MyWiki:WikiProject Military history/Assessment/HMS Queen Mary

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The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Promoted -- Ian Rose (talk) 13:21, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

HMS Queen Mary

[edit source]
Nominator(s): Sturmvogel 66 (talk)


I am nominating this article for A-Class review because I've been sadly neglecting my responsibilities as as member of OMT to fulfill our goal of the largest featured topic in Wiki. I believe that it meets the criteria, but look forward to working with reviewers to improve the article.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 03:01, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

  • Needs more work. Let me give a few examples of where the coverage of the article could be improved. Who were the commanding officers? How was the crew made up in terms of numbers of people in different departments of the ship? How successful was the fire control? Note also that two of the books in the references list are by the same author, but the authors are listed differently N. J. M. Campbell and John Campbell, which is unhelpful. (The author used both ways of referring to himself - in Jutland: An Analysis of the Fighting, he used John Campbell on the cover and N. J. M. Campbellon the title page and on the page that contained publication data. I am not really sure why Sturmvogel 66 felt it necessary to change the edition being cited either, seemed like edit warring to me. --Toddy1 (talk) 17:13, 7 April 2011 (UTC)
Let's break this down in a format more convenient to respond to:
Commanding officers. That's a fair cop, gov, but only Reginald Hall is actually notable. So I've added a reference to him, but not to Cecil Prowse, who is not notable, AFAIK.
Crew composition. Not known, nor do I feel that it's particularly relevant for an article in Wiki.
Fire control. I think the fact that she made a number of hits, as noted in the article, speaks pretty much for her gunnery and fire control. That aside I don't think that any hit ratio can be derived for comparison purposes because nobody knows exactly how many rounds she fired before she blew up. The common estimate of 150 is just that.
Campbell. Lemme dig up a copy and I'll see how he's shown on the one that I have access to.
You're pretty quick to throw out an accusation of edit warring. I rolled your changes back because your disambiguation for the references were in a style that I particularly despise and find horribly redundant. However, you failed to note that all of your more substantial changes were added back in, after fixing their formatting to match my own, so your claim of edit warring is undeserved and unsubstantiated. As a point of information, you would do well to match the existing formatting for notes and such when adding information to articles that are substantially complete. It saves work on behalf of the primary editor if the article is going to go for ACR or FAC where such trivial things matter.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 22:15, 7 April 2011 (UTC)
No doubt you change the edition of Campbell's book on Jutland cited from the 1986 UK edition to the 1998 US edition for the reasons specified above:
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--Toddy1 (talk) 06:30, 14 April 2011 (UTC)
Actually my personal copy, which just arrived, is the Naval Institute Press edition.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 21:15, 14 April 2011 (UTC)
My belief is that it is useful to have a list of commanding officers in articles on ships if the information can be found.--Toddy1 (talk) 06:30, 14 April 2011 (UTC)
I believe that the consensus is against lists of commanding officers, which I generally agree with. However, I'm less irritated by them if they can be worked into the text somehow if they're notable in their own right.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 21:15, 14 April 2011 (UTC)
I feel fairly sure that the crew does matter on a ship. So information on crewing arrangements is as useful and informative as information on the engines, or the gun mountings.--Toddy1 (talk) 06:30, 14 April 2011 (UTC)
Sorry, most authors don't seem to agree with you, which makes it hard to cover, with the partial exception of ship biographies. And even then it has the potential of overwhelming the rest of the article.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 21:15, 14 April 2011 (UTC)
Toddy, some wikiprojects are easygoing, and whatever you want to do is okay; SHIPS isn't one of those projects :) We've discussed how much to report about the crew quite a bit, and Sturm is following the consensus. Having said that, if you want to suggest a sentence to add about the crew, let's have a look. - Dank (push to talk) 17:50, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

Comment. I've asked over at WT:MHC#ACRs for closure if I can start doing my copyediting in the last 24 hours of the A-class review, so that the article hasn't changed too much and is still fresh in my mind when I review it for FAC. If folks go along with that, then I'll have a look at this one when it gets listed there for closing. - Dank (push to talk) 19:39, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

