Trade under neutral flags is not a modern phenomenon. Even in the eighteenth century, Swedish ships under a neutral flag traded with and between belligerents, and the American Revolutionary War saw a boom in Swedish shipping. But Britain, which dominated the seas, tried to curb and even stop the trade under neutral flags. This essay considers Swedish ships seized by the British navy and privateers and the patterns of Swedish shipping in wartime in 1776–1783, using the ship seizures recorded in the Prize Papers – an extraordinarily rich and underused archive.