Talk:USS President (1800)

Break up date
DANFS says broken up 1817, Colledge says June 1818, Colledge may be more authoritative, but a third voice would be better. Stan 17:52, 23 Feb 2004 (UTC)

It was definitely June 1818; Admiralty records show that in March 1818 the Navy Board were still intending to repair her, and it was only in May, after fresh survey showed that she was too decayed, that an order was issued to built a replacement (see Admiralty Order of 25 May 1818). Rif Winfield (talk) 08:59, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Too many "She"s
In reality the ship doesn't have a gender. Shouldn't we just say "it"? --Bentendo24 16:01, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

Fact and figure discrepancies
A constant problem with introducing strength of armament and numbers of crewman killed or wounded inevitably brings different totals from different sources. Currently in the article and cited from James is this passage:

''President had lost 35 men killed and 70 wounded, including Decatur. Endymion had 11 killed and 14 wounded. President had had a crew of 447 and a broadside of 828 pounds against Endymion's crew of 346 and broadside of 664 pounds.[101]''

As expected other sources give different figures. Maclay Smith says:

''The President carried thirty long 24 pounders and twenty-two short 42-pounders—in all, fifty-two guns, with seven hundred and sixty-five actual pounds of metal to the broadside. The Endymion mounted thirty long 24-pounders and twenty short 32 pounders—in all, fifty guns, aggregating six hundred and eighty pounds of metal to the broadside. In this chase the President sustained a loss of twenty-four killed and fifty-six wounded. The loss in the Endymion was eleven killed and fourteen wounded.''

Roosevelt says:

The President lost 24 killed and 55 wounded'; the Endymion, 11 killed and 14 wounded.

Cooper says:

''In this long and close cannonade, agreeably to the official reports, the President lost 24 men killed, and 56 wounded. The Endymion had 11 killed, and 14 wounded, according to the published reports''.

Toll says: President 25 killed and 60 wounded.

The point of all this being that to begin introducing strengths and kill ratios into the article will require explaining all of the discrepancies between the sources. Picking one source and calling their counts as definite is misleading to the reader and additionally makes for a poorly researched article. The comparisons should go to the main article on the battle Capture of USS President as that is where arguments over strengths belong and prevents this article from going into unnecessary detail.

One last point. The passage about Endymion:

In 1847 the Admiralty authorized the issue to any still surviving crew from Endymion of the Naval General Service Medal with clasp "ENDYMION WH. PRESIDENT".

This belongs in the article for HMS Endymion (1797) as it has nothing to do with President. --Brad (talk) 18:15, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

Thoughts

 * "consequently, all construction came to a halt" is referenced to a treaty, which I don't think would cover it.
 * Are refs 55, 78 and 79 reliable?
 * Copyedit: "The Royal Navy investigation revealed Captain Bingham insisting that President had fired the first shot and continued firing for forty-five minutes, rather than the five minutes Rodgers claimed."
 * The article asserts that Little Belt fired the first shot, yet it appears there is some controversy regarding the matter?
 * A lot of the sources are rather old... I don't have a problem with it, but someone might at FAC. — Ed   (talk  •  majestic titan)  02:09, 28 March 2010 (UTC)


 * Is referenced to the Naval Act of 1794; see section 9.
 * Good question. Has Age of Nelson ever been decided upon as reliable? May need to do so.
 * Copyedit... what exactly?
 * Yes there is controversy but since this was an article on the ship that Rodgers commanded I felt it right to use his version of events while explaining the "He said He said" later on.
 * Old in what way? The older public domain material said nothing different about President than the more recently published material except where referenced. Is that what you meant? --Brad (talk) 04:15, 28 March 2010 (UTC)


 * Yes, but if construction stopped in 1796, two years after the treaty...a second ref can't be found?
 * I don't like how "revealed" is used in this context. Maybe "Captain Bingham insisted in the Royal Navy investigation that President ..."
 * Okay, I see that logic, but perhaps a note can be added directing people to that paragraph for more on the controversy? (try anchor)
 * Well never mind then. :) — Ed   (talk  •  majestic titan)  04:28, 28 March 2010 (UTC)
 * I made some more changes. Is a note really necessary in a section that only has four paragraphs? There is a separate article Little Belt Affair on the engagement but it's so completely biased and without any references I decided that steering the reader there wouldn't do any good. --Brad (talk) 19:17, 28 March 2010 (UTC)

Copyedit request
I'm placing the tag here rather than on the article page. This article was promoted to Featured in April. It went through what I refer to as "panic editing" in order to get it past FAC. What I believe the article needs is a basic run through for prose and flow and maybe some grammar. Everything in the article is cited and being careful not to change the meaning of what has been cited can be difficult. Brad (talk) 17:20, 27 July 2010 (UTC)
 * I take that back. If you can't spell then don't copyedit articles. Brad (talk) 18:55, 27 July 2010 (UTC)

Reference and bibliography layout.
Since there was no conversation about changing the 2c criteria of the citations, I've reverted today's edits. Brad (talk) 06:33, 29 July 2011 (UTC)

This article is a travesty
I'm considering reverting to the version that passed FAC several years ago. The front page appearances have led to a ton of edit creep. I've looked at the current version, and while there have been constructive edits, the bad outweighs the good. The best thing to do is revert and improve all over. AcadRonin, I know you mean well, but the majority of your edits are not helpful. Brad (talk) 22:26, 16 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Obviously, I disagree. Many of my edits are simply corrections of fact, or of formatting. A couple that you reverted were fully sourced (in particular one set that you reverted as not NPOV, when the comment was not mine but that of a major author re frigates). The article still has numerous small errors, and the style is still frequently clumsy with its dependence on the passive voice. My most recent changes converted the general "two merchant ships" to named vessels, detailing what actually transpired, again, fully sourced. I fail to see how this represents a "travesty". Regards, Acad Ronin (talk) 01:51, 17 March 2016 (UTC)

The war was not yet over
While it is true that the capture of the President occurred before news of the treaty reached America, the fact that the war was still on until after full ratification is the more relevant fact. For example. USS Constitution fought and captured HMS Cyane and HMS Levant in full knowledge of the treaty, but without knowing it had been ratified, so they would have fought even if they had known of the treaty. And, if the war really was over, then why did the British not return the ship after learning of their "mistake"? Before disagreeing with me, why not read the treaty?

Tupelo the typo fixer (talk) 22:20, 29 September 2021 (UTC)