  • Support Comments:
    • no dab links, ext links work;
    • images appear correctly licenced (no action required);
    • images lack alt text, you might consider adding it in (suggestion only): [1]
    • "Lion class" should be "Lion-class" (infobox and General characteristics section) - per previous ACRs;
      • No, they're not compound adjectives. Just an ordinary adjective modifying the noun "class"
        • Fair enough, it seems I've misunderstood what was said previously then. AustralianRupert (talk) 22:00, 14 April 2011 (UTC)
    • in the General characteristics section, both paragraphs begin the same way - could it be reworded slight for variation?
      • Done.
    • in the General charactersitics section, "to place her officer's quarters in" this should be "officers' quarters" (position of the apostrophe denotes plural);
      • Good catch
    • in the General characteristics section, it might be too much detail for the article (I'm a layman) but I'm curious - where did other battlecruisers place the officers' quarters if not where they were traditionally placed?
      • They were amidships, where the officers were closer to their duty positions.
    • "Rear-Admiral David Beatty" - I don't think the hyphen is correct;
    • some of the times seem to use "am" and "pm", but others don't - should this be consistent?
      • Am and pm are only used the first time they are needed.
    • in the Raid on Scarborough section, "Vice Admiral Sir George Warrender" and then "Admiral Warrender" - inconsistent, also you probably don't need to mention rank a second time;
      • Fixed.
    • in the Notes section, I think # 2 probably should have a citation;
      • Done.
    • in the Footnotes section, # 23 "Roberts, Battlecruisers. p. 123" seems to be formatted differently to the other citations;
      • Fixed.
    • in the Footnotes section, # 41 there is a slight inconsistency "Campbell (1998), p. 338" is different to the presentation used in Footnote # 9 "Campbell 1978, p. 33";
      • Fixed.
    • should the Portal be in the Bibliography? I seem to remember a comment at FAC that it should be in the first "endnotes" section - I might be wrong, though. AustralianRupert (talk) 01:32, 14 April 2011 (UTC)
      • I believe that it's supposed to be in the See also section if any.
        • It's your call, and its not a war stopper for me, but my understanding is that what was said at FAC was that it should be in the See also section, or if there is none, in the first endnotes section. For instance, look at at how it is done in SMS Friedrich der Grosse (1911) AustralianRupert (talk) 22:00, 14 April 2011 (UTC);
          • Sandy says that everyone at FAC (except SHIPS people) puts their portal links in the first end section if there's no See also section. Last time I looked, that's not in the style guidelines. This is something Sandy always keeps an eye on. - Dank (push to talk) 17:43, 17 April 2011 (UTC)
    • in the infobox it says that the ship was completed in August 1913, but in the prose it says "completed on 4 September 1913". Should this be changed? AustralianRupert (talk) 02:02, 14 April 2011 (UTC)
  • Comment Support
    • The citation checker tool reveals a number of errors: "Roberts, p. 83" (Multiple references contain the same content), "Roberts, p. 123" (Multiple references contain the same content), "r3" (Multiple references are using the same name) and "b7" (Multiple references are using the same name).
      • The only significant one was the multiple use of Roberts, which has been corrected. There are no other redundant entries now.
    • "Queen Mary's first action was as part of the battlecruiser force under the command of Admiral Beatty". This should just be "Beatty" not "Admiral Beatty". Rank should not be used after the first mention per WP:SURNAME.
      • Done.
    • There seem to be some inconsistency with times, in some instances you use "7:00" in others "1:10 pm". The issue being having "am" and "pm" in some places but not others. Needs to be consistant per WP:MOSTIME. Anotherclown (talk) 08:08, 17 April 2011 (UTC)
      • Hmm from reading above I can see this has already been raised. That said I'm not satisfied with the response. IMO this is inconsistent and needlessly confusing. Anotherclown (talk) 08:11, 17 April 2011 (UTC)
        • Well, I'd for one disagree about needlessly confusing as the context makes it perfectly clear after the first use if am or pm is being used. So to conform to the MOS and avoid needless typing and useless redundancy, I've switched everything over to military time.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 16:06, 17 April 2011 (UTC)
          • This apparently is the section Anotherclown had a problem with: "... 5:15 am and fought an inconclusive action with them. Vice Admiral Sir George Warrender, commanding the 2nd Battle Squadron, had received a signal at 5:40 that the destroyer Lynx was engaging enemy destroyers although Beatty had not. The destroyer Shark spotted the German armoured cruiser Roon and her escorts at about 7:00, but could not transmit the message until 7:25. ... message to Beatty at 7:36, but did not manage to make contact until 7:55." Is anyone else unclear about whether we're talking about morning or evening? Agreed that WP:MOSTIME is unclear, and I asked a question at WT:MOSNUM about that a couple of months ago. IIRC, no one had a problem with the format Sturm is (was) using here. - Dank (push to talk) 17:38, 17 April 2011 (UTC)
            • I also raised this issue in my comments (above). In my opinion it is not confusing if the reader is paying attention and reading the whole article, however, if a reader is quickly searching for a small bit of information about when something happened it may be confusing. That being said, I'm not one to buck consensus so I'm happy to accept it if it is a previously established convention. Nevertheless, the change to 24 hour time seems to resolve the issue. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 00:19, 18 April 2011 (UTC)
              • I missed that you brought it up, Rupert. Okay, putting "am" after each isn't IMO an option, most readers would perceive it as needlessly repetitious. So would you two prefer 24-hour clocks in SHIPS articles where there are multiple times close together, or in all SHIPS articles? I have no preference. Sturm? - Dank (push to talk) 00:43, 18 April 2011 (UTC)
                • I'm not sure really. Personally I'm not sure that it would be repetition to use "am" and "pm" for all times (for me it is a matter of clarity over repetition - for instance we always state what unit of measure we are using), and my reading of MOSTIME is that it does in fact ask for this. However, maybe I'm wrong and if the previous style (i.e only mentioning "am" or "pm" on first mention and when it changes) has consensus in the Ships project and if it hasn't been raised as an issue at FAC, I'd be against making a blanket request for change on the basis of this ACR. Sorry if that sounds like sitting on the fence. AustralianRupert (talk) 08:48, 18 April 2011 (UTC)
                  • I'm with AR here. All I expect is consistency, mufti time or 24 hour time I don't really mind, but I don't see why we would be purposefully unclear, which IMO this seemed to be. That said if its accepted convention I'm prepared to move on. Although it leaves me scratching my head I certainly have no interest in taking it any further. Anotherclown (talk) 10:39, 18 April 2011 (UTC)
                    • I can't find it in my style guides at the moment; can I ask you to trust me on this one? "At 8:00 am this, at 8:15 am that, at 8:30 am the other" is more or less unknown in scholarly prose, although it would work as something list-y of course. - Dank (push to talk) 12:52, 18 April 2011 (UTC)


