Tuesday, September 27, 2016

What happened to the colony originally known as New Sweden?

When we study the colonies, New Sweden is not the first colony we think of! It is unlikely we think of Swedish explorers as some of the earliest colonists in America. For a brief period of about twenty years, the tiny kingdom of Sweden maintained a colony in the territories of New Jersey, Pensylvania, and Delaware.
The New Sweden colony was the smallest in population. At any one time, there were no more than one-hundred colonists which contributed to the short life span of the settlement. Though short-lived, the Swedish contributed to American culture by bringing Lutheran religious beliefs and ideas to America. Some think the log cabin was the invention of Swedish colonists.
The colony was not well-funded by the home country but was self-sufficient having made peaceful agreements with native tribes in the area. Peter Minuit in 1638, the early leader of the colony was able to successfully negotiate a land purchase from the Lenape and Susquehannock Indian tribes. The land would cover portions of the area of Delaware, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey. Unfortunately for the Swedish, Dutch colonists considered the property accessible by the Delaware River they settled to be part of the Dutch territorial claims. From the New Netherland colony, messages were dispatched by leaders of the Dutch colony warning the Swedish they had trespassed on Dutch territory.
The lack of human resources plagued the colony for many years. Unlike other European nations, the Swedes were not able to attract enough people to move and settle the area permanently. A reliable workforce was in such short supply the Swedish government forced criminals to come to the colony. The lack of financial support of the Swedish government was a problem as well. The success of other colonies nearby was an incentive for Swedish colonists to desert New Sweden for better economic opportunities which they did further weakening the workforce.
Eventually, the lack of labor, financial resources, and the increasing threat of conflict with the Dutch military resulted in the New Sweden colony effectively being disbanded and what remained became part of the Dutch colonies until the English took it over in the 1680s.
https://libraries.psu.edu/about/collections/unearthing-past-student-research-pennsylvania-history/new-sweden-brief-history

https://www.history.com/news/americas-forgotten-swedish-colony

No comments:

Post a Comment

What is the theme of the chapter Lead?

Primo Levi's complex probing of the Holocaust, including his survival of Auschwitz and pre- and post-war life, is organized around indiv...