Difference between revisions of "Lauritz Christiansen"
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== Later Life and Death == | == Later Life and Death == | ||
| − | Christiansen moved to Valwyck after his retirement. He resided in a small lakeside cabin there, in which he compiled his autobiography. He was rarely seen since his retirement, sparsely making trips to [[Karosgrad]] to see his youngest son, Konrad Terrence | + | Christiansen moved to Valwyck after his retirement. He resided in a small lakeside cabin there, in which he compiled his autobiography. He was rarely seen since his retirement, sparsely making trips to [[Karosgrad]] to see his youngest son, Konrad Terrence Lauridsen, who was a Tribune in the Royal Duma. |
== Marriages and Relationships == | == Marriages and Relationships == | ||
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== Bibliography == | == Bibliography == | ||
'''Novels''' | '''Novels''' | ||
*1752 - The Mouse Prince | *1752 - The Mouse Prince | ||
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*1753 - The Lord in the Flying Castle | *1753 - The Lord in the Flying Castle | ||
*1754 - Matters of the Heart | *1754 - Matters of the Heart | ||
Revision as of 22:24, 15 October 2021
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Sir Lauritz Henrik Christiansen HKML KM (Common: Lawrence Henry; High Imperial: Laurentius Henricus; New Marian: Lerald Henrik), also commonly known as L. H. Christiansen was a Kaldenic jurist, lawyer, politician, statesman, and author, who served as the seventh High Justiciar of Haense, and as the fourth and final President Pro Tempore of the Imperial Senate. He had an extensive career as both a lawyer and a politician, spanning the positions of Senator, Judge, Member of the House of Commons, and High Justiciar over a period of 52 years.
Contents
Early Life
Born on the 13th of the First Seed, 1733, to Christiansen Frederik Jørgensen and Dorothea Holberg. While not many other details are known of his early life, he is believed to have been born in Sejsborg, Kalden, a Kingdom based on an island of the same name south of Aeldin. According to his autobiography, him and his family left the continent and emigrated to Aeldin in 1737, citing a brewing civil war as the reason behind this. Both of his parents, as well as his older siblings, died when one of the family’s two ships wrecked during the travel, leaving behind Lauritz, his twin sister, and their younger siblings to arrive orphaned in Aeldin.
Early Career
Early Authorship
Christiansen is believed to have immigrated to Helena, Oren, in Arcas around 1752, where he first attempted to make a living as an author, though he was ultimately unable to pursue this due to a lack of proper property to operate a bookstore for. He quickly, however, gained a reputation for his cunning intellect and vast amounts of knowledge, and was hired to be a tutor in Selm by Vespira d’Arkent. There, he befriended Mary d’Arkent, who would be one of his closest friends until her passing in 1778.
It was during this period Christiansen wrote his most well-known books, the Mouse Prince, the Lord in the Flying Castle, and Matters of the Heart.
Christiansen is described to have been infatuated with the City of Helena since the day he arrived there, and described it in his autobiography as “The Jewel of Humanity, of which no city will ever be grander.”
Senator of Helena and President Pro Tempore of the Senate
Christiansen was elected to the Imperial Senate in the 1754 Election, receiving 48% of the vote out of a total of four candidates. Both of the Senatorial seats of Helena were vacant at the time, and the second seat became occupied by Louisa Pruvia, who he would later end up marrying. He was 21 years old at the time of his election, making him one of the youngest Senators in Orenian history.
Christiansen spent the predominant part of his first two years in office working on the Paddington Act, a monumental act in Orenian history, which created the concept of an intelligent non-person and granted them certain rights. The act was seen as monumental, and was lauded by civil rights activists at the time.
At the end of the 1754-1756 Session, then President Pro Tempore, Terrence May, stepped down from the position, and instead nominated Christiansen for it. Vivaca Rutledge also nominated herself as President Pro Tempore, but withdrew her nomination as it became clear that the other Senators supported Christiansen’s nomination, and he was thus elected as the 4th President Pro Tempore of the Imperial Senate.
Under Christiansen, the Imperial Senate would enjoy one of its most productive periods over the next eight years, with a number of important bills passed, such as the Oren Revised Code Act. The Christiansen Senate came to be described by some as “the Christiansen Frat House Senate”, due to the camaraderie and similarity in political ideology shown by Senators in that period. It was also during this time that Princess Amelya Valeriya of Haense served as a ward under his guardianship.
However, the period was not without its controversies, such as the murder of Jeanne Vladov at the hands on a rogue golem in 1760. In that same year, a threat was made to the Senators lives in the form of a corpse strung above the President Pro Tempore’s seat, which caused Christiansen to decide to hold a sitting of the Senate in the Duma Hall of New Reza.
Christiansen would be re-elected in 1758 and 1762. His third term would have ended in 1766, if not for the Edict of Reform of 1763, which replaced the Imperial Senate with the House of Commons, making the 1762-1764 Session the final one of the Imperial Senate. While Christiansen was urged to run for House of Commons, he refused to participate in the party system that was also created by the [https://www.lordofthecraft.net/forums/topic/190722-edict-of-reform-1763/ Edict, deciding to become neither Josephite nor Everardine. He did, however, also state that the decision to not run was influenced by his engagement to Winifred Halcourt, the Baroness of Artois, who he would marry in 1764.
