Jens Schou Fabricius (3 March 1758 – 6 April 1841) was the
Norwegian
Norwegian, Norwayan, or Norsk may refer to:
*Something of, from, or related to Norway, a country in northwestern Europe
* Norwegians, both a nation and an ethnic group native to Norway
* Demographics of Norway
*The Norwegian language, including ...
appointed Minister of the Navy 1817–1818. He served as a representative for ''Søe-Deffensionen'' at the
Norwegian Constitutional Assembly
The Norwegian Constituent Assembly (in Norwegian ''Grunnlovsforsamlingen'', also known as ''Riksforsamlingen'') is the name given to the 1814 constitutional assembly at Eidsvoll in Norway, that adopted the Norwegian Constitution and formalised th ...
at
Eidsvoll
Eidsvoll (; sometimes written as ''Eidsvold'') is a municipality in Akershus in Viken county, Norway. It is part of the Romerike traditional region. The administrative centre of the municipality is the village of Sundet.
General information
...
in 1814. During his naval career he served first the Danish Crown until the separation in 1814 of Norway from Denmark, and thereafter the Norwegian-Swedish Crown. Fabricius retired from the navy as a
vice admiral.
Background
Jens Schou Fabricius was born in
Larvik,
Norway
Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and the ...
. He was the son of District Judge Laurs Sørensen Fabricius (1695-1761). Jens Schou Fabriciu was a student at the
Royal Danish Naval Academy
The Royal Danish Naval Academy ( da, Søværnets Officersskole or more commonly, ''Søofficerskolen'') educates and commissions all officers for the Royal Danish Navy. Having existed for more than 300 years, it is the oldest still-existing offic ...
in
Copenhagen
Copenhagen ( or .; da, København ) is the capital and most populous city of Denmark, with a proper population of around 815.000 in the last quarter of 2022; and some 1.370,000 in the urban area; and the wider Copenhagen metropolitan ar ...
from the age of eleven.
Danish service
He became a junior lieutenant on 20 December 1779.
[There is a slight discrepancy on dates between the Norwegian Wikipedia article and the Topsøe-Jensen reference. Topsøe-Jensen is given preference here.] He was promoted to senior lieutenant on 25 January 1788. to lieutenant-commander on 13 November 1789 and to captain on 31 May 1799.
;1781–1787
He was ''Ekvipagemester'' (Head of Naval Stores)
[Ekvipagemester translates literally as Master of Horse, but this is an honorary appointment. The definition/job description from ]
''Danish Dictionary'' (Gyldendals)
is for the naval officer in the time of sailing ships with responsibilities in the dockyard for the fitting out of the fleet and for the management of all the naval storehouses. for the Danish company trading from the Baltic to
Guinea in West Africa from 1781 to 1787, during which time he journeyed to the Mediterranean Sea with the warship ''Oldenborg'' and to
China as first mate on the ''Charlotte Amalie''.
;1788–1799
He saw service in the frigate ''Store Belt'' which, in 1788, was a cadet training ship, as second-in-command of the frigate ''Alsen'' when she was acting as guard-ship in the Øresund, and as captain of the smaller ''Speideren'' in the home squadron. In October 1788 he became deputy ''ekvipagemester'' at Fredriksvern in
Vestfold
Vestfold is a traditional region, a former county and a current electoral district in Eastern Norway. In 2020 the county became part of the much larger county of Vestfold og Telemark. Located on the western shore of the Oslofjord, it bordered t ...
and in the following years was often away on tours of duties with various ships, as captain.
In 1795 Fabricius sailed to the Danish West Indies, but he could not tolerate the climate and was sent home by his senior officer. In 1797 he sailed as captain of the brig ''
Lougen'' which was part of a squadron destined for the
Mediterranean Sea
The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Western and Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa, and on the ...
. On the outward journey his ship broached in a storm in the North Sea but righted herself with four feet of water in the hold and in the cabins. Fabricius and ''Lougen'' returned to Copenhagen on 6 August 1799.
;1800–1809
After a period as second-in-command of the warship ''Danmark'' in the home squadron, and some sick leave, Fabricius was appointed in October 1801 as commander of the port and fortress at
Fredriksvern
Fredriksvern (also called ''Friderichsværn'' (1801), ''Frederiksværn'' (1865), ''Fredriksværen'' (1900) and abbreviated ''Frsværn'') was an important Norwegian naval base, just south of Larvik in Vestfold. It is named after Fredrik V Denmark- ...
