Translated: Mrs. Ingegerd Hildebrand, 17 Styrmansgatan, Stockholm: The Swedish Colony St. Bartholomew and the West India Company up to the Year 1796, Dissertation for the degree of Ph.D. at the University of Lund.
Extract from her summary of chapter 3:
St. Bartholomew was a small barren island, the greatest asset of which was a good and well-protected harbour. The island could only be of any considerable importance commercially and politically, and in order to attract the vessels of foreign nations to put in there, the island was declared a free port in a Royal Proclamation on the 7th of September 1785. In 1785 two Swedish trade expeditions were undertaken to St. Bartholomew, return cargoes being obtained in the form of smuggled goods from the French islands. On 31 October 1786, the Government granted a concession for a West India Company, which was to take over the trade with the colony and share the administration of the island. The Company received certain privileges, but it had no monopoly of the West Indian trade.
Reviewed by The Hispanic American Historical Review © 1954
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