Olof Palme (historian)

Olof Palme, born 21 September 1884 in Porvoo, died 3 April 1918 in Tampere, was a Finnish-born Swedish historian and the organizer of the Swedish voluntary brigade in the 1918 Finnish Civil War. He was the uncle of Olof Palme, the prime minister of Sweden, who was murdered in 1986.

Life
Palme was born in Porvoo, Finland as the son of the Swedish politician and artillery officer Sven Palme and Finnish Hanna von Born. He went to school in Stockholm and later studied history at the University of Uppsala. Palme took part of the archaeological excavations in the Medieval Sigtuna and was the founder of the 1916 established Sigtuna museum.

Palme was known as a keen anti-socialist who was radicalized after the 1906 Hakaniemi riot in Helsinki. He was openly racist and has been described as a proto-fascist. In January 1918 Palme organized the voluntary Swedish Brigade to join the Finnish Civil War, fighting aside with the Finnish White Guards. He was killed by the Reds on the first day of the Battle of Tampere in April 1918. Palme was buried in Sigtuna.

Family
Olof Palme was the brother of the military officer Nils Palme and the businessman Gunnar Palme (1886–1934), who was the father of the prime minister Olof Palme. He was married to Ola Tenow. The couple had five children, Sven Ulric Palme (1912–1977) was known as a historian and Rutger Palme (1910–1995) as a politician. His grandson is the journalist and writer Christian Palme.