Hiatus from Politics
Following Christiansen’s retirement from Imperial politics, he started two companies: Lauritz Christiansen Solicitor-At-Law, a law firm, and Christiansen Publishing, a publishing company through which he began to publish his written works. Christiansen Solicitor-At-Law would later be merged with Konstantin & Company Solicitors to form Christiansen-Wick Solicitors in 1770.
He was an open critic of the House of Commons, and during this period wrote two critiques, For the Common Man, andOn the Origin of Parties. The former criticised both Josephite and Everardine claims that they were both the representative of the average Imperial, due to his belief that any man who was truly in favour of the common good would dedicate himself only to the people, and not to a party’s policy. The latter criticised the creation of the Josephites and Everardines, describing it as forced and artificial.
He was nominated to the position of Judge in 1766 and was swiftly confirmed by the House of Commons. His first trial was the Crown v. Corbish trial in 1767, which ended up being one of the biggest trials of the period, with even the King of Haense in the audience.
The Scyfling Invasion
Christiansen set out for Haense in 1768, when news of the Scyfling armies arriving near the shores of Valwyck reached him. He became an active volunteer during the entirety of the Scyfling Invasion, fighting alongside the Haeseni Royal Army and the Haeseni people on many occasions.
Particularly, Christiansen was present at the siege of Valwyck, as one of the few defenders of the castle, as he was close friends with Sofiya Vanir, the Duchess of Valwyck at the time. Furthermore, he was present when the Haeseni launched several warships from Vasiland to meet the Scyfling fleet in the Battle for the North Sea, toward the end of which he took command of one of the ships. He led that ship to defend the otherwise undefended Vasiland in the First Siege of Vasiland, where heavy losses were suffered, among them were his friend, Arianne Helvets. He would later suffer an injury during the Storming of Fort Buck, which cost him his left eye, leaving him out of smaller scale skirmishes for a while.
Christiansen would return to fighting ahead of the Second Siege of Vasiland, where he reunited with his siblings, Laura, Kirstine, and Noah, who had all made their way to Arcas to participate in the defense of Haense. Kirstine would die during Clash at Vasiland, a part of the Great Battle for the North, and Noah would die during the Siege of Reza, leaving Lauritz and Laura as the only two living siblings.
Christiansen was captured by Scyflings in the Shaman Raid in 1770, which led to one of the most brutal rescue raids of the war. He later claimed that he had gotten captured intentionally to get closer to the Scyflings, and that he lamented the bloodshed that had come from his misjudgement.
Christiansen, for the period following the Shaman Raid, took no major part in the war until the Moonfire Massacre in 1774, where his former ward, Princess Amelya would perish, as well as his friend, Grand Prince Godfric Alimar. He then took part in the Battle of the Shoals, being the second-in-command of the Wonkmen led by Juan de Lyons, another close friend of his who would perish during the battle.
Christiansen was assigned leadership of the troops heading to defend Vasiland by Lord Marshal Erwin Barclay in 1775. The Clash at Vasiland was one of the smaller precursors to the Great Battle for the North, and while the Haeseni troops led by Christiansen held the Bushlings back for many hours, they would eventually have to retreat just as the proper Great Battle of the North began. Lauritz stuck close by the side of King Sigismund II during the war, and is even credited with saving the monarch’s life.
During the Siege of New Reza in 1777, Christiansen was tasked with the protection of the new young King, Joseph I, and did not leave the Ekaterinburg Palace once during the battle. While combat ensued in the throne room, Christiansen and the King instead retreated to the residential palace until the fighting had ended, and the Scyfling Invasion was over at last.
Christiansen’s efforts during the war had not gone unnoticed, and he received The Sparrows Valor, a Haeseni War Medal given to those who have proven themselves capable of leading men in combat. Additionally, he received two Crosses of St. Karl on behalf of his siblings, Kirstine and Noah.
Later Career
House of Commons
During the period in which Christiansen was not fighting in the Scyfling Invasion, he briefly returned to Helena for that period. He was awarded a Knighthood in the Imperial Order of Merit in 1773, as a result of his work as President Pro Tempore of the Senate and as an Imperial Circuit Judge. He became Sir Lauritz Christiansen KM.
Christiansen nevertheless, despite his split time between Helena and Haense, ran for the House of Commons in 1775. While he had been principally against the Edict of Reform, amendments had since been made to it, which allowed candidates to run outside of the two primary parties. He resigned his position as an Imperial Circuit Judge, and was elected [1775], becoming the first independent Member of the House of Commons in history. He received 24.4% of the vote, making him the third most popular candidate overall, behind Konstantin Wick and Jonah Stahl-Elendil.
