Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Assessment/4th Pennsylvania Infantry Regiment

Article promoted by Vami IV (talk) via MilHistBot (talk) 01:20, 8 July 2022 (UTC) &laquo; Return to A-Class review list

4th Pennsylvania Infantry Regiment
Instructions for nominators and reviewers
 * Nominator(s): 

Most regiments are famous for what they did do in battle, this unit was known for what it didn't. An article about the only Union regiment that refused to fight in the first major battle of the war. Kges1901 (talk) 20:17, 12 June 2022 (UTC)

HF - support

Great to see you back at ACR, and its always great to see more ACW articles here! I'll review at some point this week. Hog Farm Talk 22:08, 12 June 2022 (UTC)


 * "here it was ordered by General Robert Patterson " - wasn't Patterson technically a Major General instead of a full general?
 * Good catch, fixed.Kges1901 (talk) 23:46, 17 June 2022 (UTC)

I supported back at GAN, and didn't have much to pick on then, and I'm at a support here as well. Hog Farm Talk 22:29, 17 June 2022 (UTC)

Support from Gog the Mild

 * " Members of the only regiment to refuse to fight at the battle due to the expiration of its term of service, its men were denounced as cowards." I had to read this twice to parse it. Consider rephrasing.
 * Rephrased


 * "on the eve of First Battle of Bull Run". Should there be a definite article there?
 * Good catch


 * "in subsequent Pennsylvania regiments". I'm not sure that is grammatical.
 * Rephrased


 * "during the war, and they formed the bulk of". I don't think you mean "and". Perhaps 'for example' or similar?
 * Rephrased


 * "In response to President Abraham Lincoln's call for 75,000 men". Consider adding something like 'to serve in the army for three months' to give the context.
 * Done


 * "The militia regiment volunteered". How does a unit volunteer? As opposed to the men who made it up?
 * Done


 * "Departing Norristown with a send-off from the people of the town after the presentation of flags sewn by women of the town". Listing the three events in reverse chronological order makes this a little difficult to follow. And is it possible to avoid "... of the town ... of the town ..."?
 * Done


 * "the needs of the state for speedily formed units". Do you mean something like for 'the urgent of the state for formed units'?
 * Done


 * "With this order, the regiment became a volunteer unit in federal service, and confirmed the militia officers in their positions in an election." Which confirmed the officers positions? The order or the election?
 * Done


 * Link muster.
 * Done


 * "before it rejoined the regiment at Annapolis". Did it travel by rail or steamer? Or march?
 * Done


 * "after receiving the necessary equipment." What equipment is needed to drill and be inspected?
 * Source says that "camp and garrison equipage was not supplied" initially, so they didn't have tents. As mentioned they didn't have "uniforms and equipments" other than muskets and small amounts of ammunition. Presumably they didn't stand for inspection without having uniforms.


 * "The appeals of McDowell and Hartranft to patriotic duty fell on deaf ears: many in the regiment were willing to stay, but others wanted to muster out as scheduled due to their previous negative experiences with lack of equipment, and they believed that they were entitled to a rest as they planned to reenlist in new three years' units, which regimental officers were preparing to organize following the expiry of the three-month term." This sentence is a bit long. Perhaps split it?
 * Split, is it ok now?
 * Looks good.


 * "Hartranft and Captain Walter H. Cooke of Company K stayed with the army ... Cooke ... initially started for the camp of the New York Fire Zouaves to serve as a private ... Both distinguished themselves during the Battle of Bull Run and were awarded the Medal of Honor in the late 1880s." Which of the three is intended to be excluded?
 * Cooke and Hartranft are the only people mentioned and both received the Medal of Honor. Is this unclear?
 * D'oh!


 * "its departure witnessed by numerous reports who ensured that". A "report" can't witness, nor be referred to as "who".
 * Rephrased. Kges1901 (talk) 20:39, 20 June 2022 (UTC)


 * "which soon followed on 27 July". Delete "soon".
 * Done


 * "three years' regiments". Were they not referred to as 'three-year regiments'? (I could well be wrong, this is not my area.)
 * Done, the former seems to be more 19th-century language


 * " which included the Madison Guards as its Company A". Perhaps mention that "Madison Guards" was the name for Company C? (I know that this mentioned in the table, but I suspect that many readers will skim this.) Similar perhaps to how you handle the similar issue in the last sentence of the article.
 * Done

Gog the Mild (talk) 12:56, 20 June 2022 (UTC)
 * You've missed one, but otherwise the changes are all fine. Gog the Mild (talk) 20:15, 20 June 2022 (UTC)

Comment Support from Georgejdorner

 * I am still baffled by all the extra WorldCat references and other extraneous links to cites. However, nothing required is missing from this article, and thus there are no grounds to deny support.Georgejdorner (talk) 20:48, 6 July 2022 (UTC)

Info box

 * A unit's manning is usually given categorizing officers and enlisted ranks separately. Is that possible here?
 * 39 officers and 756 enlisted from the muster rolls, but I'm not sure that is necessary as I've seen plenty of works that don't separate. In a volunteer unit where the men elected their officers I don't think this matters.
 * Power of command always matters. To the best of my knowledge, the breakdown of officers and men is listed when known.
 * Listed breakdown.

