New Sweden on the Delaware River

 In 1614, a mere seven years after Jamestown and six years after Quebec, thirteen Dutch merchants established a factorij, or trading center, on an island just below present-day Albany, New York, to engage in trade with the Iroquois people. This was Fort Nassau.

For nine years they were very successful in their enterprise. Then, in 1621, The Netherlands granted exclusive rights to trade in the Americas to the Dutch West India Company. In 1624, the Company built another fort near Nassau called Fort Orange.

In 1625, the Company established a settlement on Manhattan Island. This would be the fort of New Amsterdam and lead by Pieter Minuit. Five years later, Minuit lost an argument with his government and left the service of the Company and the Netherlands. A short time later, he entered the service of the Swedish government.

William Usselinx, also a Dutchman, had interested Swedish king Gustavus Adolphus II in establishing a Swedish colony in America. Gustavus Adolphus II, however, was killed in 1632 at the Battle of Lutzen. His six year old daughter, Christina succeeded to the throne. Peter Minuit saw an opportunity and reminded the Swedish government of Usselinx' plans. The first Swedish expedition sailed from Gottenberg late in 1637, under Peter Minuit, and landed on the Delaware River early in the Spring 1638. It comprised a clergyman and 50 settlers.

The Dutch, from New Amsterdam, had claimed all the land, by secured deeds from the Indians, between the Hudson River and the Delaware River on the west and the Connecticut River on the East. Minuit obtained deeds and title to the land along the west and east shores of the Delaware. While trade with the natives would be an important early part of New Sweden, hence the challenge to the Dutch, it was far more important to secure the land for the colonists that were to follow.

One member of this first expedition, Mons Klinga, was commissioned by the government to return to Sweden and recruit colonists for America. Klinga may have been of Finnish origins, Finland being a part of Sweden at that time. Large number of Finns had been settled in the western part of middle Sweden to clear the forests and open new farmlands. They were very efficient in felling the trees and then, after they had dried, burning them and plowing and cultivating the land. Too efficient, as far as the Swedish government was concerned. But the vast forests of America, it was believed, would be more suitable for the tender touch of the Finns. So Klinga was sent to recruit from among the Finns settlers for New Sweden in America. While some volunteered, many were conscripted as colonists.

Two ships, the "Key of Kalmar" and "Charitas," sailed from Sweden in August 1641 with settlers for New Sweden. These first emigrants reached their destination, Fort Christina (the present Wilmington, Delaware) on the 7th of November of the same year, that is only twenty-one years after the arrival of the Mayflower with the Pilgrim Fathers to New England. Many of the "settlers" had come involuntarily, but they came.

The location of the first Swedish settlement was at "The Rocks," on the Christina River, near the foot of Seventh Street. A fort was built called Fort Christina after the young queen of Sweden, and the river was likewise named for her.

The most important Swedish governor was Colonel Johan Printz, who ruled the colony under Swedish law for ten years, from 1643 to 1653. He was succeeded by Johan Rising, who upon his arrival in 1654, seized the Dutch post, Fort Casmir, which the governor of the Colony of New Netherlands had built in 1651, on the site of the present town of New Castle.

Rising governed the Swedish Colony from his headquarters at Fort Christina until the autumn of 1655, when Peter Stuyvesant came from New Amsterdam with a Dutch fleet, subjugated the Swedish forts, and established the authority of the Colony of New Netherlands throughout the area formerly controlled by the Colony of New Sweden.

Fort Christina became modern Wilmington. Fort Casmir is the site of modern New Castle. A Finn by the name of Peter Kock settled on land west of the Delaware River, building as his first structure a bath-house or "Sauna." The earliest map of the Philadelphia area, drawn by the Dutchman Roggevin, shows just one name-Sauna. Many have tried to explain this name; the simplest is that Roggevin marked the location of Kock's settlement which eventually became Philadelphia.

In 1654, the Swedes expelled the Dutch from Ft. Casimir near what is now New Castle. In retaliation, a Dutch force led by Peter Stuyvesant arrived at Fort Christina in 1655 with several hundred men and occupied this "South River" territory. It became part of the greater New Netherlands territories. Peter Stuyvesant quickly returned to Manhattan, New York to defend the Dutch colonists there from an Indian uprising. He appointed Jean Paul Jacquet as Vice-Director.

In 1664, New Netherlands and New Sweden were seized by the English and conveyed to the Duke of York. The English propensity for absentee landlords did not set well with the Swedes and Finns. In 1669, a Finn organized and led a revolt against English rule - the little known Long Finn Rebellion. The first of a number of rebellions leading up to the American Revolution. Johan Andresson Stalcup was one of the rebels. Johan Anderssen Stalcup and John Coleman were members of the inner circle. Each had secret motives. None too successful farmers, they coveted the estate of Englishmen.

The plan of rebellion came to the ears of the English authorities before its execution, and the leader Marcus Jacobsen was apprehended and placed in prison to await trial. The punishment for the "simpler sorts" was requested as labor. Johan was to be secured in like manner as the lone Swede, since he was perceived as a chief instigator of this tragedy. The trial was held quickly and the prisoners were sentenced. The Long Finn was sentenced to be whipped, branded on the face, and transported from the colony. The rest of the prisoners were fined. Heading this list was Johan Andersson, whose fine was 1500 guilders.

In 1682, the Duke of York conveyed his lands to William Penn. Immediately, the inhabitants of the Delaware territories were invited to take an oath of allegiance to the new form of government. Johan took this oath in 1683 along with several other members of his family.

In spite of the heavy fine, Johan continued to prosper. Johan was engaged in an assortment of business ventures. A grant of land from the Dutch vice-director and the help of two other investors provided the backing to build a grist mill between 1658-1662 at "Turtle Falls-kil". This business stayed in the Stalcop family for three generations. Many land transfers and transactions were recorded during these years for Johan. The most lucrative was the eight hundred acres of land on which Wilmington, Delaware now stands; granted by the Duke of York to Johan about 1671.