Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Assessment/Little Rock campaign

No consensus to promote at this time - Vami IV (talk) via MilHistBot (talk) 00:20, 5 November 2022 (UTC) &laquo; Return to A-Class review list

Little Rock campaign
Instructions for nominators and reviewers
 * Nominator(s): 

Arkansas 1863. The Confederates are rather easily driven out of the Arkansas state capital in a campaign probably best known for the infamous duel between two Confederate generals. Hog Farm Talk 02:12, 9 August 2022 (UTC)

Harrias
An interesting read as always, I look forward to your responses. Harrias (he/him) • talk 21:04, 18 August 2022 (UTC)
 * Add a caption to the map in the background section.
 * Done
 * "..the Confederate firing on Ft. Sumter on April 12.." Rephrase to avoid a SEAOFBLUE. I'm also not keen on the phrase "firing on" as it is used here; the lead of that article seems more appropriate: "bombardment of".
 * Both points taken care of
 * "..threatened the state capitol of Little Rock. but running out of supplies.." Some more rephrasing needed here to tidy up the start of this sentence.
 * Done
 * "..Price order fortifications built.." Should be "ordered".
 * Done
 * "..and gave Brigadier General John S. Marmaduke's orders to monitor.." Either remove the possessive s, or tell us what Marmaduke had that was given orders.
 * Done the latter (cavalry)
 * "August 16 saw a minor skirmish between Davidson's men and Confederate cavalry.[20] Davidson sent out the 13th Illinois Cavalry Regiment on August 16, which routed.." Repetitive with the same date being mentioned twice. In fact, overall this article suffers from the date being mentioned too often. Try and replace more of them with relative phrases like "the next day" or "the day after" or "three days later".
 * I've taken a crack at replacing some of these
 * "..while Steele and the infantry moved to set up an operations hub at DeValls Bluff, which was hoped to be a healthier area. The movement for DeValls Bluff began the next day." It feels like this could all be one sentence, rather than having quite a short and fragmented sentence at the end.
 * Merged sentences
 * "..attempted to form a new line, but retreated from that one also." Not keen on the ending of this sentence; maybe something like ".., but were forced to retreat again."
 * Done
 * "..which strained relationships between him and Marmaduke even worse." Change to "..which further strained his relationship with Marmaduke."
 * Done
 * "Price began to doubt that Little Rock could be defended and had supplies transferred to Arkadelphia and began preparing.." Change to avoid repetition of "began".
 * Rephrased in a couple ways
 * "The August 27 fighting cost.." Personally, I think this would sound better as "The fighting on August 27 cost..", but it is probably just me.
 * Done
 * "Price had a little less than 8,000 men.." As this is countable, it should be "fewer than".
 * Done
 * "..in the Skirmish at Ashley's Mills." Change to "..in a skirmish at Ashley's Mills."
 * Done
 * "..made a fighting retreat 5 miles (8.0 km) back.." No need for that level of precision on the conversion; "8 km" is sufficient.
 * should be fixed
 * "..and the ensuing Battle of Bayou Meto was the heaviest.." Should this be Battle of Bayou Fourche?
 * Good catch; fixed
 * "..with historian Carl Moneyhon estimating.." Avoid the noun plus -ing construction.
 * Resolved
 * Question: is bayou wikilinked anywhere? It is used a lot, and I have no idea what it means.
 * I've added a link at the first spot where it's used not in a specific place name. (I suspect that bayou is a much more common word in AmEng than BrEng)
 * These are the specific issues I've found, but overall the prose is stilted and reads like a series of events strung together as bullet points, then converted into prose. To be completely honest, I think it would benefit from being heavily rewritten to tell a narrative, rather than a series of events. This is primarily achieved by showing how each event led onto or impacted the others, removing the detail, and just working on the big picture. Parts of the article do this quite well, but in other places, it doesn't really work for me at all I'm afraid.
 * The article would also benefit greatly from some maps showing the movements of the two armies and where significant actions took place, to give more context.
 * my computer is fubar'd at the moment so it'll be next week before I can do any substantial rewriting. Hog Farm Talk 23:32, 19 August 2022 (UTC)
 * No rush, just ping me when you're done. Harrias  (he/him) • talk 14:01, 20 August 2022 (UTC)
 * - I'm beginning to do the rewrite to try to get this a more unified flow. Before I make a pass through the whole article, is this an improvement?  I'm going to look to cut some of the more minor details, such as peripheral detail or place names that are largely meaningless to the overall events. Hog Farm Talk 03:21, 31 August 2022 (UTC)
 * Yes, definitely. Harrias  (he/him) • talk 16:56, 1 September 2022 (UTC)
 * - I'm through the first pass of working on the prose - significant changes made pretty much from the onset of the campaign to Bayou Meto, I thought that the Bayou Fourche coverage was less stilted. Still need to determine what to do with maps - I don't want to bother  who's largely retired but did a nice Price's Raid map awhile back.  It's beyond my ability to produce anything that's cartographic. Even the sources overall are lacking in maps - Huff has the maps that cover most of the campaign, although they're a bit rough.  DeBlack has a decent map of the moves from Ashley's Mills to the end.  If the maps are a deal-breaker, then withdrawal until I can get that situation worked out is probably best. Hog Farm Talk 22:52, 3 September 2022 (UTC)
 * I'm away from home most of this week and next with work, but I'll try and take a look when I can. Maps aren't a deal breaker, depending if my time frees up next month, I might be able to lend a hand myself, but I can't commit to anything. Harrias  (he/him) • talk 21:32, 5 September 2022 (UTC)
 * - - have you been able to get back to this?  It's okay if not. Hog Farm Talk 14:04, 18 October 2022 (UTC)

