Naval Warfare Revolutionized

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President Calvin Coolidge also stated in his speech, May 29, 1926:

“We assemble here today to do reverence to the memory of a great son of Sweden…John Ericsson…. We honor him most of all because we can truly say he was a great American….

Sweden is a country where existence has not been easy. Lying up under the Arctic Circle…

At an early period they were converted to the Christian faith and their natural independence made them early responsive to the Protestant Reformation, in which their most famous king, Gustavus Adolphus, ‘The Lion of the North,’ was one of the most militant figures in the movement for a greater religious freedom.

It was under this great leader that plans were first matured to establish a colony in this country for purpose of trade and in order that the native, as was set out in the charter, might be

‘made more civilized and taught morality and the Christian religion… besides the further propagation of the Holy Gospel.’

While it was under a new charter that a Swedish colony finally reached the Delaware in 1638, they never lost sight of their original purpose, but among other requests kept calling on the mother country for ministers, Bibles, and Psalm books…”

Coolidge continued:

“Forty-one clergymen came to America prior to 1779.

One of the historians of this early settlement asserts that these colonists laid the basis for a religious structure, built the first flour mills, the first ships, the first brickyards, and made the first roads, while they introduced horticulture and scientific forestry into this Delaware region….

The building of nearly 2,000 churches and nearly as many schools stands to their credit….

Always as soon as they have provided shelter for themselves they have turned to build places of religious worship and founded institutions of higher learning with the original purpose of training clergymen and teachers….

Reverence for religion which is the foundation of moral power.”

Calvin Coolidge wrote further of the Swedes:

“Though few in number during the period of our Revolutionary War, they supported the Colonial cause and it has been said that King Gustavus III, writing to a friend, declared

‘If I were not King I would proceed to America and offer my sword of behalf of the brave Colonies’…

Such is the background and greatness of the Swedish people in the country of their origin and in America that gave to the world John Ericsson.”

When offered payment for designing the Monitor, John Ericsson, who ‘had a particular horror of slavery’, replied to a U.S. Senator in 1882:

“Nothing could induce me to accept any remuneration from the United States for the Monitor…

It was my contribution to the glorious Union cause…which freed 4,000,000 bondsmen.”

Coolidge added of Ericsson:

“This great mechanical genius wrote to President Lincoln offering to

‘construct a vessel for the destruction of the hostile fleet in Norfolk and for scouring southern rivers and inlets of all craft protected by southern batteries.'”

John Ericsson explained to President Lincoln:

“Attachment to the Union alone impels me to offer my services at this frightful crisis -my life if need be- in the great cause which Providence has caused you to defend.”