New Sweden Genealogy

== History ==

New Sweden (Swedish: Nya Sverige) was a Swedish colony on the Delaware River on the Atlantic coast of North America from 1638 to 1655. It was centered at Fort Christina, now in Wilmington, Delaware, and included parts of the present-day states of Delaware, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania. About 600 Swedes and 300 Finns, Dutch, and Germans built the colony for the purpose of producing tobacco and furs.

A lasting legacy of New Sweden was an interest among Swedish people in migrating to America. Another legacy was the log cabin, an idea from Sweden which became the most popular style of first-home on the American frontier. New Sweden also brought some of the earliest Lutheran believers and their ministers to America.

From the first, the leaders of New Sweden knew they were settling on land claimed by the Dutch of New Netherland (New Jersey), and the British Lord Baltimore of Maryland (that is, Delaware). In 1654 New Sweden captured Fort Casimir from New Netherland in what is now New Castle County, Delaware. The next year, 1655, the Dutch counter-attacked, conquered, and absorbed all of former New Sweden, but granted it some autonomy. In turn, New Netherland was conquered and absorbed by the British nine years later in 1664.

Websites

 * "New Sweden Settlers, 1638-1654" in Sweden Genealogy Links at http://www.genealogia.fi/emi/3d41indexe.htm (accessed 4 November 2008). Originally published in the Swedish American Genealogist vols. 16-19.
 * "List of the Swedish Families Residing in New Sweden in 1693 for Genealogy Research" in Colonial Ancestors at http://colonialancestors.com/de/families.htm (accessed 4 November 2008). 188 families, 932 persons.
 * "List of persons to the Colony of New Amstel, compiled from 'Return of Moneys paid for the Colonie on the Delaware River, November 18, 1659 - November 3, 1662'" in New Netherland and Beyond Delaware River Settlements 1637-1682 at http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~nycoloni/amsteld1.html (accessed 4 November 2008). 41 names.
 * Swedish Colonial Society - history, churches, and settlers.

Place Names
Maps


 * Amandus Johnson, “Detailed Map of New Sweden 1638-1655” attributed to a book by Amandus Johnson, Swedish Settlements on the Delaware (Philadelphia: Univ. of Pennsylvania, 1911) in “Settlements on the Delaware River” in New Netherland and Beyond at http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~nycoloni/nswamap.html (accessed 8 November 2008). Best available map, but the labels are sometimes tiny and difficult to read on the Internet. The explanations on this map are probably the main source for ubiquitous lists of settlement dates for the forts, for the permanent settlements, and rivers and creeks of New Sweden. This map is not listed in the above book's table of contents or list of maps; perhaps it was a flyleaf pocket insert. An identical map is in Amandus Johnson, The Swedes on the Delaware 1638-1664 (Philadelphia: Swedish Colonial Society, 1915), 392. However, the digitized by Google version of page 392 is virtually blank.
 * “Kartskiss öfver Nya Sverige 1638-55 (Efter Amandus Johnson)” a map image in the article “Nya Sverige” in Nordisk familjebok. Uggleupplagan. 20. Norrsken - Paprocki (Stockholm: Nordisk familjeboks förlags, 1914; digitized by Projekt Runeberg, 2002), 153-54. Less detailed but much more readable on the Internet than Johnson's original. Shows forts and blockhouses only—no other settlements.

Large Forts


 * Fort Christina, now Wilmington, Delaware 1638-1655
 * Fort New Gothenborg (Nya Göteborg), now Essington, Pennsylvania 1643-1655
 * Fort Nya Korsholm (Gripsholm?, Manäyungh), now Southwest Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 1647-1653
 * Fort New Elfsborg (Nya Älfborg), now west of Salem, New Jersey 1643-1651
 * Fort Casimir (Trefaldighets), now New Castle, Delaware 1651-1655

Blockhouses (log cabin forts)

Settlements

Rivers and Creeks