During the 17th Imperial Diet, Christiansen proposed and passed more bills than the Josephites and Everardines, showing the power of independent candidates in the House of Commons. Lukas Rakoczy would later join him as an independent, when he was ejected from the Josephites. Despite his contributions to the House of Commons, Christiansen only received 12.1% of the vote in the 1780 election, a decrease of 12.3%, and less than half of what he received in the previous election. He was still elected, however, having a margin of 1.5% down to the next candidate, George Kovachev.
Christiansen was revered for his experience by the rest of the House of Commons, and was often called upon when others were unavailable to fulfill their decisions. Jonah Stahl-Elendil chose him as acting Leader of the House on one occasion, and he served as Acting President of the House twice, in place of Konstantin Wick and Lukas Rakoczy.
Christiansen retired from the House of Commons in 1784, having chosen not to run for re-election, he announced that he was vacating his seat at the final session of the 18th Imperial Diet, where he would immediately be voted in as an Imperial Circuit Judge for a second tenure.
Attempted Retirement
After having been confirmed as an Imperial Circuit Judge, Christiansen sought to live a much quieter life in the countryside, and moved to the Haeseni countryside in 1784, settling on a farmstead there. He is described to have been “[...] immensely bored, and feeling more unproductive than ever.” during the period, which lasted but two years, before King Joseph I called upon him to serve as High Justiciar of Hanseti-Ruska.
High Justiciar of Haense
Christiansen's appointment as High Justiciar in 1786 came as a surprise to many Haeseni at the time, despite the bonds he had made with them during the Scyfling Invasion. He was, after all, not native to Haense, and had only lived there for a period of two years prior to his appointment.
Christiansen’s appointment, however, could not have come at a more opportune time. It was not many months into his tenure that he, alongside Joseph I and a small delegation travelled to Helena to meet with the Empress and Emperor, Anne I and Joseph II. Here, the Edict of Separation and the Treaty of Helena were both signed, and the delegation returned to New Reza to cheers and celebrations from the people, hailing the beginning of a new era with an independent Haense.
He became instrumental in the creation of the Haeseni legal system post-independence, especially in building up the foundations of an Office of the High Justiciar in the process of reinventing itself. He created the Asrandz i Jurovarez, an association of all jurists in Haense, and represented the Haeseni Crown in many trials. During his tenure, he would stand undefeated in the Court of law, with the Office of the High Justiciar winning every case they prosecuted.
Towards the end of his tenure, Christiansen would become a Hauchkossar of the Order of Queen Maya and the Lily, on the 6th of the First Seed 1803, as an award for the efforts he had put into Haense and it’s legal system.
Christiansen would retire in 1806, after a tenure of twenty years as High Justiciar. He was succeeded to the position by Matyas Baruch, the Duke of Valwyck.
Later Life and Death
Christiansen moved to Valwyck after his retirement. He resided in a small lakeside cabin there, in which he compiled his autobiography. He was rarely seen since his retirement, sparsely making trips to Karosgrad to see his youngest son, Konrad Terrence Lauridsen, who was a Tribune in the Royal Duma.
Marriages and Relationships
Christiansen was married twice and widowed twice during his lifetime. His first marriage was to Louisa Pruvia, whom he married in 1755. The two of them had not known each other long at the time of their wedding, and was likely done out of practicality than anything else. The two had one child, Margrethe Alexandra Lauritsen. Louisa would pass away in 1758, only three days after their wedding.
Christiansen’s second marriage was to Winifred Halcourt, the Baroness of Artois. Simon Basrid, then Archchancellor of the Empire, had advised Christiansen to meet with Winifred. The two of them met in Curon for the first in 1762, and would marry in 1764. The couple had five children together, Jens Otto, Edith Irene, Francis Leon, Viktor Sigismund, and Konrad Terrence. Winifred passed away in 1778 during childbirth.
Issue
| Name | Birth | Death | Marriage | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Margrethe Alexandra Lauritsen | 5th of the Deep Cold, 1756 | Alive | Maria Henrietta Amador | Firstborn daughter and only child of Lauritz and Louisa |
| Jens Otto Lauritsen | 11th of the Grand Harvest, 1765 | Alive | Unwed | Firstborn son and twin of Edith |
| Edith Irene Lauritsen | 11th of the Grand Harvest, 1765 | 8th of the Deep Cold, 1800 | Unwed | Secondborn daughter and twin of Jens |
| Francis Leon Lauritsen | 13th of the Grand Harvest, 1767 | 4th of the First Seed, 1783 | Unwed | Secondborn son |
| Viktor Sigismund Lauritsen | 20th of the Deep Cold, 1768 | 12th of Malin’s Welcome, 1807 | Unwed | Thirdborn son |
| Konrad Terrence Lauritsen | 19th of the First Seed, 1778 | Alive | Ana Maria Reyes | Fourthborn son |
Bibliography
Novels
- 1752 - The Mouse Prince
- 1753 - The Lord in the Flying Castle
- 1754 - Matters of the Heart
Essays
- 1764 - For the Common Man
- 1771 - On Clerical Errors and the Pursuit of Justice
- 1778 - On the Origin of Parties
