THE DUTCH & SWEDES ON THE DELAWARE 1609-64 BY CHRISTOPHER WARD THE DUTCH & SWEDES on the DELAWARE 1609-64 By CHRISTOPHER WARD UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA PRESS PHILADELPHIA MCMNXX COPYRIGHT 1930, BY CHRISTOPHER WARD LONDON HUMPHREY MILFORD : OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA JOHAN PRINTZ, Governor of New Sweden,1643-53 PAINTING BY N. C. WYETH TO THE MEMORY OF MY GRANDFATHERS, CHRISTOPHER L. WARD, ESQ PRESIDENT OF THE BRADFORD COUNTY (PA.) HISTORICAL SOCIETY, AND LEWIS P. BUSH, M.D., PRESIDENT OF THE HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF DELAWARE, THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED PREFACE The stories of the early settlements of the English in New England, of the Dutch in New York and of the English in Maryland and Virginia have been told again and again. But, between these more northern and more southern lands, there lies a great territory stretching along both shores of Delaware River and Bay, whose earliest history has been neglected. In the common estimation of the general reader, the beginnings of civilization in this middle region are credited to William Penn and his English Quakers. Yet, for nearly fifty years before Penn came, there had been white men settled along the River's shores. When he came, he found farms, towns, forts, churches, schools, courts of law already in being in his newly acquired possessions. Small credit has been given to those who laid these foundations, the Swedes and the Dutch, whom the English superseded. The names of Winthrop, Stuyvesant, Calvert and Berkeley are familiar to many. Who knows the name of Johan Printz, the Swedish governor, who for ten years pioneered in this wilderness? Yet, in picturesqueness of personality, in force of character, in administrative ability and in actual accomplishment, within the limits of the resources granted him, Printz is the fit companion of these other so widely acclaimed men. This book, then, tells this story, which, in its entirety and with proper fullness of detail, has waited until now to be told. It begins with the discovery of Delaware Bay by Henry Hudson in 1609. It ends in 1664, when the English took from the Dutch New Amsterdam and its then appendage, the Delaware River territory. During this period the Swedes and the Dutch ruled the River. At times they divided its ownership between them. At times they alternated in complete domination. Their affairs were thus so intertwined that their stories must be told as one. In the table of "Principal Authorities" at the end of this volume will be found a sufficient indication of the historical sources drawn upon by the present writer, to whose editors and authors he acknowledges his indebtedness. Notable among them are the documents published by the State of New York and Dr. Amandus Johnson's learned and exhaustive work, "The Swedish Settlements on the Delaware." Special acknowledgment is due to Dr. George H. Ryden, Professor of History of the University of Delaware, for his kind assistance in the assembly of the source materials and his subsequent careful and thorough criticism of the manuscript. C. W. Wilmington, Delaware August 4, 1930 BOOK ONE:THE DUTCH CHAPTER I OF TRAFFICS AND DISCOVERIES HEN Solomon the Great had built his temple and had built all the cities which he "desired to build in Jerusalem and in Lebanon and in all the land of his dominion," he "made a navy of ships . on the shore of the Red Sea, in the land of Edom." Then, because the Israelites were not seafaring men, he called on his friend Hiram, King of Tyre, and Hiram sent him " shipmen that had knowledge of the sea." So the firm of Solomon & Hiram was formed and began to trade overseas. They brought gold from "Ophir," which may have been Africa or Egypt or Arabia, and from the Far East they brought sandal-wood and precious stones, "ivory and apes and peacocks," and "King Solomon exceeded all the Kings of the earth for riches and for wisdom." Two thousand years after the time of King Solomon, men in ships were still seeking the luxuries and elegances which only the Far East could furnish. Venice and Genoa had succeeded Tyre and Sidon as the chief emporia of the Mediterranean. They monopolized the trade with the Orient and for five centuries "held the gorgeous East in fee." Then in 1453 Muhammad II took Constantinople, the gateway to the East, and barred it to all Christian nations. No longer was the Mediterranean the highway to India and China and the Islands of Spices. The direct road was closed. It was necessary to find a detour. Thrust out into the Atlantic at the southwestern corner of Europe was another land that bred seafarers. Hitherto it had been at a