Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Assessment/Bombardment of Pape'ete


 * The following discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page.  No further edits should be made to this discussion.


 * Promoted -MBK004 11:39, 13 February 2010 (UTC)

Bombardment of Papeete

 * Nominator(s): XavierGreen (talk)

I am nominating this article for A-Class review because I believe it meets the standards of an A-class article. XavierGreen (talk) 02:05, 5 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Comments
 * No problems reported with alt text or external links. One dab link needs to be located and fixed though.
 * I think i fixed this.XavierGreen (talk) 17:18, 5 February 2010 (UTC)
 * The edit tab for the background section is out of place, please see if you can fix it.
 * I don't know what you mean by this?XavierGreen (talk) 17:18, 5 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Your gun caliber sizes are all in metric, but we need standard measurements as well for the benefit of those who can not think in metric.
 * Fixed this.XavierGreen (talk) 17:18, 5 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Your dates need to be consistent, either day month year or month day year, but not a combination of the two as current appears in the article.
 * I fixed thisXavierGreen (talk) 17:18, 5 February 2010 (UTC)
 * No citation is provided for the lines "The French land batteries and the gunboat in the harbor attempted to return fire, but scored no hits on the German cruisers. The German cruisers soon turned their attention to the French shipping in the harbor." in the battle section, please add one.
 * Added a citation.XavierGreen (talk) 17:18, 5 February 2010 (UTC)
 * How long did the battle last? At what time did the German's withdraw? the article doesn't say, but I would like to know. TomStar81 (Talk) 15:11, 5 February 2010 (UTC)
 * The Germans arrived at 7 A.M. and withdrew by 11 A.M., ive added this to the article.XavierGreen (talk) 17:18, 5 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Support TomStar81 (Talk) 19:51, 5 February 2010 (UTC)

