Jon Lauritz Qvisling (1844–1930) and his wife Anna Caroline Bang (1860–1941), the daughter of Jørgen Bang, ship-owner and at the time the richest man in the town of Grimstad in South Norway. The elder Quisling had lectured in Grimstad in the 1870s; one of his pupils was Bang, whom he married on 28 May 1886, following a long engagement. The newly-wed couple promptly moved to Fyresdal, where Vidkun and his younger siblings were born. The family name derives from Quislinus, a Latinised name invented by Quisling's ancestor Lauritz Ibsen Quislin (1634–1703), based on the village of Kvislemark near Slagelse, Denmark, whence he had emigrated. Having two brothers and a sister, the young Quisling was "shy and quiet but also loyal and helpful, always friendly, occasionally breaking into a warm smile." Private letters later found by historians also indicate a warm and affectionate relationship between the family members. From 1893 to 1900, his father was a chaplain for the Strømsø borough in Drammen. Here, Vidkun went to school for the first time. He was bullied by other students at the school for his Telemark dialect, but proved a successful student. In 1900, the family moved to Skien when his father was appointed provost of the city. Academically Quisling proved talented in humanities, particularly history, and natural sciences; he specialised in mathematics. At this point, however, his life had no clear direction. In 1905, Quisling enrolled at the Norwegian Military Academy, having received the highest entrance examination score of the 250 applicants that year. Transferring in 1906 to the Norwegian Military College, he graduated with the highest score since the college's inception in 1817, and was rewarded by an audience with the King. On 1 November 1911, he joined the army General Staff. Norway was neutral in the First World War; Quisling detested the peace movement, though the high human cost of the war did temper his views. In March 1918, he was sent to Russia as an attaché at the Norwegian legation in Petrograd, to take advantage of the five years he had spent studying the country. Though dismayed at the living conditions he experienced, Quisling nonetheless concluded that "the Bolsheviks have got an extraordinarily strong hold on Russian society" and marvelled at how Leon Trotsky had managed to mobilise the Red Army forces so well; he asserted that by contrast, in granting too many rights to the people of Russia,