Maritime Seminar: Adam Grimshaw (University of Helsinki)
"Claiming Restitution: Sweden, Privateering and the Nine Years’ War"
Seminar
Date:
Friday 24 October 2025Time:
13.00 – 14.00Location:
The Franzén room, The Vasa Museum, DjurgårdenAdam Grimshaw (PhD University of St Andrews, 2017) is a Postdoctoral Researcher at the University of Helsinki. His current research project, alongside Dr Jeremy Land, also of the University of Helsinki, utilises a comparative approach of contemporary commercial sources between Stockholm, Amsterdam and the Sound in order to uncover smuggling. It is funded by the University of Helsinki Rector’s Fund.
Adam has published on aspects of Swedish trade and diplomacy during the seventeenth century. His first monograph “Anglo-Swedish Commercial Connections and Diplomatic Relations in the Seventeenth Century” was published by Brill in 2023.
Presentation abstract
During the Nine Years’ War (1688-97) Swedish trade was dealt a hammer blow by the privateering activities of the belligerent powers of England, France, the Dutch Republic and Spain. From the Straits of Gibraltar to the Sound in just nine years, over three hundred Swedish ships were captured in an unprecedented wave of predatory attacks.
Due to the geopolitical importance of Swedish and Baltic goods, Swedish shipping had been increasingly targeted in northern and western Europe during the naval conflicts of the previous fifty years. However, such was the extent of privateering activity that a Swedish governmental commission was founded in 1691 purely to tackle and remedy this problem.
In anticipation of the development of a new research project, this talk aims to discuss how Swedish citizens and the state were impacted by such privateering activities, and crucially, how they aimed at claiming restitution.
About the Maritime Seminar
The Maritime Seminar is organized by the Centre for Maritime Studies in collaboration with the National Maritime and Transportation Museums. The seminars are open for all. They usually take place at the Vasamuseum and can be seen online. Links and other specified information is shared prior to each seminar through the CEMAS newsletter, which also contains updated information on schedule and other Centre news.
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Last updated: 2025-10-15
Source: Department of History