Talk:Piotr Śmietański

Latest comment: 6 years ago by Icewhiz in topic Re un-sourced 1968 claims.

Untitled edit

"Polish communist opposition" - is this what the source said? "Opposition to communists", perhaps? East of Borschov 19:41, 25 November 2010 (UTC)Reply


the link to Henryk Borowski is to a different person. (79.190.69.142 (talk) 22:42, 6 January 2011 (UTC))Reply

It mentions that he died in 1950 but it also mentions he left Poland for Israel in the 1960's 192.133.129.164 (talk) 01:21, 20 January 2011 (UTC)Reply

In Polish Wiki, he died in 1950 in Poland. Where you find sources with Jewish connections & Israel?

Death date edit

In the article it states that he died 23 February 1950, but further down it mentiones that he supervised the execution of Major Zygmunt Szendzielarz, Lieutenants Henryk Borowski, Antoni Olechnowicz, Lucjan Minkiewicz on February 8, 1951. Further on it says that he either died of tuberculosis at the age of 50 or emmigrated in 1968. Currently, the article is pretty contradictionary on his death, should the death date be changed to unknown or have (possibly) added to it? Calistemon (talk) 12:16, 19 September 2011 (UTC)Reply

I came in to write the same thing. The death date is confusing and the discrepancy should be discussed in the article. KellenT 13:16, 19 September 2011 (UTC)Reply

Witold Pilecki is not listed in "Righteous among the Nations edit

Witold Pilecki is not listed in "Righteous among the Nations". See: http://www1.yadvashem.org/yv/en/righteous/statistics.asp The Righteous Among the Nations Department Righteous Among the Nations Honored by Yad Vashem By 1 January 2012

........... Pilat, Pawel & Helena 2001 Pilat, Piotr & wife, children Leon, Wincenty, Jan & his wife Matylda 1965/1990 Pilch, Kasper, ch. Czeslawa & Stanislaw 2007 Pilecka, Michalina 1992 Pindelak, Roman & Paulina 1979 Pindor, Stanislaw & mother 1990 ................. Sjam2004 (talk) 10:38, 17 May 2013 (UTC)Reply

Execution of common criminals edit

Did he ever execute anyone other than political enemies or was he just used for that purpose ? 31.68.1.116 (talk) 12:12, 19 September 2015 (UTC)Reply

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Re un-sourced 1968 claims. edit

@Volunteer Marek: - I suggest you review the source here specifically. This first stmt is sourced to a Chodakiewicz blog (which would not be a RS) - but doesn't appear in it - one page 3 of the blog post - Chodakiewicz write Ciekawe na przykład jak potoczyły się losy takich ludzi, jak kat Mokotowa Piotr Śmietański? Po tego rodzaju marcowych emigrantach nie ma co płakać. Trudno też żałować rozmaitych partyjnych prominentów, którzy odcinali kupony od prześladowania zwykłych obywateli, aż poczuli „ludową sprawiedliwość” na własnej skórze i zdecydowali się opuścić PRL. Pamiętajmy, że przed 1956 r. takiej alternatywy nie mieli niepodległościowi Polacy rozstrzeliwani, wysyłani do Gułagu, czy wsadzani do komunistycznych więzień. Nawet ci, którzy uciekli mieli bardzo ciężko. - that's it. no 1,000 zloty - and he says people like Śmietański went to Israel in 1968 - without saying Śmietański himself went to Israel in 1968. The next sentence is about how there is a different Śmietański that went to Israel (who may have confused Chodakiewicz) - but it become irrelevant once there isn't a source claiming Śmietański (who died in 1950) went to Israel in 1968. And the rest of the paragraph continues to deal with this apparent confusion - for which there is no source.Icewhiz (talk) 05:07, 9 May 2018 (UTC)Reply

