Aland Islands

Author(s) Friedrich Engels
Written 24 July 1857


First published in The New American Cyclopaedia, Vol. I, 1858
Reproduced from The New American Cyclopaedia
Source : Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 18
Collection(s): New American Cyclopaedia

Aland Islands, a group of about 200 rocky islets, of which 80 are inhabited, situated at the entrance of the Bothnian gulf, between lat. 59° and 60° 32" N. and long. 19° and 21° E. They belong to Russia, having been ceded by Sweden in 1809, and form a part of the government of Abo, in Finland.[1] The population, about 15,000 in number, are of Swedish descent, and are excellent sailors and fishermen. The rocks, covered with a thin soil, produce pines and birches, rye, barley, potatoes, hops, flax, and the inhabitants keep great numbers of cattle, and export cheese, butter, and hides; they also manufacture cloth for home use and for sails. The chief island is named Aland; its area is 28 square miles, its population 10,000; it has a good harbor on the W. side. All the harbors are more or less fortified; foremost among these was the island and harbor of Bomarsund, taken and blown up in 1854 by the allied fleets of England and France during their war against Russia.[2] In 1714, the Russian admiral Apraxin won a decisive naval victory against the Swedes near the cliffs of Signilskar.[3]

  1. ↑ Under the Frederikshamm Peace Treaty of September 1809, which concluded the Russo-Swedish war of 1808-09, Sweden ceded Finland and the Aland Islands to Russia.
  2. ↑ The battle of Bomarsund in August 1854, during the Crimean war, is described by Engels in two articles in the New-York Daily Tribune (see present edition, Vol. 13, pp. 379-88) and in an item in The New American Cyclopaedia (see this volume, p. 287).
  3. ↑ A reference to the battle of Hangut, a peninsula at the exit of the Gulf of Finland, which took place on July 25-27, 1714, between the Russian and Swedish fleets during the Northern war (1700-21). The battle ended in a victory for the Russians.