Peter Minuit Peter Minuit Peter Minuit, Pieter Minuit, Pierre Minuit, or Peter Minnewit (between 1580 and 1585 – August 5, 1638) was a Walloon from Wesel, in present-day North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, then part of the Duchy of Cleves. His surname means "midnight" in French. He was the 4th Director of the Dutch North American colony of New Netherland from 1626 until 1631, and 3rd Governor of New Netherland. He founded the Swedish colony of New Sweden on the Delaware Peninsula in 1638. Minuit is generally credited with orchestrating the purchase of Manhattan Island for the Dutch from the Lenape Native Americans. Manhattan
Woody Island (Alaska) short period of accommodation and trade, after which the Russians engaged in brutal subjugation of the people, resulting in "epidemics, forced relocations, and extermination of those who resisted." Russian naval officer Gavriil Davydov observed an Aleut winter ceremony on Woody Island in 1802. He wrote: In 1805 a village on the east side of Woody Island was inhabited by 54 Alutiiq people. A smallpox epidemic struck the region in 1837 and the Russians forcefully amalgamated the survivors into seven villages, among them a village on Woody Island. The Russian American Commercial Company operated an ice company on the island beginning