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America Pre 1893 – New Sweden

In the early-mid 17th century, Sweden wanted to get in on the fur and tobacco trade in the New World. So did a lot of other countries — and its survival of the fittest out there. Although the New Sweden colony ultimately failed, the presence of the Swedes positively impacted the formation of the United States and changed the way Europeans interacted with Native Americans.

In 1637 Swede, German and Dutch investors in northern Europe got together and made the New Sweden Company, with Peter Minuit to be the leader. They were looking to make a smaller copy of New Netherlands. Minuit was the guy to lead this new expedition because he was a Governor of New Netherlands and purchased Manhattan (Thompson, n.d.).

Minuit lost his position in the Dutch Colony because he had problems with a minister and/or gave out land at the expense of the West India Company. He thought this was bogus, so he teamed up with Sweden to go back to America (Britannica, 2023).

The New Sweden Company convinced the Swedish chancellor to help them; Sweden, wanting to be seen as a Great Power in Europe, sent them over. Minuit found land unoccupied by Europeans on the western bank of the Delaware river (Interestingly, each colonial power had different maps marking their claimed territory, so it was difficult for someone to determine where the claims overlapped or ended in some areas).

The Company met with the local Lenape and purchased 67 miles of land next to the river, and the two groups began a friendly trading relationship. This was pivotal in the survival of the colony in the early days because the original colonists (a mix of Swedes, Finns, and Dutch) had to rely on this trading partnership to survive. New Sweden was never self-sufficient, farmers could barely feed their own families and supply ships weren’t as frequent as they could have been (There was a war between Sweden and the Dutch in Europe, stealing away supply ships going to the New World) (Covart, n.d.).

The rivalry between the Dutch and Sweden was strong both in Europe and in America. The third governor of New Sweden, Peter Ridder, expanded the territory very close to a Dutch fort and the fourth governor, Johan Printz, expanded to gain control over the mouth of the Delaware and keep an eye on the Dutch fort Nassau across the way (Thompson, n.d.).

The New Sweden and New Netherland claims started to conflict; Dutch sent over a new governor for their colony, Peter Stuyvesant. Printz’s soldiers stood no chance against the Chad Stuyvesant troops. Printz was doing a poor job at keeping anyone in his colony happy, leaving Johan Risingh to replace him, and a year later, lose the colony to the Dutch (Covart, n.d.).

Not enough people were emigrating to New Sweden, so the Swedish government had to resort to sending convicts over as punishment, (this practice was later made famous via Australia), but the convicts managed to flee to Maryland or New Netherlands (unfortunately, escape options for prisoners in Australia were far more limited). Other New Sweden colonists also dreamed about moving to neighboring colonies because their own sucked so bad but had to be coerced into staying (“New Sweden Historical Marker,” n.d.).

The colony was also not meeting projected profits, with the Lenape trading partners not bringing enough fur to satisfy the Swedes. (The English were also much better at getting fur than anybody else, as soon as they got there, they almost immediately monopolized the fur trade). There weren’t any craftspeople in New Sweden, either, so they had to trade with neighboring colonies for important things, such as, y’know, furniture (Covart, n.d.).

Risingh brought more colonists over, but not enough provisions for everyone. The colony was shrinking, and although Risingh captured a Dutch fort, eventually he pissed off Stuyvesant so much in 1655 that he commanded 317 soldiers and seven armed ships to take over each Swedish fort in their colony (Thompson, n.d.).

After the colony was dissolved, Risingh and 36 of his countrymen left for Europe, but the remaining colonists (around 350) stayed in America. The Dutch allowed them to keep their land and possessions and continue their cultural traditions (Britannica, 2013).

One thing that wasn’t a total abomination for New Sweden was the relationship between the Europeans and Native Americans. The Lenape and Minquas (Susquehannock to the English) were mostly sedentary farmers, so there wasn’t a lot of conflict when colonists were out and about.

The Swedish government ordered Printz to maintain favorable relations with the Natives (Covart, n.d.), even though he was miffed at them for not bringing enough furs (“New Sweden Historical Marker,” n.d.). This was at the time when England was ordering genocide on the Minquas.

Swedish colonists just wanted to trade with neighboring people, either other Europeans or Native Americans (Thompson, n.d.). This proved that Europeans could coexist with the natives in a less evil and more productive fashion than killing everyone who is different from you (Covart, n.d.).

The leftover Swedish and Finnish colonists that remained in the area established Lutheran churches that kept the language spoken and culture alive for longer than the colony had existed and kept them distinct culturally from the hordes of English settlers that eventually showed up in the Delaware valley.

Because the Swedes were friendly with the Lenape and English, they acted as mediators for disputes between the two, likely saving bloodshed. Also, many believe that the American Log Cabin was created by Swedish and other Nordic immigrants where the horizontal log structure was popular (Thompson, n.d.). The Log Cabin is incredibly romanticized in America for camping or remote living, and it only got so popular due to the short existence of New Sweden (Thompson, n.d.).

I had no idea that Sweden had a colony in America, all the way over here in the Midwest. I have Swedish heritage (Nygren means new branch [branch of family tree]) so I am a little bit interested in Swedish history more than I am about other European countries. New Sweden’s history had enough drama to be interesting to me but short enough to not become overwhelming.

So New Sweden was doomed to fail from the start, but it did provide an entryway for more Swedish and Finnish immigrants to America. These colonists helped smooth over relations between Europeans and Native Americans and introduced cultural elements to the US that are still around today.

Works Cited