New Sweden - History

History

By the middle of the 17th century the Realm of Sweden had reached its greatest territorial extent and was one of the great powers of Europe. Sweden then included Finland and Estonia along with parts of modern Russia, Poland, Germany and Latvia. The Swedes sought to expand their influence by creating an agricultural (tobacco) and fur-trading colony to bypass French and English merchants. The New Sweden Company was chartered and included Swedish, Dutch, and German stockholders.

The first Swedish expedition to North America embarked from the port of Gothenburg in late 1637. It was organized and overseen by Clas Fleming, a Swedish Admiral from Finland. A Dutchman, Samuel Blommaert, assisted the fitting-out and appointed Peter Minuit to lead the expedition. The members of the expedition, aboard the ships Fogel Grip and Kalmar Nyckel, sailed into Delaware Bay, which lay within the territory claimed by the Dutch, passing Cape May and Cape Henlopen in late March 1638, and anchored at a rocky point on the Minquas Kill that is known today as Swedes' Landing on March 29, 1638. They built a fort on the present site of the city of Wilmington, which they named Fort Christina, after Queen Christina of Sweden.

In the following years, 600 Swedes and Finns, the latter group mainly Forest Finns from central Sweden, and also a number of Dutchmen and Germans in Swedish service, settled in the area. Peter Minuit was to become the first governor of the newly established colony of New Sweden. Having been the Director of the Dutch West India Company, and the predecessor of then-Director William Kieft, Minuit knew the status of the lands on either side of the Delaware River at that time. He knew that the Dutch had established deeds for the lands east of the river (New Jersey), but not for the lands to the west (Maryland, Delaware, and Pennsylvania).

Minuit made good on his appointment by landing on the west bank of the river and gathered the sachems of the local Delaware tribe. Sachems of the Susquehannocks were also present. They held a conclave in his cabin on the Kalmar Nyckel, and he persuaded the sachems to sign deeds he had prepared for the purpose to solve any issue with the Dutch. The Swedes claimed the section of land purchased included the land on the west side of the South River from just below the Schuylkill, in other words, today's Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, southeastern Pennsylvania, Delaware, and coastal Maryland. The Delaware sachem Mattahoon, who was one of the participants, later stated that only as much land as was contained within an area marked by "six trees" was purchased and that the rest of the land occupied by the Swedes was stolen.

Director Willem Kieft objected to the landing of the Swedes, but Minuit ignored him, since he knew that the Dutch were militarily impotent at the moment. Minuit finished Fort Christina during 1638, then departed for Stockholm for a second group. He made a side trip to the Caribbean to pick up a shipment of tobacco for resale in Europe to make the voyage profitable. Minuit died on this voyage during a hurricane at St. Christopher in the Caribbean.

The official duties of the first governor of New Sweden were carried out by Lieutenant (promoted to Captain) Måns Nilsson Kling, until a new governor was chosen and brought from Sweden two years later.

Under Johan Björnsson Printz, governor from 1643 to 1653, the company expanded along the river from Fort Christina, establishing Fort Nya Elfsborg on the east bank of the Delaware near present-day Salem, New Jersey and Fort Nya Gothenborg on Tinicum Island (to the immediate southwest of today's Philadelphia), where he also built his manor house, The Printzhof. The Swedish colony initially prospered. In 1644, New Sweden supported the Susquehannocks in their victory in a war against the English Province of Maryland. In May 1654, the Dutch Fort Casimir was captured by soldiers from the New Sweden colony led by governor Johan Risingh. Fort Casimir was renamed Fort Trinity (in Swedish, Trefaldigheten).

Soon after Sweden opened the Second Northern War in the Baltic by attacking the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, the Dutch moved to take advantage and an armed squadron of ships under the direction of Director-General Peter Stuyvesant seized New Sweden. The Dutch moved an army to the Delaware River in the summer of 1655, easily capturing Fort Trinity and Fort Christina. The Swedish settlement was incorporated into Dutch New Netherland on September 15, 1655. Initially, the Swedish and Finnish settlers continued to enjoy local autonomy, retaining their own militia, religion, court, and lands.

This status lasted officially until the English conquest of the New Netherland colony was launched on June 24, 1664. The Duke of York sold the area that is today New Jersey to John Berkeley and George Carteret for a proprietary colony, separate from the projected New York. The actual invasion started on August 29, 1664, with the capture of New Amsterdam. The invasion concluded with the capture of Fort Casimir (New Castle, Delaware) in October 1664. The invasion was conducted at the start of the Second Anglo-Dutch War.

The status continued unofficially until the area was included in William Penn's charter for Pennsylvania, on August 24, 1682. During this later period some immigration and expansion continued. The first settlement at Wicaco, a Swedish settlers' log blockhouse located below Society Hill, was built in present-day Philadelphia in 1669. It was later used as a church until about 1700, when Gloria Dei (Old Swedes') Church of Philadelphia was built on the site.