Nykarleby (Swedish: Nykarleby, formerly Finnish: Lapuanjoensuu) is a Finnish city. Nykarleby is located in the province of Ostrobothnia, at the mouth of the Lapuanjoki River. The neighboring municipalities to Nykarleby are Kauhava, Pedersöre municipality, Pietarsaari and Vöyri. The city is bilingual: about 90 percent of the population speaks Swedish and about 8 percent Finnish. In September 1808, the Battle of Judah, which had joined the Finnish War, was fought in the locality. The stories of Johan Ludvig Runeberg's Lieutenant Stool tell of this battle.
The Lapuanjoki mouth area seems to have been inhabited
later than the Kyrönjoki and Ähtäväjoki areas on the basis of
ancient discoveries. However, already in prehistoric times, locks
have certainly been built here to catch fish and seal hunting has
been practiced in the Bay of Bothnia. A solid settlement along the
Lapuanjoki River was created in the Middle Ages, and in 1550 there
were 33 houses in the village of Lepo on the site of the present
city.
When King Charles IX of Sweden returned home from the
Polish War via Ostrobothnia, he planned, among other things, the
division of the old mothers, and one result was the formation of
Nykarleby from parts of Pietarsaari and Vöyri in 1607. The new King
Gustav II Adolf called to which in 1617 he ordered the establishment
of the city. Uusikaarlepyy received city rights in 1620.
According to the first census of 1636, there were 44 households in
Nykarleby. In 1651, Nykarleby became the center of Kaarlepor County,
but the following year the town of Pietarsaari was established right
next door. After the death of Count Åke Tott, the county of
Charlesleport returned to the crown in 1674. Difficult times for the
city were marked by the famine of 1696–1697 and the great hatred of
the beginning of the next century, during which almost the entire
city fled to Sweden and the Russians plundered the city. Outdated
trade legislation hindered trade in the region until Nykarleby in
1795 gained the rights of a tapioca, ie complete freedom to
transport its goods anywhere in Finland or abroad.
The most
important export product of the Nykarleby region was tar, which was
exported from the city at the end of the 17th century in about 5,000
barrels, or a third of the quantity exported from Kokkola. By the
end of the next century, Uusikaarlepyy had developed into one of the
largest export ports in the kingdom, and by 1782 the volume of tar
exports had risen to nearly 20,000 barrels. In 1856, more than
13,000 barrels of tar were still exported from Nykarleby, but soon
after that exports ceased. At the same time, Lapuanjoki had become
unfit for sailing. In 1903, a narrow-gauge railway was built from
Kovjoki station on the Oulu line to Nykarleby, but this did not
improve the situation either. The track was demolished in 1916 and
the rails were sold to Russia.
Most of the city in Nykarleby
was destroyed in a fire in 1858. After that, it was planned to move
the town to Oravainen Karvat next to a good port, but the project
was not implemented. Architect Carl Albert Edelfelt drew up a new
town plan, which was completed in 1910.
The first school in
Ostrobothnia, the trivial school in Nykarleby, was founded in 1641,
but it was moved to Vaasa in 1684. Finland's second Swedish-language
elementary school teacher seminary was founded in Uusikaarlepyy in
1873 and closed in 1973. In 1919, the city's Nykarleby got its own
library in 1814 and it became a public library in 1865. The city's
own newspaper, Österbottniska Posten, began publishing in 1884,
edited by Anders Svedberg.
Nykarleby remained a small town
for centuries, and even in its 350th anniversary year in 1970, it
was the smallest town in Finland. In 1974, the city had 1,569
inhabitants and a land area of 21.3 square kilometers. In 1975,
the countryside and the municipalities of Munsala and Jepua were
annexed to Uusikaarlepyy, increasing its area by more than 30 times
and its population by almost five times.
In Nykarleby, the
city and the countryside formed a common congregation throughout
their history. The first church in Nykarleby was built in 1607. It
was demolished in 1708, when the current church designed by the
assessor Elias Brenner was completed. Next to the church is a belfry
completed in 1702.