The pedigree provided for entry into Weatherby’s General Stud Book and the subsequently the Arab Horse Society Stud Book by Joseph Potocki Junior. On the back of this pedigree is written the following : “Hereby I certify that the Arab stallion ‘Skowronek’ now the property of Lady Wentworth of Crabbet Park was bred at my father’s stud in Antoniny, Ukraine and is of pure Arab origin. London, 6 July. (signed) Joseph Potocki of Antoniny.” This information is sourced from The Arabian Horse News, February 1958, pg 22.
The handwritten notes at the bottom of the document read next to breeder: “Count Joseph Potocki (senior) Antoniny Volhynia Russia. Arab stud founded by the princes Sanguszko in the XVIIIth century with stallions and mares imported from the East. All the above named stallions and mares are absolutely purebred arabs. Joseph Potocki junior, Superintendent of the Antoniny stud, (illegible month) 1918 “
This pedigree for a Russian horse appears to be certified by the Polish Legation in London. J. Lipski (Józef Lipski ) appears to be the certifying official. Mr. Lipski worked as the secretary of the Polish Mission in London from June 1919 to January 1922. Joseph Potocki junior, who self certified this document as true, also worked in the Polish Legation in London from 1918 to 1919 as a diplomat.
The evidence indicates Joseph Potocki Junior submitted fraudulent documentation to support Skowronek’s entry into two British stud books. His testimony in 1918 contradicts over 120 years of primary and secondary source information concerning the origin of his family’s horses. The Russian Arabian Stud Book of 1903 which contained Skowronek’s dam Jaskolka specifically did not classify her as “absolutely purebred arab” or of “pure Arab origin” as Potocki asserts. She was listed in the section for horses of mixed blood and insufficiently ascertained Arabian provenance.
