Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Assessment/French battleship France

Article promoted by TomStar81 (talk) via MilHistBot (talk) 11:20, 4 July 2019 (UTC) &laquo; Return to A-Class review list

French battleship France
Instructions for nominators and reviewers
 * Nominator(s): 

France was completed shortly before the beginning of World War I and ferried the President of France to Saint Petersburg for consultations with the Tsar during the July Crisis of 1914. She had a typical war for a French dreadnought, spending most of it swinging at her moorings in case the Austro-Hungarian fleet attempted to break out of the Adriatic. The ship was sent to the Black Sea in 1919 to support Allied intervention in the Russian Civil War, but her crew was tired of the fighting and mutinied. They succeeded in their goal of getting the French ships withdrawn, although most of the ringleaders were later court-martialed. France struck a rock in 1922 and quickly sank with minimal loss of life. I've reworked this article extensive based on the comments received during the reviews for her sisters Courbet and Jean Bart, so I expect that only small errors will need to be fixed. In case I'm overly optimistic, I'm looking for any stray usage of AmEnglish and infelicitous prose before sending this to FAC.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 03:03, 13 June 2019 (UTC)

Comments Support by PM
This article is in great shape. Just a few minor things: That's all I have. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 01:28, 14 June 2019 (UTC)
 * suggest "France was the last ship of the four Courbet-class battleships"
 * the secondary battery conversion doesn't match between the infobox and body
 * the TT conversion doesn't match between the infobox and body
 * suggest "She was formally declared completed on 1 July 1914, although she did not enter service until 10 October, to carry President Raymond Poincaré, on a state visit to Saint Petersburg, Russia. He boarded the ship on 16 July" and include the date she entered service when it comes up in the narrative
 * All done. Thanks for the prompt review.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 13:39, 16 June 2019 (UTC)

Image review


 * File:France_in_Toulon-Agence_Rol-1.jpeg: when/where was this first published? Nikkimaria (talk) 13:28, 15 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Unknown, but being a press agency photo most likely in France between 1914 and the ship's loss in 1922.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 13:39, 16 June 2019 (UTC)


 * K. As per the tag, suggest adding to the image description "reasonable evidence" of anonymity. Nikkimaria (talk) 15:38, 16 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Sounds good.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 17:16, 16 June 2019 (UTC)

Support Comments from Parsecboy
Parsecboy (talk) 18:51, 21 June 2019 (UTC)
 * "They made a port visit" - this is a little vague - it could be read to refer to the German ships
 * "France declared war on Germany on 2 August..." - Germany declared war on France on 3 August
 * "The battleship entered service..." - which battleship? We just mentioned 4 of them
 * Link Cephalonia
 * "Vice-Admiral Dartige du Fornet" - don't need to repeat his rank
 * Piping "socialist and revolutionary sympathisers" to Left-wing politics is a little WP:EGGy to me - if you want to keep the link, you might consider moving it down to the "parties of the left" bit
 * "...bargain between Prime Minister Raymond Poincaré..." - you can drop his first name, and you might consider something like "between now-Prime Minister" to emphasize the fact it's the same guy
 * I suspect France was entering Quiberon Bay, not the island :P
 * All done. See if my changes work for you.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 21:09, 24 June 2019 (UTC)
 * G'day, just getting all the ducks in a row here. Are you happy with Sturm's responses? Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 07:56, 30 June 2019 (UTC)
 * Yes, I'm happy now. Parsecboy (talk) 16:14, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

