Talk:Baltimore riot of 1861

Archive : error pointed out
The article starts off referring to April 12, 1861 as being "just five days before" April 19, 1861. This does not inspire confidence in the reader that this article contains other serious inaccuracies.

Start Class
This article has been returned to start class, primarily since it has not beenc chcecked against the requirments for B class. --NeoNerd 12:49, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

First Union casualty
No, that happened during the 100-gun salute at Fort Sumter

Randy Golden (talk) 13:49, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

Crime in Maryland
My addition of this article to the Crime in Maryland category was reverted as "digressive", a term which the editor seems to like using lately. Since the activity accompanying the riot was a crime and occurred in Maryland, I believe it should be included under this category. I'd be fine with using a more specific subcategory, such as "Riots in Maryland" or "Crime in Baltimore", though none currently exist. Comments? &mdash;ADavidB 13:02, 21 May 2009 (UTC)


 * Msking a subcategory of Crime in Maryland which lists the various riots already lumped together in the main category (which by the way appears to be nonrepresentative of the material) would be one way to resolve the dispute. Tedickey (talk) 13:39, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

The article is now one of four in the Riots and civil unrest in Baltimore category, a subcategory of Crime in Maryland. &mdash;ADavidB 04:17, 22 May 2009 (UTC)

Incorrect Statement
The article's opening indicates that the conflict involved "infantrymen of the United States Army." This is incorrect, as the unit in question (6th Massachusetts Volunteer Militia, Co. C,D,I and L) were not regular army, nor had they been yet mustered into Federal service. (That happened AFTER they reached Washington.)

I would suggest that phrase be corrected to read "members of the Massachusetts militia".

Temporaryhero (talk) 21:35, 12 November 2009 (UTC)

On a different line the terminology was changed from "reinforced" to "occupied" to describe the existence of Union troops in Delaware. Changed "occupied" back to "reinforced." A reference to occupation doesn't seem accurate given that Delaware had definitively refused secession/joining the Confederacy. Furthermore, if the Union troops were drawn from Delaware itself it could not be considered an occupation. The line lacks a citation and actually doesn't describe the makeup of the troops in question, nor how many were brought in. The same editor changed terminology about Union troops in Missouri as well, which I haven't changed because that seems to be more of a grey area.Yojimbo1941 (talk) 14:02, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

Change name to "Pratt Street Riot"?
In my experience and from web searches, Pratt Street Riot is a much more common name. I suppose the drawback is that this name is less obvious to outsiders. But I think that doesn't justify avoiding the popular name. (Especially since I think there were other incidents of civil unrest in 1861.) Groupuscule (talk) 20:07, 13 July 2012 (UTC)


 * I don't think the Pratt Street name has been "avoided". The redirect was in place a few months after this article was created, and the name included in the lead section a few months after that.  It may help to elaborate on your web searches.  A Google search of "Baltimore riot of 1861" shows me 123,000 results, while "Pratt Street riot" gives 79,800. —ADavidB 05:40, 14 July 2012 (UTC)


 * Ah, but a great many of these hits come up due to the title of the Wikipedia article! We're too big to fail :-) How should we proceed?


 * Are you based in Baltimore? We should work on an editathon @ the EPFL! Groupuscule (talk) 15:11, 14 July 2012 (UTC)


 * I added "-wiki" to my Google searches and then got 107,000 and 19,100 results, respectively, though the Wikipedia article name could still be influential, as you suggested. I'm not currently based in Baltimore. An editathon sounds productive. —ADavidB 23:16, 14 July 2012 (UTC)


 * Sources using "Pratt Street Riot": National Park Service, historian Harry Ezratty; Sources using "Baltimore Riot of 1861": Georgia's Blue & Gray Trail, history.net. I do feel that most local sources use Pratt St. Riot. Groupuscule (talk) 15:56, 14 July 2012 (UTC)


 * This local source uses Baltimore Riot. I would think that a general searcher looking for info on the subject is more likely to think "Baltimore Riot" than "Pratt Street Riot." For example, if I'm reading McPherson's "Battle Cry of Freedom" (page 285) or Weigley's "A Great Civil War" (pages 36-39) and wanted more details, I wouldn't even know from the text that the events occurred on Pratt Street. I went through the indexes of another half dozen works and none listed Pratt Street -- you had to go through Baltimore to find where the events are described. Tom (North Shoreman) (talk) 18:43, 14 July 2012 (UTC)


 * The article title policy expresses a preference "to use the name that is most frequently used to refer to the subject in English-language reliable sources. This includes usage in the sources used as references for the article." Going through the readily accessible web-linked sources currently used in the article, about five use Baltimore Riot, none use Pratt Street Riot, one just refers to a "riot", and several don't give a name to the conflict. The article could use some fresh reliable sources; perhaps they'd help with any decision to change the name. —ADavidB 23:16, 14 July 2012 (UTC)

OK thanks for all the feedback. I agree with you both, especially with the sources the article has now. I'm also not too worried about it, practically speaking, since end users searching for "Pratt Street Riot" will end up here either way. Am currently (and often) in the Maryland Room @ EPFL, so that should be a great place to find more sources. Love, groupuscule (talk) 18:25, 17 July 2012 (UTC)

Statement in limbo
'According to the report of Colonel Edward F. Jones, Sixth Massachusetts Militia, during their travel, James Brady was “taken insane” and left in Delanco Township, New Jersey, with J. C. Buck.'

This does not seem to relate to anything before or after it. Possible vandalism? Valetude (talk) 12:26, 29 January 2014 (UTC)


 * That whole paragraph was added about a year ago, with the 1800 source. —ADavidB 16:22, 29 January 2014 (UTC)

Orphaned references in Baltimore riot of 1861
I check pages listed in Category:Pages with incorrect ref formatting to try to fix reference errors. One of the things I do is look for content for orphaned references in wikilinked articles. I have found content for some of Baltimore riot of 1861's orphans, the problem is that I found more than one version. I can't determine which (if any) is correct for this article, so I am asking for a sentient editor to look it over and copy the correct ref content into this article.

Reference named "articles.baltimoresun.com": From Maryland in the American Civil War: http://articles.baltimoresun.com/2001-11-27/features/0111270102_1_habeas-fort-mchenry-lincoln-suspension From History of St. Mary's College of Maryland: Jo-Ann Pilardi, Baltimore Sun, "Margaret Brent: a Md. founding mother", March 05, 1998 http://articles.baltimoresun.com/1998-03-05/news/1998064114_1_margaret-brent-lord-baltimore-calvert 

I apologize if any of the above are effectively identical; I am just a simple computer program, so I can't determine whether minor differences are significant or not. AnomieBOT ⚡ 01:11, 17 October 2014 (UTC)

External links modified
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...it was the Baltimore riot that pushed the two sides over the edge into full-scale war
This claim seems a bit late, given Lincoln did call these troops to DC.

This seems like historical revisionism given the North won the war.SkrillixWasTooSoon (talk) 14:00, 19 April 2018 (UTC)