 Comments Support
 * The type of cruiser should be specified in the lead and in the main body.
 * I added the type and class of the cruisers.XavierGreen (talk) 04:06, 6 February 2010 (UTC)
 * What raid at Fanning? That's mentioned out of the blue.
 * Nurnberg and Titania were sent by spee to raid the cable station at fanning on September 7th, i added a link to a stub about the event. It was bloodless and relatively unnotable besides the fact that the wireless was destroyed, the cable cut, and some gold was siezed.XavierGreen (talk) 04:06, 6 February 2010 (UTC)
 * All gun sizes should have a hyphen as they are adjectives.
 * I changed it so that it is hyphenated, but the conversion template will not allow one to use both the abreviation function and the adjective function so the measurements are now unabreviated.XavierGreen (talk) 04:06, 6 February 2010 (UTC)
 * What were the French coastal artillery guns aside from those of Zélée?
 * The other guns were extremely antiquated and apparently either innoprative or to obsolete to be used, as such only the landed guns of the Zelee were used as the coastal artillery during the battle. I changed the text to reflect this.XavierGreen (talk) 04:06, 6 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Use the accents each time for names like Zélée.
 * Fixed, i also added the umlauts on Nürnberg. XavierGreen (talk) 04:06, 6 February 2010 (UTC)
 * The shells fired by the Germans were HE and less useful in a ship-to-ship gunnery duel like Coronel so be careful that you don't overstate your case here.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 23:09, 5 February 2010 (UTC)
 * During the battle of the Falklands most of the German cruisers ran low and in some cases completely out of ammunition of all types. As such every shell wasted at Papeete could have been used instead at the Falklands. The arguement isnt my own, and is presented in multiple texts on the battle and cited as such with the article. I haven't seen any information on the types of shells fired at the Zelee and Walkure, but i assume they would have used armour piercing shells against them?XavierGreen (talk) 04:06, 6 February 2010 (UTC)
 * The bulk of the article is in American English, but the conversions are in British English. This can be fixed by adding |sp=us to each conversion.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 03:42, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Fixed.XavierGreen (talk) 19:43, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Support Comments
 * Comments This is a great article on an interesting topic, but I think that it needs a little more work:
 * Some background on the German East Asian Squadron's cruise prior to this action would be helpful - the article jumps straight into "Failing to catch the Samoa Expeditionary Force at Apia and having seen no action at all since leaving Tsingtao, the men of the German East Asian Squadron under Admiral Maximilian von Spee were anxious to meet the enemy in battle" without providing any background first
 * There really isnt much background to get into. Spees squadron left Pagan with Emden going off on her own, and then pretty much just steamed about the pacific for a little while before heading to Samoa. I added a sentance or two more, but there really wasnt a whole lot going on with Scharnhost and Gneisau before they steamed into Apia.XavierGreen (talk) 16:50, 6 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Was the Walkure armed? The article mentions her in the context of the French defensive units.
 * It was a prize taken by the French and therefore a government vessel, it was unarmed however. I tweaked the text to reflect this.XavierGreen (talk) 16:30, 6 February 2010 (UTC)
 * "Von Spee's forces also outnumbered the French with over 1,500 sailors aboard their vessels, more than enough to overwhelm the 160 or so that Destremau had to oppose them." - it seems unlikely that he would have landed the entire crews of the ships
 * FixedXavierGreen (talk) 16:34, 6 February 2010 (UTC)
 * As the battle was fairly simple, the 'Battle' section doesn't need to identify the nationality of each combatant every time its mentioned (eg, in "The French land batteries and the gunboat in the harbor attempted to return fire, but scored no hits on the German cruisers" 'French' and 'German' should be omitted as the Germans had no land batteries and the French no cruisers)
 * FixedXavierGreen (talk) 16:43, 6 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Was Papeete a city or town? It's called both things, including in the same sentence in one instance
 * FixedXavierGreen (talk) 16:43, 6 February 2010 (UTC)
 * The prose is unnecessarily complex at times - theres a fair bit of repetition which could be omitted (I've had a go at fixing an couple of instances of this in this edit and this edit)
 * The statement that some of the cost of the bombardment "was repaid through the seizure of a German store on the island" seems questionable - was this 'store' [was this a business or a depot?] in any way associated with the German Government? If not, the term 'repaid' hardly seems appropriate.
 * I changed the word to recouped.
 * Similarly, why were the German civilians who happened to be living in Papeete the "compatriots" of the raiders? When combined with the above it appears that the locals revenged themselves against German civilians who had nothing to do with the raid...
 * Compatriots in the sense that they are citizens of the same nation, i can tweak it to change it if nessesary. They were interned so they were thrown in with the same lot of their homeland whether they liked it or not.XavierGreen (talk) 16:43, 6 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Yes, can you please change this? It makes it sound like the local Germans had something to do with the attack. Nick-D (talk) 10:11, 12 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Fixed.XavierGreen (talk) 15:09, 12 February 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm a bit worried about the wartime sources - they're probably not going to be neutral given the hysteria of the war years - can these be replaced with more recent sources? It's a bit telling that they're the sources which are provided for the two points above. Nick-D (talk) 09:20, 6 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Many of the wartime sources used are from America which was Neutral and not a party to the conflict at the time. Detailed accounts of the bombardment in english are relatively few, the most modern of sources do not describe it in detail.XavierGreen (talk) 16:17, 6 February 2010 (UTC)
 * I managed to find an Australian source from 1941 about the battle and used it to add citations to the Battle section, which was previously quite lacking in post war sources.XavierGreen (talk) 03:48, 9 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Support All my comments are now addressed, great work with this article. Nick-D (talk) 11:12, 13 February 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm assuming the book in the Further reading section is in French - if this is so, it needs to note this using the "language=" parameter.
 * Lead, "as much of Scharnhorst's and Gneisenau's ammunition had been depleted by then." Maybe make this a little more explicit and say "had been depleted by the bombardment of Papeete"?
 * Battle section, "A French refusal was returned with shelling of the shore batteries and the town by von Spee's ships from a distance of 6,000 m (6,600 yd)." This is somewhat confusing, as you discuss a French refusal and then immediately jump to a German shelling within the same sentence. At first I thought that the French were shelling someone along with refusing to surrender. Perhaps "The French refused, and von Spee's ship began to shell the shore batteries and town from a distance of..."
 * Aftermath section, "Effects of the ammunition depleted as a result of the action at Papeete had some effect on". Effects/effect

Overall a nice little article, just a few tweaks needed before I will add my support. Dana boomer (talk) 22:23, 7 February 2010 (UTC)
 * I think all these issues are fixed now.