Comments Support by CPA-5

 * Mutinied is overlinked.
 * The ship was laid down on 30 November 1911 Remove 1911.
 * and the ships arrived at Dunkerque on 29 July. and they were in Brest at 4 August? So I assume after they arrived at Dunkerque they'd go off the next day on 30 July or on 31 July and arrived on 2 August in Brest, right?
 * Presumably, but not specifically stated in the source.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 15:05, 1 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Link kW and shp in the infobox.
 * on Austria-Hungary by Italy on 23 May 1915 and the Italian decision Remove 1915.
 * Shouldn't the Postwar have a hyphen in the "Postwar activities" section?
 * I usually see it written as a single word, it may be a BritEng thing, but I'll have to wait for a native speaker to tell me so.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 15:05, 1 July 2019 (UTC)
 * I'll ping some Britons here Gog and Tim, to be sure or "post-war" officially British is or not. Some dictionaries like Lexico (powered by Oxford) and Collins says it is British but Cambridge Dictionary says "postwar". Cheers. CPA-5 (talk) 17:52, 1 July 2019 (UTC)
 * In BrE "post-war" is usual (OED and Chambers), but I don't think most native English speakers would find "postwar" barbaric.  Tim riley  talk   18:13, 1 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks, Tim.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 18:22, 1 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks Tim for your involvement in this nomination. Cheers. CPA-5 (talk) 18:25, 1 July 2019 (UTC)


 * the 2nd Battle Division, with Rear-Admiral (Contre-amiral) Louis-Hippolyte Violette commanding Was rear-admiral with an hyphen an official term at the time?
 * You sure Sturm? I mean the British Rear admiral article does use rear admiral, it's possible that this is a typo by a user years ago. Cheers. CPA-5 (talk) 17:36, 1 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Hmm, that maybe a post-1945 change, but note that all the links for various types of rear admirals there use hyphens. And I do know that it's usually written with a hyphen in my British-published books covering things before 1945.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 17:44, 1 July 2019 (UTC)
 * That's the British usage; Americans don't use the hyphen for the admiral ranks--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 15:05, 1 July 2019 (UTC)
 * The Oxford English Dictionary has the phrase as two unhyphenated words, but in the ten examples that it prints of the use of the phrase between 1589 and 2005 it's half and half between "rear admiral" and "rear-admiral". Just to muddy the waters further, the OED hyphenates "vice-admiral". Hope this satisfactorily confuses the matter all round.  Tim riley  talk   18:08, 1 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Heh.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 18:22, 1 July 2019 (UTC)


 * a 5° list by 02:00 and the order was given Only one order? If not then it should be "the orders were given"?

That's anything from me. Cheers. CPA-5 (talk) 14:21, 1 July 2019 (UTC)
 * The captain gave the order, and it was undoubtedly passed down by his subordinates. So only one order.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 15:05, 1 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks for looking this over. I think that I've fixed everything. See if you agree.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 15:05, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

Source review
 * The book of Gardiner, Robert & Gray, Randal has a little typo in its title. Normally it should have 1906–1921 instead of 1906–1922 in its title.
 * Crap, that fix is probably going to be needed all over the place.
 * You sure that Seaforth Publishing published the book of Jordan, John & Caresse, Philippe? Because Google Books claims that Naval Institute Press the original publishers is.
 * The book states original publication by Seaforth, but the NIP and Seaforth have a cooperative publishing arrangement so things can get confused. My copy is from NIP, so that will be another one that needs lots of fixes, I expect.
 * The book of Whitley, M. J.'s title is "Battleships of World War Two: An International Encyclopedia" not "Battleships of World War II".
 * All citations are properly formatted and the references are from highly-reliable sources. Cheers. CPA-5 (talk) 19:48, 1 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Unexcitedly looking forward to fixing these little problems across many, many articles.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 20:40, 1 July 2019 (UTC)
 * I am sorry to hear that, but, it looks great and good luck. Cheers. CPA-5 (talk) 21:14, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

Support from Tim riley
I don't usually comment on military or naval articles (I don't hold the Queen's Award for Cowardice for nothing) but having popped in to pontificate about BrE I have reviewed the whole article. The prose seems to me irreproachable, the sequence of events is narrated clearly, with enough but not too much detail. The range of references is not extensive, but seems broad enough and all important points are referenced. The article seems to me to meet all the FA criteria and I see no reason not to support.  Tim riley  talk   19:03, 1 July 2019 (UTC)
 * Thanks, Tim.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 19:29, 1 July 2019 (UTC)