My World Tuesday

Kristiansten Fortress is located in Trondheim. It was built after the city fire of Trondheim in 1681 to protect the city against attack from the east. Constructed finished in 1685. It fulfilled its purpose in 1718 when Swedish forces lay siege of Trondheim. The fortress was decommissioned in 1816 by king Charles John.

Trondheim was traditionally protected fortifications by the river Nidelven and Skansen, but the city was vulnerable to attack from the east. The Fortress was therefore put on a hill to protect the city centre and control the area from Ila to Lade. General Johan Caspar von Cicignon was responsible for the new town plan of Trondheim after the great fire of April 18, 1681. In 1750 the fortress was modernized with new bastions and casemates to protect against mortar artillery. Two new isolated defensive works were also built to the east - Grüners and Frølichs redutt - but they are hardly visible today.

The main building featured in the picture is the defensive tower - Donjonen - with artillery, quartering and stores was the centre of the defences. After decommissioning in 1816 it was location of the fire watch, and since 1997 as a museum.

In the final days of the Great Northern War, Karl XII of Sweden initiated a second invasion of Norway in the fall of 1718. While Karl XII led his main army in an attack from the south, an army under General Carl Gustav Armfelt was sent to seize Trondheim. Armfelt advanced against Trondheim, which was defended by an army of 6,900 men under Vincens Budde. The Swedish forces were resisted both by Norwegian forces and by the people of the countryside, who bitterly recalled the previous Swedish occupation of Trøndelag. Provisions were not available, and the Norwegian winter set in. Although he reached the city and laid siege, the strength of Kristiansten Fortress and other fortifications was such that he chose to retreat. Karl XII issued a sharp rebuke and ordered Armfelt to take Trondheim. Although Armfelt's forces surrounded Trondheim, Budde's forces were able to keep him at bay. Camping in the open and poorly fed, many of Armfelt's troops fell ill and his capable forces were reduced to 4000 men. When Karl XII was killed in December by a bullet at Fredriksten Fortress in Halden, Armfelt's forces retreated to Sweden. On their way back across the mountains, almost the entire army was lost, mostly because of snow, cold temperature and a strong blizzard; the retreat has been likened to Napoleon’s from Moscow for the severity of casualties.

During WWII the Nazis executed a number of Norwegian patriots at Kristiansten.

The fortress was the official place of execution of convicted and condemned traitors and war criminals following the legal purge in Norway after WWII. The notorious Henry Rinnan was executed here on February 1, 1947, and nine of his followers afterwards, eight of them on the same day in 1947.

This last picture is a view from the fortress. You can see the fjord and the city.

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