The Swedish Colony in Northern Maine

William Widgery Thomas, Jr., was the Maine official who created the Swedish Colony and led the first settlers from Sweden to New Sweden.

On March 23, 1870 the Legislature passed an Act authorizing a Board of Immigration and Thomas was named Commissioner of Immigration. On April 30 he sailed from the United States and landed in Gothenburg on May 16 where he began selecting the first group of immigrants. On Midsummer's Eve, June 23, the colony of 22 men, 11 women and 18 children gathered with Thomas and their friends and relatives for a farewell party in the Baptist Hall. They sailed with Thomas on June 25 to Hull, then by rail to Liverpool, then sailed to Halifax, arriving on July 13. They ascended the St. John River by steamer to Fredericton, where they transferred to horse-drawn tow-boats to Tobique Landing (now Perth-Andover). While on the tow-boats an infant baby, Hilma Clase, died (and was brought to their new home).

The Capitolium-first public building and heart of the Colony.
(Line illustrations are from the 1895 Quarter-Centennial Celebration publication.)

The colonists spent the night in a barn in Tobique. They then traveled by wagon train to a welcoming luncheon in Fort Fairfield, and on to Caribou for a bountiful supper and overnight in Arnold's Hall. The wagon train continued on July 23 along a newly cut woods road, arriving at noon at their new home, which Thomas named New Sweden, "a name at once commemorative of the past and auspicious of the future".