Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Peter the Painter

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep‎. WP:SNOW (non-admin closure) Polyamorph (talk) 20:27, 4 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Peter the Painter (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log | edits since nomination)

(Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL)

Appears to fail WP:V in that there do not appear to be sufficient sources to show notability and the sources which do exist appear to suggest that he may not have existed. At best this appears to be a candidate for a complete rewrite making it clearer that it was likely a mythical person. But even if that was done, I'm not sure how it would be possible to verify the details. Maybe there are more details which could be found, but without a study published by a historian on the topic, I don't think this page does much more than to repeat an old rumour. JMWt (talk) 10:08, 2 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

• Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Latvia and United Kingdom. JMWt (talk) 10:08, 2 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep I was surprised to see this nomination. Do a Google book search on “peter the painter houndsditch” and you will see plenty of coverage in reliable independent sources. The same search in Google news brings up five stories in the UK press since 2010, demonstrating sustained coverage over more than a century. While his identity is uncertain I don’t think we can assume he was “mythical”, and the uncertainty about who exactly he was, though he was wanted for the murder of three policemen and Winston Churchill took personal charge of hunting him down, was one of the reasons why he has been so widely discussed. Mccapra (talk) 10:21, 2 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

  You are right, there is more to read than I thought. I have also found some more sources including this book and this one. It appears that I may be wrong on this one - although these books do emphasise the lack of information and likely mythical status of the person. JMWt (talk) 10:32, 2 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

  Just to say that I've now read sections of three different books - including one about the history of the British Secret Service - which seem to think completely different things about this character - one that it was a soviet spy called Serge, another says he was a peasant called Jaklis arrested by the French police, another says he didn't exist at all.

  I'd still like to hear how it is possible to write a coherent page on this. JMWt (talk) 10:45, 2 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

• Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: People and Crime. Skynxnex (talk) 15:07, 2 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep - Sources and hypothesis of this guy are all over the internet. Was he real? Was Jack the Ripper real? This is one of those historical figures (or legends, take your pick) of England that are so fascinating to read about. Category:People whose existence is disputed is proof that there's room for this article in Wikipedia. With these types, it's even better if the riddle is never solved. — Maile (talk) 16:15, 2 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep - Good sources in my opinion. WP:GNG applies as well.BabbaQ (talk) 17:05, 2 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep - There are plenty of sources, and notability seems to be quite well established. If it needs some expansion and/or rewrite that's a separate issue. - R. fiend (talk) 18:36, 2 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep. There has been a lot of study into Peter the Painter, particularly from Philip Ruff whose years (decades even) of research into the man has taken him to Latvia and as far as Australia, culminating in the publication of A Towering Flame. The quality of this page might not be of the best standard, but that alone is not sufficient reason for deletion. The figure clearly meets our general notability guidelines, as pointed out above. --Grnrchst (talk) 08:56, 3 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
• Snow keep (withdrawal recommended). I can appreciate that the topic is messy, but with two full-length non-fiction books on the subject, we can write about the mystery just the same. Those volumes constitute significant coverage in multiple reliable, independent sources. (?) For a similar case, see what has been written about the mystery of B. Traven's identity both in books and on-wiki. czar 21:27, 3 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.