Carl Gustaf Krokstedt

Carl Gustaf Krokstedt, born on the island of Gotland as the son of a merchant, joined the navy in 1901. He was promoted to lieutenant in 1908. An outstanding épée fencer, he was entered in three fencing events of the 1912 Olympic Games but did not compete.

In 1913, Krokstedt started a pilot training at Carl Cederström’s flying school in Linköping and received the Royal Swedish Aero Club’s aviator diploma number 14 as well as the international pilot’s license later that year. He worked as a flight instructor at the Swedish Navy’s Air Force and as a test pilot at Nordiska Aviatik AB. In the following years, he completed several record-breaking flights around the Swedish coast.

In June 1918, Krokstedt took off for a delivery flight from the Swedish airbase at Furusund to Finland with a twin-engine aircraft together with his former teacher Cederström. The plane crashed into the sea around the Åland Islands. While Cederström was found a few days later on the island of Signilskär, Krokstedt’s body was never recovered. Krokstedt left behind his wife Gurli (née Bille) and two daughters.