Support from Iazyges
Claiming my spot here, will take a look soon. Iazyges  Consermonor Opus meum 04:57, 20 August 2022 (UTC)
 * Reviewed article at GAN, happy to support it here. Iazyges   Consermonor   Opus meum  05:48, 26 August 2022 (UTC)

Comments by Pendright
Let me know when you have cmpleted your rewrite and I'll start my review. Pendright (talk) 23:06, 6 September 2022 (UTC)
 * - I've made the first pass of the rewrite. Just waiting on Harrias to have the spare time to look over the rewrite.  Any further help in polishing this up would be greatly appreciated. Hog Farm Talk 01:23, 7 September 2022 (UTC)
 * To jump-in now, before all the issues have been settled, woould disrespect Harris and his good fath efforts. So, ping me when Harris has compled his review. Pendright (talk) 22:35, 8 September 2022 (UTC)
 * Suggestion: Perhaps emailing Harris would be more effective. Pendright (talk) 22:30, 30 October 2022 (UTC)


 * At this point in time, with deference to Harris, I'd be free to start a reiew in a day or two - should you still want me to do so. I should say, however, that I agree wth Harris about "show don't tell" and the use of transistional words and phrases between sentences and paragraphs in the text. Ping me whether it's yes or no. Pendright (talk) 01:08, 4 November 2022 (UTC)
 * - I've gotten horribly busy in RL and will probably only sporadically active for most of the rest of November. I welcome any comments but can't promise to get to them in a timely manner. Hog Farm Talk 01:24, 4 November 2022

(UTC)
 * The place to begin,I believe, is with the Harris assessement of the article wherein he said the following:
 * "...but overall the prose is stilted and reads like a series of events strung together as bullet points, then converted into prose. To be completely honest, I think it would benefit from being heavily rewritten to tell a narrative, rather than a series of events. This is primarily achieved by showing how each event led onto or impacted the others, removing the detail, and just working on the big picture. Parts of the article do this quite well, but in other places, it doesn't really work for me at all I'm afraid."
 * I agree with the assessment but, more importatly, what
 * do you think about it? Pendright (talk) 21:33, 4 November 2022 (UTC)
 * It's probably true; my writing is generally lacking stylistically. (and it probably doesn't help that the sort of maps this needs is beyond my ability to create) I don't have the bandwidth to attempt a total rewrite at the moment and will be only marginally active for at least several weeks, so to avoid wasting everyone's time, this should probably be closed as failed/withdrawn . Hog Farm Talk 21:47, 4 November 2022 (UTC)

Image review - pass
All images are appropriately licenced, positioned and captioned. Alt text would be a nice addition. Gog the Mild (talk) 16:50, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

Comments Support by Indy beetle
I'll get around to this one. -Indy beetle (talk) 21:23, 20 October 2022 (UTC)
 * The Confederacy should be linked in the lede.
 * Linked
 * The end of the Vicksburg campaign freed up additional Union troops for operations in Arkansas The end of the Vicksburg campaign in Mississippi
 * Done
 * Price's only real chance of success would be if a Union force attacked his fortifications head-on This is conjecture, and if an expert opinion it should be attributed in text, or if this was the belief of Price it should be made explicit.
 * This was the belief of Price, clarified (IMO he was probably right)
 * Over what body of water/geographic feature did Reed's Bridge cross?
 * Clarified it was Bayou Meto
 * Did Grant or Lincoln not have any comment on the fall of Little Rock? Or Davis, for that matter? The fall of a Confederate state capital seems like it would have considerable political consequences that would have elicited national comment.
 * I haven't seen anything in sources specifically mentioning comments by Grant, Lincoln, or Davis. I've added that it provided a morale boost to Union forces.  The Confederate response was a bit more mixed, which I've tried to clarify a bit - there was some criticism, of course, but Price's superior backed the decision to withdraw.  Arkansas was already lost to Davis anyway after Vicksburg fell - it was so isolated and cut off from Richmond that Kirby Smith became what is probably the closest thing to a military dictator America has ever seen. Hog Farm Talk 04:11, 22 October 2022 (UTC)
 * although this figure is incomplete and the true number is higher. Do we know why this figure is incomplete? Does it only cover a certain day of the campaign, or was a record lost, or the men left behind in the city not counted? The nature of the inaccurate reporting would be nice to know, if possible.
 * Incomplete reporting. Added. Confederate losses in the war are often notoriously hard to piece together
 * Did Halleck explain why he didn't want the federal forces to press onward, the same reasons as listed before that? Mention Halleck's position would also be nice.
 * Kerby says the orders from Halleck were to just hold and secure the new position. I checked several other sources as well (Huff, Christ, Cutrer) and they don't include any details on the matter.

- All to date have been addressed. Hog Farm Talk 19:25, 23 October 2022 (UTC)
 * I've added a bit on a historic preservation tour. Otherwise, I think we're good here and I support promotion. -Indy beetle (talk) 20:01, 23 October 2022 (UTC)