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Erich Schmiedicke

German politician

Correspondence, annotated notebooks and portrait silhouettes prepared for research
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Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionJul 12, 2026
Entity authorityQ1353187 ↗
Source-derived summary

Erich Schmiedicke (13 May 1887 – 9 February 1970) was a German Nazi Party official and politician.

Early life

Schmiedicke was born the son of a fire chief in Neustettin (today, Szczecinek). After attending volksschule and gymnasium, Schmiedicke trained on German and English sailing ships for a career as a ship’s officer in the merchant marine. From 1910 to 1912 he served as an officer in the Australian merchant navy and also attended the Nautical Academy in Sydney. After his return to Germany, Schmiedicke joined the Imperial German Navy as a one-year volunteer from 1912 to 1913. He attended helmsman’s school in Hamburg, passed the German helmsman's examination in March 1914 and joined the German merchant navy until the outbreak of the First World War.

From August 2, 1914 until the end of the war in 1918, Schmiedicke again served in the Imperial Navy as a Leutnant zur See and Oberleutnant zur See. From 1914 to March 1917 he was posted to the Mediterranean Division aboard the battlecruiser SMS Goeben and the light cruiser SMS Breslau. From April 1917 to August 1918 he served in a staff position in the high command of the German naval forces in Turkey. In the last months of the war, he was the Naval Liaison Officer to the Bulgarian fleet in Varna.

Editorial summary

The public source identifies “Erich Schmiedicke” as german politician. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Erich, Schmiedicke and German.

Editorial reviewStrongest as a route into the people, institutions and dated events that shaped the subject’s public record. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1887, 1970, 1910, 1912—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1887-05-13. Its value is orientation rather than verdict, with Erich, Schmiedicke and German providing the first useful test.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Erich Schmiedicke”, the useful work is to connect “german politician” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.

Evidence profile

Biographical claims are most persuasive when dates, appointments and relationships can be traced to records created close to the events described. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 12, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1353187. VIAF identifies the subject as 18332222. 1 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1887, 1970, 1910 and 1912.

Critical limits

Later biographies can compress uncertainty and repeat inherited reputations, so apparently settled claims may still require comparison. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Read biographical claims against dates, named institutions and the cited references. Distinguish a subject’s later reputation from evidence produced during their lifetime.

Best used for
  • Establishing names and roles
  • Building a first chronology
  • Locating cited institutions
Verify next

Personal papers, civil or court records, institutional files and the scholarship cited by the source.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Erich Schmiedicke”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Erich Schmiedicke primary sources, Erich Schmiedicke archive and Erich research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Erich Schmiedicke”?
  2. Which primary records establish identity, chronology and institutional ties?
  3. Which claims depend on a single source or contested interpretation?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Erich Schmiedicke” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.