Friedrich's parents were serfs. His father worked as a shoemaker. After the liberation of 1815, the family was able to send their son to school at the Rakvere district school. In 1820, he graduated from secondary school in Tallinn and worked as an elementary school teacher. In 1833, Kreutzwald graduated from the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Tartu and he married Marie Elisabeth Saedler on August 18 of the same year. From 1833 to 1877, he worked as the town physician in Võru, Estonia. He was the member of numerous scientific societies in Europe and received honorary doctorates from many universities.