, including the Norwegian flotilla of small gunboats. With the outbreak of hostilities between Denmark and Britain, he became a member of the commission responsible for planning Norway’s maritime defences.
;1810–1814
In 1810 his duties at Fredriksvern were reduced whilst he still retained command together with the directorships of the church, school, pilotage and quarantine departments. In 1812 Fabricius sought a transfer to another position where he could better do his best, but this achieved little.
On 1 March 1814 he resigned from his Danish war duties.
Norwegian service
;1814–1824
On 13 April 1814 Fabricius’ name was deleted from the list of Danish naval officers as he had sworn loyalty to the Norwegian government without having obtained a release from Denmark.
On 19 February 1816, Danish Captain
Carl Adolph Rothe, Copenhagen's harbour master, arrived in Christiana (now Oslo) to negotiate with Norway’s
Thomas Fasting, Norwegian temporary Councillor of State, the return of the seven warbrigs that had ended up in Norwegian waters after the
Treaty of Kiel
The Treaty of Kiel ( da, Kieltraktaten) or Peace of Kiel ( Swedish and no, Kielfreden or ') was concluded between the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and the Kingdom of Sweden on one side and the Kingdoms of Denmark and Norway on t ...
. The negotiations were taken up by his Norwegian counterpart the (now) rear admiral, Admiral Jens Schou Fabricius, who did not dispute the Danish king's right to five of the brigs, but proposed consideration of the feeling in Norway whether the affair could be settled by Norway paying suitable compensation for keeping the ships. On 22 June agreement was reached between Fabricius and Rothe. The brigs ''Allart'' and ''Seagull'' which had been captured in Norwegian waters were awarded to the
Norwegian navy. The other five brigs that were already in Norway would stay there on payment of 95,000 speciedlr (a little over $2 million US dollars bullion value in 2012). Thomas Fasting, then Minister for Maritime Affairs (''marinesaker''), was succeeded by Jens Fabricius for the period 1817-1818, then Fasting took over again.
''Departement (marinesaker)'' (Regjeringen.no)
/ref>
In 1818, Fabricius became adjutant general
An adjutant general is a military chief administrative officer.
France
In Revolutionary France, the was a senior staff officer, effectively an assistant to a general officer. It was a special position for lieutenant-colonels and colonels in staf ...
to Charles XIV John
Charles XIV John ( sv, Karl XIV Johan; born Jean Bernadotte; 26 January 1763 – 8 March 1844) was King of Sweden and Norway from 1818 until his death in 1844. Before his reign he was a Marshal of France during the Napoleonic Wars and participat ...
, King of Sweden and Norway and was promoted to vice admiral on 23 August 1821. He was elected to the Norwegian Parliament
The Storting ( no, Stortinget ) (lit. the Great Thing) is the supreme legislature of Norway, established in 1814 by the Constitution of Norway. It is located in Oslo. The unicameral parliament has 169 members and is elected every four years bas ...
in 1824 as a representative for Bratsberg (now Telemark).
;Later
He retired, at the age of 78, in 1836 and died in Porsgrunn
is a city and municipality in Telemark in the county of Vestfold og Telemark in Norway. It is part of the traditional region of Grenland. The administrative centre of the municipality is the city of Porsgrunn.
The municipality of Porsgrunn w ...
on 6 April 1841.
Notes
Primary Source
*Translated from the Norwegian (Norsk bokmål) Wikipedia article ''Jens Fabricius''
References
Other sources
*Topsøe-Jensen, T. A. and Emil Marquard (1935) ''Officerer i den dansk-norske Søetat 1660-1814 og den danske Søetat 1814-1932'' (Copenhagen: H. Hagerups Boghandel)
*Holme Jørn (2014) ''De kom fra alle kanter - Eidsvollsmennene og deres hus'' (Oslo: Cappelen Damm)
External links
''Representantene på Eidsvoll 1814'' (Cappelen Damm AS)
''Men of Eidsvoll'' (eidsvollsmenn)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Fabricius, Jens Schou
1758 births
1841 deaths
People from Larvik
Royal Dano-Norwegian Navy personnel
Norwegian military personnel of the Napoleonic Wars
Government ministers of Norway
Presidents of the Storting
Fathers of the Constitution of Norway
Royal Norwegian Navy admirals