwiłł suffered a defeat from Prince Yakov Cherkassky in the Battle of Shklow. In September, the Polish garrison agreed to leave the city after it was promised a free retreat. The garrison left Smolensk and handed over its weapons and ensigns to the Russians before retreating to Commonwealth-controlled territory. A significant number of landowners, however, preferred to stay and keep their estates, becoming subjects of the Russian Tsardom.