Stanisław Smolka

[1] He was born into the family of a Polish lawyer and independence activist Franciszek Smolka [pl] and Leokadia née Bekier (Bäcker von Salzheim) in Lviv.

[1] At the age of 19 in 1873, he received his doctorate from Professor Georg Waitz for his work Polnische Annalen bis zum Anfange des vierzehten Jahrhunderts.

[1] In 1902, he began to experience health problems, including arthritis and nervous disease, which slowed his scientific work and forced him to resign from most of his positions.

[1] After Poland regained independence, he took over the chair of Polish history at the newly established Catholic University of Lublin.

[1] He died on 27 August 1924 in Nowoszyce estate (today's Belarus), which belonged to his daughter Maria, widow of Karol Orda.

[1] In 1916 he published his work Die Reussische Welt: Historisch-Politische Studien, Vergangenheit und Gegenwart, in which he had denied the right for existence of the separate sovereign Ukrainian nation.

The oldest Kazimierz was captured by the Russians in the Battle of the Vistula River and spent several years in Siberia, after returning he dealt with the administration of landholdings.