Kristian Welhaven

At the outbreak of World War II Welhaven was made head of a commission set up to plan the evacuation of the population of Oslo in case of war. When the German invasion of Norway came on 9 April 1940, attempts were made to evacuate people, but in the chaos of the invasion the organization fell through and at 1300hrs Welhaven called off the evacuation work. At the same time German troops entered Oslo after having captured Fornebu Airport in an airborne operation, their seaborne attack having been blunted at the battle of Drøbak Sound early that morning.[6] Welhaven had been contacted by Minister of Justice and the Police Terje Wold in the early hours of 9 April and had been authorized to use all municipal powers to prepare Oslo for war, especially in case of bombing. Welhaven was given responsibility for aiding the civilian population in case of bombing, and was tasked with taking over civilian power in the capital in case the government had to evacuate Oslo.[7] Wold had also told Welhaven to arrest Norwegian Fascist leader Vidkun Quisling if the opportunity presented itself.[8] At around noon on 9 April, Wold ordered Welhaven to surrender the city to the Germans.[9] After the German occupation of Oslo Welhaven was asked by the German envoy Curt Bräuer to telephone the Norwegian government and try to organize a meeting between Bräuer and King Haakon VII personally to negotiate for peace. Bräuer got his meeting with the king, but it led nowhere and the fighting continued.[10] Welhaven also facilitated contact between the local authorities in Oslo and Bräuer,[11] and provided a police escort and support for bishop Eivind Berggrav during his later infamous journey to Krokskogen outside Oslo to encourage irregular Norwegian forces to lay down their arms.[12] Welhaven, together with Director of Public Prosecutions Haakon Sund and Mayor of Oslo Trygve Nilsen, also signed radio broadcast announcements on 12 April which quoted the Hague Conventions on the laws of war. The same announcements warned that francs-tireurs taking part in irregular fighting would be punishable by death in a court-martial. The concern of Welhaven and the other dignitaries was that Norwegians would not know the regulations of the Hague Conventions nor understand the concept of being francs-tireurs, and be then court martialled by the Germans [13] Among Welhaven's other actions following the German invasion was to order the Norwegian surveillance archives destroyed by burning.[14]

During the occupation, Welhaven refused to cooperate with the German occupiers and the Norwegian Nazi collaborators.[2] Welhaven, together with Supreme Court Justice Paal Berg, Oslo mayor Trygve Nilsen and Commissioner of finance Hartmann approached the German authorities to have Quisling's government removed. This led to the establishment of the Administrative Council on 15 April and the temporary removal of Quisling's government.[15] Welhaven was removed from his position by the Germans 23 September 1940,[16][17] and replaced with the Nazi-loyal Bernhard Askvig.[18] He was arrested by the Germans 12 September 1941 and incarcerated at the Grini concentration camp until 19 January 1943.[19] He was transferred to Germany where he was kept in custody from 1943 to 1945, first in the Gestapo prison in Prinz-Albrecht-Straße in Berlin, and later interned in Landsberg am Lech, Bavaria with his wife Margit and daughter Gerda.[2][20][21] Didrik Arup Seip and his wife, who was in a similar situation, visited the Welhaven family in Landsberg in 1943.[22] In March 1945 the family was brought to Gross Kreutz outside Berlin by Johan Bernhard Hjort, whose family had also been interned in Germany during the war years, and in April they were brought to Sweden as part of the White Buses operation.[23][24]