Wikipedia:Featured list candidates/List of Victoria Cross recipients of the Indian Army

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The following is an archived discussion of a featured list nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured list candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The list was promoted 23:18, 14 May 2008.

List of Victoria Cross recipients of the Indian Army[edit]

This is another of the Victoria Cross recipients lists. It follows on from List of Victoria Cross recipients by nationality and its "sublists" Australian and Canadian recipients, all FLs. Although not representing nationality, this list shows the recipients who served with the Indian Army, in much the same way as the FL List of Victoria Cross recipients of the Royal Navy It meets all the criteria as far as I can tell and it has built upon comments in previous FLCs. Thanks for your time. Woody (talk) 22:23, 20 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Resolved stuff from The Rambling Man (talk) 09:27, 23 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Comments from The Rambling Man (talk · contribs)

I split the references into specific and general if you don't mind. Other specific comments:

  • Indian Army doesn't appear to be linked here.
  • 19th Century doesn't need capitalisation.
  • The first award and its appearance in the Gazette seem oddly ordered to me.
  • I maybe said this before, and of course ignore it if you choose, but any way of illustrating the article beyond just the VC image?

Otherwise I can't see much holding it back. The Rambling Man (talk) 15:48, 21 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I have reworded the Lead a little bit now, condensed some of those sentences. Does it work for you? It is oddly ordered because it was odd. Traditionally it is Gazetted and then you recieve it some time later. This was a rare occasion where it happened the other way around. With regards to the images: the majority of the VC lists are very full with text. If images were placed on them then they would get very cramped. In my opinion they are cramped enough as it is, especially when I go down in resolution, there is simply no room to put them in. The images actually overlap the table and as such I don't feel they are that desirable. Thanks for the review. Woody (talk) 16:04, 21 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, no problem at all. I just wondered. Some of those old cigarette card style images are cool so I wondered if they'd find a suitable home here. Not to worry. And the reword makes it clearer, to me at least! All good. The Rambling Man (talk) 16:13, 21 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Yep, I agree about the images. There are some good ones. I particularly like Image:Lord roberts of kandahar.jpg, seems so regal. That and this statue image. Thanks again. Woody (talk) 16:22, 21 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment Perhaps you should delink some of the redlinks. -- Scorpion0422 18:20, 24 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment My only concern is of the high number of ugly redlinks :( -- ṃ•α•Ł•ṭ•ʰ•Ə•Щ• @ 04:23, 25 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • I have been working on the number of redlinks, creating articles and redirects where appropriate. I do think that the number of redlinks has now been reduced, the majority are in the places column. Would it be better to unlink these articles? I don't want to selectively delete redlinks from the list; it would look strange. I don't think a few redlinks should prevent it from becoming and FL. Woody (talk) 13:02, 27 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
      • I agree. They might turn blue in the future, and if they're not linked that helps the reader even less. There is a chance that a reader of the list is interested enough in the topic that it motivates him to create a missing article. Other than this, I have to stay Neutral. I won't be around for the next two weeks to see out the nomination to feel comfortable to support (or oppose) this early in the game. Sorry. -- ṃ•α•Ł•ṭ•ʰ•Ə•Щ• @ 05:49, 29 April 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support — I remember when you were trying to get Victoria Cross to FA. It's been wonderful to see you keep up with this corner of military history, and this article is as good as all the rest. JKBrooks85 (talk) 06:05, 1 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments

  • Woody, in response to your message at my talk, the simple years I think shouldn't be linked, especially those in modern times. The other links seem useful enough (as required by MOS). But I do agree with you that overlinking is a significant problem in FLCs.
  • "This is a list of Victoria Cross recipients of the Indian Army, which existed 1857–1947." I'm itching to avoid repeating the exact wording of the title at the start of the lead. And is it the VC or the Indian Army that existed during that period? Perhaps "The Victoria Cross was awarded to ?members of the Indian Army from 1857 until independence in 1947."
  • "It may be awarded to a person of any rank in any service and civilians under military command, and is presented to the recipient by the British monarch during an investiture held at Buckingham Palace." Add "to" before "civilians"—it's a little far from the "to" for an ellipsis to work. "Held" is redundant. The last part is rather too different to be separated by just a comma and "and". "It may be awarded to a person of any rank in any service and to civilians under military command; the VC is presented to the recipient by the British monarch during an investiture at Buckingham Palace."
  • So did it "exist" from 1856 or 1857? It's clarified later, but perhaps "in Great Britain" should be added after "introduced"?
  • "Troops of the Indian Army were not originally eligible for the Victoria Cross as they had been eligible for the Indian Order of Merit since 1837, which was the oldest British gallantry award for general issue." Just "Indian troops" by now?