XavierGreen (talk) 05:58, 8 February 2010 (UTC)
 * The changes I suggested, plus the others made, look good to me, and so I am adding my support of this article's A-class nomination. Dana boomer (talk) 23:24, 11 February 2010 (UTC)


 * Comments - a few things I noticed. Carcharoth (talk) 03:44, 8 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Support - comments now mostly addressed. Carcharoth (talk) 04:20, 12 February 2010 (UTC)
 * When I looked at what links here, it looks like most of the links are due to this article being included in Template:Campaignbox Command of the Oceans 1914-1915. Is it possible to work out which articles this article is linked from within the text of the articles, and to consider whether it should or could be linked from more articles?
 * It was linked directly in the text of 7 articles and i edited two more so that now nine articles are linked to the Bombardment of Papeete in their texts.XavierGreen (talk) 19:43, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
 * The start of the article proper is a little bit vague: "When word of war reached Admiral Maximilian von Spee...". It seems to lead on from the lead section, rather than stand alone by itself. Is it possible to give a date here for when "word of war" reached Spee? That would also make it possible to give an idea of how long it takes these ships to steam between islands, and how long it was between each of the events described in the article (especially the first paragraph).
 * The first use of the word "collier" might be usefully explained. To some it will be clear it is a ship. Others will think of collier and be confused. You could link to collier (ship type).
 * I added a bluelink to fix thisXavierGreen (talk) 03:46, 9 February 2010 (UTC)
 * The hidden categories are "Unclassified articles missing geocoordinate data" and "All articles needing coordinates". Can this be fixed or the categories removed if they are not needed? I would suggest using the co-ordinates of Papeete, if that is what is normally done for battle articles.
 * FixedXavierGreen (talk) 02:07, 12 February 2010 (UTC)
 * I managed to read the entire article without realising that Papeete was the capital of Tahiti, or even that it was on Tahiti. I had (for some reason) assumed that Papeete was an island in French Polynesia. It would be good to mention Tahiti in the article and link to it. The only mention in the article is here: "The French had no heavy defenses at Papeete but had been warned that von Spee's squadron might raid Tahiti and that a German squadron had been sighted off Samoa." It is not clear from that sentence that Papeete is the capital of Tahiti. I continued to think that Papeete and Tahiti were separate islands (that is what I get for failing to click on "Papeete").
 * Papeete is the captial of french polynesia, which was then called French Settlements in Oceania, i have linked to both the territory and the island.
 * Thanks. I didn't know that about the official name of the colony at the time. Interesting. Carcharoth (talk) 08:51, 9 February 2010 (UTC)
 * A little bit of context on the history of Papeete could be brought into this article. For example, that it had been settled in 1818, and had grown into a "major regional shipping and transportation center". It would be nice to know what the size and population of Papeete was at the time of this action.
 * It was not a major regional shipping center in 1914, it lacked a wireless station and had a garrison of only 45 men (i have added this to the text). I have a figure for the population of the entire island, but for the town alone i do not.XavierGreen (talk) 03:46, 9 February 2010 (UTC)
 * I suppose it depends which region you are talking about. What was the largest garrison at the time in the French Settlements in Oceania (Établissements Français de l'Océanie)? I can well believe it was a colonial backwater compared to some places, but which places in Oceania had wireless stations at that time? It's not a major issue, though, as you've now said it was the capital, so that does indicate that it was one of the major towns in the local area of islands, and the garrison strength is a good figure to have in there as well.Carcharoth (talk) 08:51, 9 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Most of the islands did not have garrisons at all, or if they did were extremely small (Nuka Hiva had only a handful of gendarmes). The major settlements in the pacific tended to have wireless stations or communications cables at this time. Fiji, Hawaii, and Fanning had a cable as well as wireless, Yap, Samoa, and several others had wireless.XavierGreen (talk) 18:08, 9 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Would a map showing the location of Papeete, and of Tahiti help? Maybe even (really pushing the boat out here) a map showing the route taken by Spee's ships. OK, that is probably not possible, but a map showing all the islands mentioned here (and the dates the ships arrived at each island) would give an idea of the distances being covered here (I presume they spent most of their time at sea trying to avoid being spotted).
