Editing New Netherland (section)

===South River and New Sweden===
Apart from the second [[Fort Nassau (South)|Fort Nassau]], and the small community that supported it, settlement along the [[Delaware River|Zuyd Rivier]] was limited. The settlement sponsored by the ''patroons'' of [[Zwaanendael Colony|Zwaanendael]], [[Samuel Blommaert]] and [[Samuel Godijn]] was destroyed by the local Indigenous population soon after its founding in 1631 during the absence of their agent, [[David Pietersen de Vries]].<ref name="Jacobs">{{cite book |last1=Jacobs |first1=Jaap |title=The Colony of New Netherland: A Dutch Settlement in Seventeenth-Century America |date=2009 |publisher=Cornell University Press |location=Ithaca, New York |isbn=978-0801475160}}{{page?|date=October 2024}}</ref>

[[Peter Minuit]], who had obtained a deed for [[Manhattan]] from the Lenape (and was soon after dismissed as director), knew that the Dutch would be unable to defend the southern flank of their North American territory and had not signed treaties with or purchased land there from the [[Lenape]]. After gaining support from the Queen of [[Sweden]], Minuit chose the west bank of the [[Delaware River]] to establish a colony there in 1638, calling it [[New Sweden]]. As expected, the government in New Amsterdam took no action other than to protest. Small settlements centered on [[Fort Christina]] sprang up as the colony slowly grew, mostly populated by [[Swedes]], [[Finns]], and [[Dutch people|Dutch]].<ref>{{cite web |last1=Covart |first1=Elizabeth |title=New Sweden: A Brief History |date=September 16, 2016 |url=https://libraries.psu.edu/about/collections/unearthing-past-student-research-pennsylvania-history/new-sweden-brief-history |publisher=Penn State University Libraries |access-date=1 December 2023}}</ref>

In 1651, the Dutch dismantled Fort Nassau and constructed [[Fort Casimir]] on the west bank in an attempt to disrupt trade and reassert control. Three years later, Fort Casimir was seized by the Swedes, who renamed it Fort Trinity. In 1655, [[Peter Stuyvesant|Stuyvesant]] led a military expedition and regained control of the region, naming its main settlement "[[New Amstel]]" (''Nieuw-Amstel'').<ref>*{{cite book| first =Alan |last = Taylor |title=American Colonies: The Settling of North America | url =https://archive.org/details/americancolonies00tayl | url-access =registration |publisher=Penguin|year=2001|isbn = 9780142002100 }}</ref> While Stuyvesant was conquering New Sweden, some villages and farms at the [[New York Harbor|Manhattans]] ([[Pavonia, New Netherland|Pavonia]] and [[Staten Island]]) were attacked in an incident that is known as the [[Peach War]]. These raids are sometimes considered revenge for the murder of a Munsee woman attempting to pluck a peach, though it is possible that they were an attempt to disrupt the attack on New Sweden.<ref name="Shorto"/><ref name="Trelease">{{cite book |last1=Trelease |first1=Allan W. |title=Indian Affairs in Colonial New York: The Seventeenth Century |date=1960 |publisher=Cornell University Press |location=Ithaca, New York |url=https://archive.org/details/indianaffairsinc0000alle |url-access=registration}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Van Zandt |first1=Cynthia Jean |title=Brothers among Nations: The Pursuit of Intercultural Alliances in Early America, 1580-1660 |date=2008 |publisher=Oxford University Press |location=Oxford New York |isbn=978-0195181241}}</ref>

A new experimental settlement on [[Delaware Bay]] was begun in 1663, just before the [[British people|British]] takeover in 1664. [[Franciscus van den Enden]] had drawn up a charter for a utopian society that included equal education of all classes, joint ownership of property, and a democratically elected government.<ref name="Shorto" /> [[Pieter Corneliszoon Plockhoy]] attempted such a settlement near the site of Zwaanendael, but it was largely destroyed in 1664 by the British.<ref>{{cite web
 |last        = Plantenga
 |first       = Bart
 |title       = The Mystery of the Plockhoy Settlement in the Valley of Swans
 |work        = Historical Committee & Archives of the Mennonite Church: Mennonite Historical Bulletin
 |date        = 2001
 |url         = http://www.mcusa-archives.org/MHB/Plantenga-Plockhoyt.htm
 |url-status     = dead
 |archive-url  = https://web.archive.org/web/20101221043517/http://www.mcusa-archives.org/mhb/Plantenga-Plockhoyt.htm
 |archive-date = December 21, 2010
 |df          = mdy-all
}}</ref>