Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Assessment/William T. Anderson

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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.

Article promoted Hawkeye7 (talk) 19:59, 5 June 2012 (UTC)[reply]

William T. Anderson[edit]

Nominator(s): Mark Arsten (talk)


Anderson was a guerrilla fighter for the Confederates in the American Civil War, and became known as one of the most brutal combatants of the war. This article is currently a GA and has received a peer review, so I'd like an A-Class review. This is the first Milhist article I've done much work on, so there's a decent chance that I'm unaware of some of the conventions here. Thanks, Mark Arsten (talk) 04:45, 21 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

  • Image comments:
File:Bloody-bill-anderson.jpg is fine, good tag.
File:William T. Anderson in sherman.jpg is fine, good tag.
File:William T Anderson death.jpg is fine, good tag.
File:Quantrill.png is fine, good tag.
File:Jesse and Frank James.gif cannot be PD-70 without an author and the author's death date. PD-1923 would work, or something like PD-US-Anonymous or PD-US-Unknown if it exists (see below)
File:Battle of Lawrence.png is fine, good tag.
File:General Order No 11.jpg is actually PD-100, not PD-70. It can be merged into a single PD-Art tag too, methinks.
Comment: Is there a PD-US-Anonymous or PD-US-Unknown? That would be more specific. Without knowing for certain when or if the images were published, we cannot use PD-US-unpublished. Crisco 1492 (talk) 05:04, 21 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for the second image check, I used your suggestions on the two problematic ones--hope they're fine now. Mark Arsten (talk) 05:47, 21 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Prose: "... the first time Confederate guerrillas had done so in the war." - Did the Union capture a train?
Information about the slave debates, perhaps in a footnote instead?
Perhaps some variation, so we don't see "William T. Anderson" and "William C. Anderson" five times in a single paragraph.
Rapes - are they all alleged, all proven, or a mix? You have Anderson's as having been reported, but the rape by his gang as fact.
"Anderson's sister, his former lover." - Which sister?
  • Other than that, the prose is just as stellar as wehen I reviewed for GA. Crisco 1492 (talk) 09:28, 21 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    • Thanks for taking another look, got all but the first one, the page I had cited only mentioned that the bushwhackers hadn't done so yet, will take more effort to figure out if others did. Mark Arsten (talk) 02:26, 22 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support - Good read, seems complete to me, well researched. Crisco 1492 (talk) 13:41, 22 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

So far so good down to where I stopped, William T. Anderson#Texas. As always, feel free to revert my copyediting. Please check the edit summaries. - Dank (push to talk)

Comments -- I'll take over reviewing prose from where Dank left off, will report back in due course... Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 08:01, 26 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Support after completing my detailed review/copyedit per above:

  • Prose-wise, I'm largely deferring to Dank on everything up to Texas, although I did skim that part and saw nothing amiss. Copyedited from Texas on, so pls check I haven't accidentally altered any meaning.
  • Structure-wise it looks straightforward, my one suggestion would be that you might combine the last two sections under the heading "Legacy", as the "Popular culture" part is so short and such sections are somewhat frowned upon anyway.
  • Referencing looks good -- I think you've had your share of recent spotchecks at FAC so don't need to see one here particularly.
  • Image-wise I'll accept Crisco's check.
  • Content/detail-wise, it looks complete to me.

Well done. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 10:52, 26 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

    • Alright, thanks for your support, comments, and copyedit, I've condense the two sections (wonder why I didn't do that before). Your copyedits look great, double-thanks for those. Mark Arsten (talk) 17:31, 26 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Support, with comments below:

  • "By 1860, William T. Anderson was a joint owner of a 320-acre (1.3 km2) property that was worth $500 and his family had a net worth of around $1,000." - could you give modern equivalent sums, or comparisons, for how much this money was worth?
  • "After he returned to Council Grove, he began horse trading, taking horses from towns in Kansas, transporting them to Missouri, and returning with more horses." - it was unclear from the text if he was stealing them at this point or not; probably worth clarifying this either way
  • "Anderson began stealing horses to sell as far away as New Mexico." - stealing them from as far away as New Mexico, or to sell as far away as New Mexico, or both?
  • " Bruce Nichols stated that..." worth explaining who Bruce Nichols was/is (was he a contemporary? A modern historian?)
  • " to challenge Union hegemony" - Just to check - do you mean hegemony, or control?
  • "Anderson did not noticeably change after his marriage and some guerrillas spread rumors that he was not legally married." - unclear from this if the two parts of the sentence are linked (i.e. were the rumours linked to the absence of change in his behaviour?)
  • (In his biography of Quantrill, historian Duane Schultz counters that General Benjamin McCulloch had Quantrill arrested after his refusal to deploy to Corpus Christi.) - Are the brackets actually necessary here? Either that, or could it go in a footnote?
  • "(The two were prominent Unionists, and did not reveal their identities.)" - ditto
  • "Bashi-bazouks " - you don't need a capital here, I think. Hchc2009 (talk) 12:03, 27 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    • Thanks for the review, good comments. I've got most of them, just the first two left. Mark Arsten (talk) 02:27, 28 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]
    • Ok, I think I took care of the final two, thanks again. Mark Arsten (talk) 04:03, 28 May 2012 (UTC)[reply]
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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