Swedish colonial history
The Swedish overseas colonies consisted in acquiring some branches and colonies in Africa and America in the 17th and 18th centuries. Tried as a young European power Sweden , the relatively small amount of the slave and the Swedish East India Company on the East Indies trade was involved, from the 17th century non-European colonies to acquire permanent. As with other colonial powers, the first step on this path was the establishment of overseas trading posts. In the long term, however, Sweden was unable to prevail against competition, particularly from the Netherlands and Great Britain .
Branches and colonies in Africa
African trading colonies owned by the private Swedish Africa Company with fortresses and factories existed on the so-called Swedish Gold Coast , all of which came into Swedish possession between 1650 and 1653 and were lost to Denmark between 1657 and 1659 : Fort Witsten ( Takoradi ), Fort William ( Anomabu ), Christiansborg ( Accra ) and Cape Coast Castle ( Cape Coast ). With the loss of the African bases, Sweden's attempt to become a colonial power had failed.
Branches and colonies in America
New Sweden in North America, acquired in 1638, was lost to the Netherlands in 1655 . In 1784 Sweden acquired the Caribbean island of St. Barthelemy (St. Barts) from France against trading rights , which it sold back to France in 1877. After the Napoleonic Wars, Great Britain ceded Guadeloupe to Sweden. In the Peace of Paris in 1814, Sweden returned it to France.
Parallel expansion in Europe
The overseas colonial efforts of Sweden were supplemented by expansive efforts in Europe, which in the course of the Thirty Years' War in 1648 Vorpommern ( Swedish-Pomerania ), including Stettin and the entire Oder estuary, Wismar and Neukloster as well as the Archdiocese of Bremen and the Diocese of Verden as imperial fiefs in Swedish possession brought. Sweden also succeeded in conquering Livonia or the Baltic States and Ingermanland in the First Northern War , but in the Great Northern War in 1721 they lost the territories to Russia .