Lede

 * Sentence beginning, "Hantraft and a company commander..." could be prefaced with "However," to sharpen the point there were courageous soldiers in the regiment.
 * Done

Formation

 * Mention of the supplies missing when they left Camp Curtin would lead into later mention of equipment shortage.
 * Done


 * No mention of Odd Fellows Hall in source.
 * Auge mentions on page 184 that a meeting was called at the Odd Fellows' Hall. All good with this?
 * The link from Auge in the bibliography leads to a title page, and does not support the facts cited. If you did not have the link here, I would not have commented. It's ironic that deleting the link would solve this issue.
 * The same phenomenon occurs in several other biblio links.
 * Added links. I think users can be trusted to be able to navigate google books if they want to verify the facts cited for themselves. Kges1901 (talk) 02:33, 24 June 2022 (UTC)
 * Sorry to say this, but I think this is absurd. These added meaningless links, to the average reader, must seem like useless clutter. And, to the best of my knowledge, these links are not required by WP standards.Georgejdorner (talk) 19:35, 24 June 2022 (UTC)
 * BLUF, the average reader does not view the references intentionally if they are not deeply interested in the subject. Adding links for PD books is standard and in fact there are bots that go through articles adding such links to online versions to aid in verifiability for Wikipedia editors. Kges1901 (talk) 21:40, 24 June 2022 (UTC)
 * I've been in WP since 2008; this is the first time I ever ran into this situation. And what is BLUF?Georgejdorner (talk) 20:42, 6 July 2022 (UTC)

Garrison duty

 * Phrase "half of the regiment" can be condensed to "half regiment".
 * I feel that this would be confusing since half regiment can also refer to a specific unit size for a unit that is half of regimental strength
 * I am unaware of any TO&E half regiments outside the French Foreign Legion. And the text does not say the regiment was split in two; it states "half". And the present sentence is awkward.
 * Have rephrased to be more concise, decided to just use "the other half" to avoid redundancy
 * Much improved.


 * Leading sentence of second para is awkward and needs rewriting. The next sentence lists the equipment needed; it might be better placed, in a rewrite, in Formation.
 * Rewritten, does it read better now
 * Still needs work. Try something like, "...its men were not issued before departing hastily from Camp Curtis on 28 April." Though I still cannot tell if they were uniformed or in civvies.
 * Done


 * "left without uniforms..." is followed by a description of shoddy blouses and pants issued. Seems contradictory. Could use some clarity here.
 * These were what they received at Annapolis
 * So did they receive shoddy civilian clothing? Or partial uniforms?
 * Primary sources describe these as contractor-produced 'uniforms' issued by the state. The regiment received new uniforms in June due to the inferior quality of the contractor supplied clothing. Kges1901 (talk) 00:27, 22 June 2022 (UTC)
 * Can your sources support statement(s) that they were first issued state-issued uniforms, then received better quality uniforms later on?
 * According to the sources, all of their uniforms were state issued, just the state fixed its own problems by changing the supplier. Kges1901 (talk) 02:30, 24 June 2022 (UTC)
 * I still find this ambiguous and confusing. Can you work the info given in the sentence above into the text?Georgejdorner (talk) 19:21, 24 June 2022 (UTC)

Elaborated on this in the text. Kges1901 (talk) 21:42, 24 June 2022 (UTC)

Manassas Bull Run campaign

 * Which Battle of Bull Run were these MoHs awarded for? Wouldn't it be less confusing to use "Manassas"; better yet, sneak in an explanation for North and South having differing names for the same battle(s).
 * Clarified
 * Nice job on the rewrite.


 * Speaking of which...why is the Confederate name of the battle used to describe a Union regiment's participation?


