A white wooden town an hour south, and the island fort whose fifty-year-old guns changed the course of the war for Norway.
An hour south of Oslo the fjord narrows to a strait less than a kilometre wide. There is an island in the middle of it, and on 9 April 1940 what happened there is why Norway had a king and a government in London rather than a surrender.
The night the Blücher was sunk
Oscarsborg was an obsolete fortress. Its main guns — three 28 cm Krupp pieces installed in 1893, nicknamed Moses, Aron and Josva — were nearly fifty years old. Two of them were manned. The garrison was largely recruits with a few days’ training.
Just after four in the morning, an unidentified darkened warship came up the narrows.
The commander, Colonel Birger Eriksen, had no orders, no confirmation of war, and no time to seek either. He is said to have told his officers: “Either I will be decorated, or I will be court-martialled. Fire!”
Two shells hit at close range. Then the submarine torpedo battery on the shore — installed in 1901 and never fired in anger — put two torpedoes into her.
The Blücher, a brand-new heavy cruiser, caught fire, capsized and sank. Around a thousand men died.
She was carrying the Gestapo and administrative personnel intended to take control of Oslo and arrest the government.
What it bought
Hours. That was all, and it was enough.
The delay let the King, the Crown Prince, the cabinet, the parliament and the gold reserves of the Bank of Norway get out of the capital on a special train.
Because the government was never captured, King Haakon VII was able to refuse the German demand to appoint Quisling — famously telling his cabinet he would abdicate rather than do it, which left them free to reject it too. Norway had a legitimate government in exile, a merchant fleet that fought for the Allies, and a resistance with a legal authority to answer to.
Eriksen was not court-martialled.
Visiting Oscarsborg
The fortress is open to visitors. The guns are still there, the torpedo battery in the rock can be visited, and there is a museum covering 9 April in detail.
There are guided tours, and the island also has a hotel, a restaurant and a concert programme in summer.
Ferry from Drøbak quay, a few minutes across.
The Blücher is still on the bottom of the fjord where she sank. Oil was pumped out of the wreck in 1994 and again later; she is a war grave and diving on her is restricted.
Drøbak
The town on the eastern shore is a small white wooden town of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century houses, and it is genuinely pretty — narrow lanes, a wooden church of 1776, boatyards, and an aquarium.
It also has a Christmas house and a post office that answers letters addressed to Father Christmas, which Drøbak claims on the basis of a fairly loose argument and markets thoroughly. Children like it.
There is swimming at the town beach and a good coastal walk north.
Practical
Bus from Oslo bus terminal takes about an hour and runs frequently.
In summer there is a passenger boat from Aker Brygge down the fjord, which takes considerably longer and is much the better journey.
Check the fortress opening season — it is reduced outside summer, and the ferry across with it.
Allow a full day if you are doing both, and take the boat one way if you can.
