Simon Affleck

Major Simon Affleck (ca. 1660 – 1725) was a Swedish tax official, of Scottish descent, who worked in then Swedish-ruled Finland. He had been appointed by the King of Sweden to collect taxes in the Pielisjärvi region, and also paid the rent of his mansion in Pielisjärvi to the King.

His probable grandfather Hillebrand or Gilbert Affleck was born in Scotland and was a burgess in Turku and inspector of gunpowder factories.

Affleck is said to have been a ruthless collector of taxes with little pity towards the poor Finnish peasants. This, and the large and ferocious dog he kept as a pet, earned him the nickname Simo Hurtta (hurtta is Finnish for hound).

In 1696, he took over the lease of crown estates in the parishes of Pielisjärvi and Nurmes, where the peasants, due to his strictness in collecting taxes, later that year rebelled and plundered Nurmes and Lieksa. The uprising stopped only after the military was dispatched and the leader of the movement was arrested. A new uprising against Affleck broke out in 1710, this time under the leadership of his father-in-law, Vicar Herkepei Pielisjavir, who convinced the peasants to swear allegiance to the Russian tsar. During the so-called Vandal War in 1712, the Russians, under the leadership of several peasants of Pielisjärvi, looted and burned Affleck's Farm in Kajana and took his wife and children prisoner. After the great atrocities, he returned to his estates in Pielisjärvi and behaved in the same tyrannical manner.[1][2]

Affleck died in 1725 after the Greater Wrath. He is said to have shot himself in the head in his mansion to deny the Finnish peasants raiding his mansion the satisfaction of killing him.