Comments. As always, feel free to revert my copyediting. Please check the edit summaries. - Dank (push to talk) 19:08, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

  • It's a pleasure to copyedit your articles btw. I changed 'Run to the South' to "Run to the South" per WP:MOS#Quotation marks (I think) on the assumption this is headed to FAC ... if not, it's perfectly good BritEng like it is. - Dank (push to talk) 19:16, 18 April 2011 (UTC)
    • Thanks, that's nice to hear. I'd like to think that my writing's improved after all the work in the last year or two.
  • What's a cruising stage?
    • Added
  • I made the change to "BL 13.5-inch Mk V guns": unless someone has changed MOSNUM and MOS, we don't do conversions inside links, because the links serve as names, because people in metric countries often use inches to describe the guns, and because the conversion is easy enough to find on the other side of the link.
  • What's a superelevating prism? A PVI mount? Neither gets any ghits.
    • Link to optical prism and deleted all mount info as TMI.
  • Does "HA" mean "high altitude"? You only use it once, so even if "HA" is the usual designation, "high altitude" would probably be kinder to the reader. (Okay, looks like you changed it to "high angle".)
  • Ah, I see you're using navweaps.com. There's a saying I learned a long time ago in math grad school that may be completely apocryphal, because I can't pull up any relevant ghits: when there's a chasm between where you are and where you want to be, some mathematicians prefer to build delicate, tenuous bridges across; others fill in the chasm. The fill-in-the-chasm approach to the navweaps problem would be just to help DiGiulian get navweaps published. I expect there would be a readership, especially in these days of e-readers and tablets and smartphones, and I'd be happy to copyedit. Is anyone from SHIPS in touch with him? - Dank (push to talk) 21:17, 18 April 2011 (UTC)
    • There may not be much of a market for a book as you propose. I'll have to swap out all the Navweaps.com refs before I sent it to FAC unless I want to fill in the chasm with an essay justifying it as a highly-reliable source.
  • "In addition they were given an upper armour belt": not sure what "they" refers to. - Dank (push to talk) 21:52, 18 April 2011 (UTC)
    • Copy-paste error.
  • "Her after torpedo director": I changed it to "aft". It's not uncommon, and less like to confuse the casual reader. I see you also choose "aft" more often than not as the adjective form.
    • I concur.
  • "Rear Admiral David Beatty": Rear Admiral Sir David Beatty, maybe? Was he knighted at this point?
    • He wasn't knighted for almost another year.
  • "almost immediately": usually doesn't mean anything, and I usually delete the phrase. If it happened "immediately", that's worth mentioning.
  • "she had been hit twice earlier by Seydlitz": Per WP:MHCL#chronology, it would be better to move this back to approximately the point in the narrative when it happened.
    • Lemme look through my sources, the times may not be known with any exactitude.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 21:19, 19 April 2011 (UTC)
      • No further info, but I've reworded the sentence to put things in chronological order. See how it reads.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 23:20, 19 April 2011 (UTC)
        • Yeah, I like that better. - Dank (push to talk) 00:28, 20 April 2011 (UTC)
  • Okay, not a lot left to fix. These are my edits. - Dank (push to talk) 00:35, 19 April 2011 (UTC)
  • Support on prose per standard disclaimer. - Dank (push to talk) 22:10, 19 April 2011 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page, such as the current discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
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