Removing or rewording that part's fine. My objection was mostly to the removal of info baed on this source.Volunteer Marek (talk) 05:16, 9 May 2018 (UTC)Reply
Note that these authors address - and dismiss - the claim that he went to Israel in 1968.Volunteer Marek (talk) 05:16, 9 May 2018 (UTC)Reply
I have no objection to that source - it seems perfectly OK as a source (from my limited ability to assess it) - but it is being used to correct the 1968 claim - for which we don't have a source! I think there's quite a bit of other information you could take from that article about Śmietański - but the correction of the 1968 confusion becomes moot once there is no confusion (at least not by Chodakiewicz's blog - there might be another blog making such a claim). Currently it is sourcing The confusion might have come from the fact that in 1923 Śmietański (as an unskilled construction worker) facing economic problems, joined the Communist Party of Poland (KPRP) with pseudonym "Mojżesz" (Moses in English) according to his own bio scribbled in 1945. The specifics of his membership claims have been shown by historians Szymon Hermański and Tomasz Wróblewski to be patently false. - dealing with this in his bio (his life prior to being a prison executioner) - might be a good idea for expansion. It seems the 1968 claim is WP:FRINGE that received little attention (Hermański and Wróblewsk leave unnamed whomever might be making this claim) - if we introduce it at all - we would need to say it is false outright.Icewhiz (talk) 05:20, 9 May 2018 (UTC)Reply
The paragraph which addresses the "emigrated to Israel" claim is the following:
W ostatnim czasie w publikacjach poświęconych tematom, w których przewija się wątek Piotra Śmietańskiego, pojawiło się wiele nieścisłości dotyczących jego osoby. Sugerowano m.in., że Śmietański, urodzony jakoby w latach dwudziestych XX w., celowo nie figuruje w dostępnych bazach ewidencji ludności, że być może żyje do dziś w Izraelu, dokąd rzekomo miał wyjechać w 1968 r.55 Prawda wygląda jednak bardziej prozaicznie. Piotr Śmietański, kat z Mokotowa, zmarł 23 lutego 1950 r. o godz. 1356 na gruźlicę w korczakowskim sanatorium. Cztery dni później pochowano go na cmentarzu Bródnowskim w Warszawie57
I'm sorry, I'm too tired right now to translate it but it basically dismisses these claims.Volunteer Marek (talk) 05:23, 9 May 2018 (UTC)Reply
I saw that - they're dismissing it outright - without even mentioning whomever is making those claims. Basically we have a post-2000s fringe theory that is debunked. Unless a fringe theory has been widely covered, we usually do not include it per WP:FRINGE.Icewhiz (talk) 05:28, 9 May 2018 (UTC)Reply
I guess it's a judgement call. The fringe theory has circulated widely enough so that historians feel compelled to mention it in order to dismiss it. And I think the fact that the theory was false was not very widely known until recently.Volunteer Marek (talk) 05:34, 9 May 2018 (UTC)Reply
We would need to omit Chodakiewicz making the claim - that's a BLP vio (vs. Chodakiewicz) - as he didn't actually make the claim (at least in the source provided). I don't think this should be included - but if it is - it should be no longer than a line something like Claims that Śmietański has emigrated to Israel in 1968 have appeared in some publications, however this was proven false by Hermański and Wróblewski who state he died in 1950 - however at present we don't have a source saying where these claims have appeared - and I don't think we should be linking to the sort of forums where this has been raised (which would be rather PRIMARYish and unRSy)- you'd need to find someone who names whomever made this in a more clear manner (or a named figure - like Chodakiewicz - actually making the claim (in a manner you can attribute to him).Icewhiz (talk) 05:41, 9 May 2018 (UTC)Reply

I think this version is good.Volunteer Marek (talk) 15:33, 9 May 2018 (UTC)Reply

Thanks. I will note that if anyone wants to flesh out a fuller bio, then the paper by Szymon Hermański and Tomasz Wróblewski is fairly comprehensive from birth to death, including personal history such as parents, marriage, kids, etc. However doing this from the Polish source is slow going for me.Icewhiz (talk) 18:06, 9 May 2018 (UTC)Reply