New Sweden (
Nya Sverige in
Swedish and
Uusi-Ruotsi in
Finnish) was a small
Swedish settlement along the
Delaware River on the
Mid-Atlantic coast of
North America. It was centered at
Fort Christina, now in
Wilmington,
Delaware, and included parts of the present-day
American states of
Delaware,
New Jersey, and
Pennsylvania. The settlement was founded
March 29,
1638, and was incorporated into
Dutch New Netherland on
September 15,
1655. Along with
Swedes and
Finns, a number of the settlers were
Dutch. There were also some
Germans who first came to the colony as soldiers in the Swedish army.
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 British 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[1], and anchored at a rocky point on the Minquas Kill that is known today as Swedes' Landing. They built a fort on the present site of the city of Wilmington, which they named Fort Christina, after Queen Christina of Sweden[2].