disadvantage because it had no Mediterranean port. In the adversity of Venice and Genoa Portugal found her opportunity. Step by step, to the Canaries, to Madeira, to the Azores, her mariners had ventured westward into unknown seas. Now, under the guidance of Prince Henry the Navigator, they turned southward. Step by step again, by successively longer voyages, at last they made their way around the Cape of Good Hope to India. In 1498 Vasco da Gama dropped a Portuguese anchor in the harbor of Calicut, and for a hundred years after that the little kingdom of Portugal was foremost in the commerce between Europe and the East. Farther north on the coast of Europe lay another land that bred sailormen. Originally inhabited by the Batavians and other German tribes, the Netherlands-the Low Lands on the North Sea-belonged in the IX Century to Germany as a dependency of the Duchy of Lotharingia. With the decline of the ducal power they were divided into several counties and duchies, Brabant, Flanders, Guelders, Holland, Zealand and the rest. By various means in the XIV and XV centuries, they came under the dominion of the Dukes of Burgundy, and so by descent to Charles I, King of Spain. The Netherlands lay in the track of trade that led by sea from Spain, Italy and the Levant to Britain and the more northern lands. Their geographical situation, long shore line and good harbors, the boldness and skill of their mariners and the commercial ability of their merchants combined to make them, and especially Holland, the greatest entre port of trade in western Europe. Sweden sent down her metals and timber, Muscovy her hides and furs, Iceland her salt fish. England shipped across the narrow sea her wool and tin. From Italy came oil, and wine from France, and from Venice and Genoa the spoil of the East, ivory, silks and spices. The Netherlands themselves produced linens and fine woolen fabrics and glass, paper and printed books, steel and swords and gems, cut jewels and cloth of gold. In the cities of Holland and of the other provinces these things met and found their market. Dutchmen were traders almost by the necessity of nature. When Muhammad the Conqueror blocked the gateway to the East, silks and spices ceased to come to Holland by way of Venice and Genoa, but that troubled the phlegmatic merchants of Amsterdam very little. They were as ready to trade with Lisbon. The desired goods continued to come, though by another route. The ships of the Dutchmen carrying their cargoes still sailed the seas and in ever increasing numbers. By the end of the XVI century the Dutch were the foremost in the tonnage of their merchantmen, the greatest European trading nation. Portugal had a natural advantage over the other European nations in this matter of oriental commerce, because of her geographical position and of the courage and seamanship of her sailors. This was made a monopoly by Pope Nicholas V in 1454, when he gave Portugal the exclusive right to explore and use the new way around Africa to the East. But in 1493 came Columbus with the news that he had found a western route to the Indies for the Spaniards. Portugal's monopoly was ended and dangerous national rivalries were created. To prevent trouble Pope Alexander VI took the matter in hand. On the map he drew a north and south line a hundred leagues west of the Azores, and gave Spain all the world to the west of it. So Portugal and Spain divided the trade with the "Indies," not knowing that one had the East Indies and the other the West Indies, and that they were half a world apart. Still the Dutch were unconcerned. There was for a long time no trade from the west, and they continued dealing very satisfactorily with Portugal for the products of the east. But in 1556 events began to occur, which were to affect them seriously in many ways. In that year Philip II succeeded his father Charles I on the Spanish throne and so became ruler of the Netherlands. He was a very religious man, incessant in "laboring for the glory of God." Heretics being equally abominable in the sight of God and of Philip, and his Netherlandish subjects being largely of heretical opinion, he set himself to convert them by edict. They refused to obey. With fire and sword he tamed the southern provinces, which were predominantly Catholic and which now constitute Belgium. But the stiff-necked Protestants of the northern provinces, Holland, Zealand, Utrecht and so on, seven in all, withstood him. They organized a Union, proclaimed their independence of Spain and elected William of Orange their prince, with the title of Stadholder. All this did not interrupt their trade with Portugal, but twenty-five years later another shift of circumstance ended it.