 * Inconsistency in wikipedia article titles because there is Manassas campaign but First Battle of Bull Run


 * Basically, every battle in the Virginia theater had two names. In this case, the Union name was either First Bull Run or Second Bull Run; the Confederate equivalents were First Manassas and Second Manassas. If this is difficult to work into the text, I recommend an explanatory Footnote.23:33, 21 June 2022 (UTC)
 * This explanation is a popular myth invented long after the war ended. William C. Davis in his history of Bull Run describes how veterans of the battle from both sides initially referred to the battle by different names: "They could not decide what to call the battle—Young's Branch, Stone Bridge, Bull Run, Manassas, or Manassas Plain—but they published letter after letter from soldiers and correspondents who were in the fight." See also Mackowski and White's introduction to Turning Points of the American Civil War, describing how there was actually a Bull Run Chapter of the UDC and a Manassas Picket Post of Union veterans, demonstrating that the narrative of conflicting names defined by the different sides is a postwar invention. Kges1901 (talk) 00:10, 22 June 2022 (UTC)
 * When I was a sprout in Maryland in the 1950s and we played Civil War, we Yankees said "Bull Run" and the Rebel kids used "Manassas". Just saying.
 * And why defend prior use of terms? Why not use terms presently in use?
 * Either way, I think this debate isn't relevant to the article, and standardized on the term used by the sources, which is Bull Run. Present usage seems to have swung towards Bull Run, as all of the 21st century studies of the battle (Detzer, Rafuse, and Longacre) use Bull Run in their titles.
 * Fair enough. My concern is answered. And how!


 * Citation (7. does not connect to source.
 * Not sure about this. Ref 7 connects to Russell 1861.
 * Your link from the bibliography connects to a Google listing instead of the actual source.
 * Fixed.

Subsequent service

 * I am puzzled by the mention of Corson's MoH. He did not win it while in the 4th Pennsylvania. Reason?
 * I have mentioned him and some other notable soldiers of the regiment in the section as examples of what the regiment's soldiers did during the rest of the war
 * So, Corson was decorated while with the 6th Pennsylvania. What does that have to do with the 4th Pennsylvania?Georgejdorner (talk) 23:29, 21 June 2022 (UTC)
 * The section describes how men of the 4th Pennsylvania, despite their actions at Bull Run, went on to see substantial combat throughout the next four years of war. It is directly relevant because it provides an epilogue to the history of the regiment. Kges1901 (talk) 00:33, 22 June 2022 (UTC)
 * Okay, now it's clear that there were some very courageous men in the 4th despite the regiment's combat refusal.

Article overall

 * Toolbox utilized. No discrepancies.

Time for a break. We are tripping over each other in our edits.Georgejdorner (talk) 00:51, 22 June 2022 (UTC)


 * Return.
 * Not everyone is familiar enough with Civil War history to place this event early in the war. I believe you need a mention of that in the lede, and a sentence or two in Formation. If your sources allow, you could mention the populace's enthusiasm for war.
 * Added context Kges1901 (talk) 02:33, 24 June 2022 (UTC)
 * Nicely done.


 * I am baffled by all the links to WorldCat in the Bibliography. What purpose do they serve? Why should the general reader care about these links?
 * BLUF the general reader probably does not care about anything other than the text and is unlikely to read the sources. The links assist with verifiability for books with no ISBN, if anyone wants to dig deeper. If anyone wants to read the book itself if it can't be found online, they can click on the link to find a list of libraries that have the book. Kges1901 (talk) 21:38, 24 June 2022 (UTC)

Ends and odds
Fun fact: Did you know that poor quality Union uniforms gave rise to the word 'shoddy'?
 * Yes!! Thank you Quora!! Many thanks!! Buckshot06 (talk) 01:53, 25 June 2022 (UTC)
 * But, I'm not Quora.Georgejdorner (talk) 20:18, 25 June 2022 (UTC)

Image review - pass
Hawkeye7  (discuss)  09:26, 7 July 2022 (UTC)
 * File:National color of the 4th Pennsylvania Infantry and the 51st Pennsylvania Infantry.jpg - PD image - okay
 * File:GenJFHartranft.jpg - PD - copyright expired - okay
 * File:First Bull Run July18.png - CC 3.0 -okay

Source review - pass
Will do, ping me if I haven't gotten to this within a few days. Hog Farm Talk 14:39, 7 July 2022 (UTC)


 * Not seeing the background information about the PA militia within the cited page of Auge, is there a pagination or ref placement issue?
 * Full details are in Bates, though Auge says the regiment was a pre-existing unit


 * Publisher needed for Auge
 * No publisher as source was self-published, although that is not an indicator of unreliability in the 19th century, for example Dyer's Compendium was self-published. Auge was likely quoting contemporary newspapers, and the same details are contained in the Civil War Journal of Colonel Bolton (ed. Dr. Richard A. Sauers, published 2000), one of the regiment's company commanders.


 * Other sources look okay

Looks fine other than the above. Hog Farm Talk 22:44, 7 July 2022 (UTC)