 * I addeed a map, there is a better one by Corbett that i saw once, but i cannot find it on the net. It was included in a seperate map case that came along with Naval Operations.XavierGreen (talk) 02:43, 12 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Do you know anything more about Destremeau and whether his actions were considered a success by his commanders? I did a bit of looking and found this account and this book (which you have listed in the 'further reading' section). That book, by a Michel Gasse, looks like something you will need to read to take the article further (which may be a problem if you need to work with French sources - maybe work with the editors of the article on the French Wikipedia?). As for Destremau, I think he wasn't praised that much at first, but got more recognition later, and a posthumous Legion of Honour. But that might be my French translation letting me down..
 * He is possibly worthy enough to have his own article though sourcing is difficult, apparently his brother recieved a legion of honor as well. I looked at the second site you cited previously but did not find much of note that was not included in the other sources i have read. As for the account by Destremeau's daughter, it seems a bit to biased towards the french in the language it uses (i read it with google translater) though i did find it useful. The legion of honor business is quite confusing, i read on some message boards (again in french) that he was awarded it in 1908 for a different event and others that it was awarded in 1915. As none of these sources would be reliable on wikipedia and none of the major english works mention the legion of honor at all I cant add it without further verification. The French version of this wikipage is of no help at all as it is simply a vebatum copy of an earlier version of the English Bombardment of Papeete page. As for the Gasse book, another editor placed that there origanally but did not use it to cite anything so i just threw it into the further reading section. Unfortunatly there is no english version and i do not read french :( XavierGreen (talk) 03:46, 9 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Is it possible to add a little bit of context for Destremau in this article, such as the fact that he died the following year? I've put some more details on the article talk page of some things I found about him and other aspects of this (stamps, street names, and a cannon from this engagement still there on display), though again, the sources may be problematic. The one by the French Polynesia History and Geography Association (about the history of the EFO - Établissements Français de l'Océanie - during WWI) might be reliable, though it could equally be a local history society of unknown reliability - I can't tell. What I'm worried about here is that there might be material in the French sources that contradicts the English sources. Someone really needs to assess that at some point. Carcharoth (talk) 08:51, 9 February 2010 (UTC)
 * I havent found anything in french that contradicts whats in english. The only element lacking in the english sources are the details specifically about destremau, but this is understandable as the man himself had relatively little impact on the scope of world history though he did have an impact on the history of french polynesia. After looking over several featured articles such as Battle_of_Lissa_(1811), it appears that information about the commanders themselves is not heavily prevelant in the text of the articles, though i agree that some further detail about commemoration of the battle is needed perhaps detailed information on Destremau would better be placed in its own article as von Spee's is?XavierGreen (talk) 18:04, 9 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Fair enough. You are right that the article should be about the battle, not the commanders, and if the English sources don't say whether the French considered the battle a success or not, there is not much you can do about that. I still think for an FA-level article, you would need to assess and use material from French sources, especially as they are more recent (the Gasse book was published last year), but I'll withdraw the objection about source-coverage as far as A-class goes. Carcharoth (talk) 01:56, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Whether or not you need to have looked at the Gasse book in order to meet A-class criteria, I don't know. I'll leave that up to others to decide. But references to the main French sources on this battle is certainly be something I'd expect in an FA-level article, and if there is extra stuff in the Gasse book, then this article might not be as comprehensive as it could be. Carcharoth (talk) 03:44, 8 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Just noting here that only my comments about links from other articles, a map, co-ordinates and more dates and timings of the departure and stops along the way before reaching Papeete, remain. If those were dealt with, I'd likely support. Spotted a few more things, but they are mostly minor and I'll add those to the talk page. Carcharoth (talk) 01:56, 10 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Following the latest changes (adding of co-ordinates and the map), I'm now supporting promotion to A-class (the stuff about the commemoration on Tahiti, which I raised on the talk page, is not so vital, and can be dealt with after this review, as far as I'm concerned). I did make a few changes to the article, including this recent edit and this one. I hope that is OK (I noticed recently that Good Article reviewers aren't meant to substantially edit the article under review, but not sure about A-class reviews). FWIW, the best description I found of the movements of the ships of Spee's squadron is here (the article on his flagship). Carcharoth (talk) 04:20, 12 February 2010 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive. 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.