DEPARTMENT OF HISTORICAL RESEARCH. 151 



It was stated in last year's report, in a passage referring to the Public 

 Record Office of Ireland, and to Professor Bell's report of materials relating 

 to American history which he found in that repository, that while the build- 

 ings in which the Irish archives were preserved had been almost completely 

 destroyed during an insurrection, the destruction of the contents was under- 

 stood not to be complete. Subsequent information has shown that, so far as 

 the papers examined by Professor Bell are concerned, the destruction was 

 absolute. None of these papers remain, and there will be no thought of 

 publishing the notes formerly obtained. 



Mr. van Laer has not yet been able to prepare for publication the manu- 

 script of his report on the numerous and important materials for American 

 history in the Dutch archives, but in a conference toward the end of the year 

 plans were made which it is hoped may bring about this result before long. 



Aside from the Dutch and French archives, the only national archives 

 in Europe having much importance for American history and yet remaining 

 to be examined and reported upon in our series of Guides are the archives of 

 the Scandinavian countries. Their importance consists in three particulars. 

 First, the Swedish archives contain copious materials regarding the history 

 of the early settlements on the Delaware River in the region called New 

 Sweden, of the Swedish West Indies, and of the Swedish West India Company, 

 while the Danish archives contain records of the Danish West Indies, not 

 only those which have always been in the royal archives, but also those which 

 were formerly preserved at the capital of the islands, Charlotte Amalie, 

 whence they were transferred to Copenhagen several years before the cession 

 of the Virgin Islands to the United States. Secondly, the archives of the 

 ministries of foreign affairs in Stockholm and Copenhagen contain materials 

 for the history of diplomatic relations between the United States and Sweden 

 and Denmark, respectively, complementary to those preserved in the Depart- 

 ment of State at Washington. Thirdly, the archives of Sweden, Denmark, 

 and Norway contain materials illustrative of the history of Scandinavian 

 emigration to the United States; these, in view of the great volume of that 

 emigration, are in some respects to be deemed most important of all those 

 that have been named. 



The Department has not had the means requisite for a wholly independent 

 examination of all these materials on the same plan of procedure as that 

 followed, in the years before the war, in its examinations of foreign archives. 

 A plan has, however, been devised by which, through combinations with 

 various other means, a volume on the Scandinavian archives can be pre- 

 pared which will not be seriously different in character from our previous 

 Guides, and which will cover those archives with similar thoroughness. 

 Professor Amandus Johnson, of the University of Pennsylvania, whose 

 admirable work on The Swedish Settlements on the Delaware, 1638-1664, has 

 been recognized as the standard authority on the subject ever since its publi- 

 cation a dozen years ago, inserted in that volume an elaborate account of 

 the materials in Swedish archives relating to the subject, so far as this earlier 

 period is concerned. Combining with this his notes of the later materials, 

 and of whatever has been more recently discovered for the earlier period, he 

 has been so good as to permit that, in the proposed volume, the Department 

 may print his full account of all these archival materials for New Sweden. 

 Nothing could better cover this portion of the plan. With similar kindness 