Comma "because"—"as" is ambiguous; I try to avoid it. "Indian troops were not at first eligible for the VC, because since 1837 they had had access to the Indian Order of Merit—the oldest British gallantry award for general issue." Issue does sound like boots and garters, but maybe that's the term to use. Having abbreviated VC already, please use it always. Trying to avoid "eligible" twice; "access" is all I can think of. Juxtapose the elements that are now either side of the dash.

  • Underuse of commas, particularly as a boundary between ideas within a sentence that are only semi-related. Add one, for example, after "Merit" in the middle of para 2. Remove "cover".
  • "There have been a total of 150 recipients of the Victoria Cross who were serving with an Indian Army or Honourable East India Company unit."—this could be neater.
  • "soldiers who were presented".
  • MOS doesn't like numerals that start a sentence, but I don't mind. "18 VCs were awarded for action in the First World War with 29 medals awarded for action in the Second World War." The connector should be "and", and why not use ellipsis? "18 VCs were awarded for action in the First World War, and 29 in the Second World War."
  • The table: the colour in the key square isn't obviously different from the background colour. "This along with the *, indicates that the Victoria Cross was awarded posthumously" --> "An asterisk in a purple square indicates a posthumous award." It's a full sentence, so a period is best.
  • Why the tiny print for specific refs?
  • Pity there are so many red links.
  • I'm new to this, but tell me: why not chronological order?

To summarise: redundant wording, underuse of commas, undesirable repetition—these are things you might keep in mind. TONY (talk) 12:37, 4 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I have given the Lead a tinkle per your comments. I think I have got all of it. With regards to the red links; I am working on it but it will take time. All of the recipients, the main point about this list are blue links as are the vast majority of units. For me, the colour stands out very well, for those who it doesn't; that is what the asterisk is for. The tiny print is a result of the highly used {{reflist}} template, it seems neater to me. Lastly, it is in name order as that is the standard way to do it for lists of this type. It is a list of names so it should be alphabetical order as far as I am concerned. Thankyou very much for the comments. Woody (talk) 17:35, 5 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks; looks better. TONY (talk) 13:57, 8 May 2008 (UTC) (Except there are still lots of red links; are they linked because you intend to start stubs on those items?)[reply]
Yep, that is on my to-do list. Trouble is, one of the major sources for regiment details has gone down, so books are needed. In terms of the places, they are time consuming, but will be created yes. Woody (talk) 14:00, 8 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose for now. It's a great list, I'd love to support it, and you deserve some serious credit for all the hard work, but I think there are far too many redlinks for this to be FL. Per criteria 1 (a) 1, which I think applies to this list. - Marrio (talk) 14:15, 8 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • I have to disagree with you on that point. 1 (a) 1 states: brings together a group of existing articles related by well-defined entry criteria; The main topic under discussion here is the recipients; all blue-links. The second most important topic is the units of the Army; 30 units do not have link. Percentage wise, this is 80% with links, and this is not for the main topic under discussion, still a very good percentage. Woody (talk) 14:22, 8 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You're absolutely right that the main group of articles this list is designed around is the recipients. But nonetheless the existing articles brought together by the list include the units the VC recipients were part of and the conflict and place of action they received it for. So what happens if a reader re-sorts the list by location, and finds a significant numbers of red-links? In any case, I think a lot of the location articles probably exist under alternate spellings of place names. For example, William Kerr received his VC for action in Kolapore, India, which is red-linked, but which I suspect is an alternate spelling of Kolhapur. And Yeshwant Ghadge's place of action, the upper Tiber Valley in Italy, could be linked to Tiber. Marrio (talk) 15:05, 8 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Quite a lot of work has gone into turning redlinks into bluelinks. The percentage now runs at 95% for all links. Given that the main focus of the list is all bluelinks, could you reconsider/take another look please. Thanks. Woody (talk) 20:21, 11 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Support, given progress on the links. I still think many more of these could be cleared up with some stub creation (for the units) and some work with the wikiprojects for the various countries where these actions took place. The difficulty with some of them (including some I took a crack at) is that they are listed in your sources under outdated anglicized names. Having a local who knows the geography of the country would help tremendously. Marrio (talk) 16:52, 13 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for that. I am still working on the unit stubs, finding sources is quite tiresome. I agree about the anglicised names, I have spent a few hours trying spelling variations on google to try and come up with the current names. For others, I have created some stubs. Thanks again for the review. Woody (talk) 16:55, 13 May 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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