Oscar af Ström

While still at school, at the age of 16, Oscar af Ström volunteered for the Life Regiment’s Dragoon Corps. After graduating from secondary school, he became a sergeant in 1888. In the following year, he graduated from the military school and joined his regiment as a second lieutenant. For less than one year, he served in the French army at the 28th Dragoon Regiment in Vincennes. In 1898, he was promoted to lieutenant and in 1906 appointed captain of his regiment. Born Oscar Ström as the son of a major, he became a member of nobility on the death of his uncle in 1904. Oscar af Ström was assigned to the Bavarian Heavy Cavalry Regiment for half a year in 1909, before being seconded as military attaché to the Swedish embassy in Wien (Wien (Vienna)) in 1912 and later in București (Bucharest). At the 1912 Olympic Games, af Ström competed in dressage, finishing sixth on his horse Irish Lass.

A few years later, he was promoted to major in the army and in the Life Regiment’s Dragoon Corps. In this rank, af Ström was transferred to the reserve of the Life Regiment on Horseback in 1930. He was made Knight of the Order of the Sword, of the Order of St John, of the Bavarian Military Merit Order, of the Prussian Order of the Crown and of the Austrian Order of Leopold. He also received the Belgian Military Cross. In 1901, Oscar af Ström, married Anna Hedvig Emilia “Lalla” Dietrichsson. After the early death of his first wife, he married Margareta “Margit” Lech, a German who was more than 30 years his junior, in 1918. He had one son with his first wife, who later became a painter, and two more sons and one daughter with his second wife.