Bengt Nordenskiöld

General Bengt Gustafsson Nordenskiöld (6 September 1891 – 28 January 1983) was a Swedish Air Force officer who served as Chief of the Air Force from 1942 to 1954. In 1910, Nordenskiöld started his military career as a volunteer in the Svea Life Guards (I 1), later attending the Royal Swedish Army Staff College. In 1928, he was made a captain in the General Staff. During 1931 he went through aircraft recognition training at the Swedish Air Force Flying School, after which he was trained as a pilot. In 1936, Nordenskiöld started to serve in the recently created Air Staff under Lieutenant General Torsten Friis, later becoming a lieutenant general. He was appointed Chief of the Swedish Air Force in 1942 as the first Chief of Air Force with pilot training. Nordenskiöld was promoted general and retired from active service in 1954.

Early life Nordenskiöld was born on 6 September 1891 in Sundsvall, Sweden, the son of managing director, Baron and his wife Ester Laura (née Andersson). He was a sea cadet from 1907 to 1908 and passed mogenhetsexamen at Lunds privata elementarskola on 10 June 1910 before enlisting as a volunteer at the Svea Life Guards (I 1) the day after.

Career

Military career Nordenskiöld in 1941, just before an exercise that he led from his airplane.

Nordenskiöld enrolled at the Royal Military Academy on 19 October 1911 and graduated and became an officer of 19 December 1912. Nordenskiöld became an underlöjtnant in the Svea Life Guards on 31 December 1912 and lieutenant there on 28 November 1916. He wan an aspirant in the General Staff from 15 April 1925 to 1927 and was promoted to captain at the Svea Life Guards on 9 December 1927. Nordenskiöld served in the General Staff from 1 January 1928 and was trained in aerial reconnaissance in 1931 and served as a General Staff officer in the Eastern Military Division (Östra militärfördelningen) from 9 October 1931 to 1933. Instead the army general Nils Swedlund became the new supreme commander. Air Vice Marshal Ralph Cochrane visited Nordenskiöld and the Swedish Air Force 8–13 June 1952. What was discussed during the visit are not known. Cochrane left Svea Air Force Wing (F 8) north of Stockholm in an English Electric Canberra on the morning of 13 June, the same day as a Swedish radio and radar signals intelligence-gathering DC-3 aircraft was shot down by Soviet Air Force fighter jets. Nordenskiöld was promoted to general on 30 April 1954, two months before his retirement on 30 June 1954. Brita later remarried to Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Ulf Björkman.

Nordenskiöld and Dagmar Werner divorced on 12 September 1934 and on 31 October 1934, he married Marie-Louise Elsa Eva Hanna Augusta Lambert-Meuller (1909–1996), the daughter of managing director August Fredrik Lambert Meuller and Elsa (née Flygare). The marriage was childless.

Dates of rank Nordenskiöld's dates of rank:

Cross of Merit (1928) Danish Medal of Freedom (Dansk Frihetsmedalj)

Honours Member of the Royal Swedish Academy of War Sciences (1936; president 1948–1949) Honorary member of the Royal Swedish Society of Naval Sciences (1954)