Irvin C. Scarbeck
American spy for Poland
Irvin Chambers Scarbeck (born May 8, 1920) was a US State Department official who was convicted of giving information to Polish UB (secret police) during the Cold War after he became involved in a romantic affair with a Polish woman and was blackmailed by Polish intelligence agents. His case was the first prosecution under Title 50 783(b) of the Subversive Activities Control Act. His case also prompted a modification of the Espionage Act of 1917 to allow it to be used outside U.S. territory.
History
Scarbeck was a student at City College of New York and New York University. He served in the United States Army from 1942-1946 and became a staff sergeant. In 1956, he went to work at the State Department, where he won an award for meritorious service. In 1958 he was deployed to the U.S. embassy in Warsaw, Poland, as an office manager. His wife, daughter, and two sons joined him there. He loved taking family trips in the countryside and enjoyed music. He was well liked by his staff.
“Irvin C. Scarbeck” enters the record as american spy for Poland. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Irvin, Scarbeck and American can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Feb 9, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q6074234. VIAF identifies the subject as 1726153532454048820002. 1 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1920, 1917, 1942 and 1946.
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This entry incorporates text from “Irvin C. Scarbeck” 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.