Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/News/August 2023/Articles


 * Maurice Suckling (Pickersgill-Cunliffe) : A Royal Navy officer of the eighteenth century, Suckling fought in only one major battle and much of his career was, as one historian puts it, "uneventful and perhaps even lacklustre". For three years before his death in 1778 he served competently as Comptroller of the Navy, enough to make him notable. What draws the attention of naval historians regarding Suckling is less to do with him and more to do with his nephew, Horatio Nelson. Suckling was Nelson's first patron in the navy and his influence saw the young officer rise quickly through the ranks, such that after Suckling's premature death from illness Nelson remarked "I feel myself to my country his heir... And it shall, I am bold to say, never lack the want of his counsel".


 * British logistics in the Western Allied invasion of Germany (Hawkeye7) : This article concludes Hawkeye7's series on British logistics in the campaign in North West Europe in 1944-45, taking the story to the end of the war in Europe. To conserve scarce manpower, the British and Canadian forces employed mechanisation and materiel to maximum effect. This involved prodigious use of ammunition, fuel and equipment, which in turn demanded a first-class military logistics system.


 * Raymond III, Count of Tripoli (Borsoka) : The County of Tripoli was the last of the Crusader states, mainly occupying northern Lebanon. Having inherited Tripoli while still a minor, Raymond spent years captive in Aleppo before assuming the regency for the underage king of Jerusalem, Baldwin the Leper. His rivalry with Baldwin's sister Sybilla and her husband Guy of Lusignan almost led to civil war. Raymond allied himself with Saladin but joined the Crusader army when Saladin invaded the kingdom, and fled from the battlefield at Hattin in July 1187; many contemporaries blamed him for the Crusaders' defeat.


 * Southend-on-Sea War Memorial (HJ Mitchell) : The latest in Harry's series on war memorials, in particular those designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens, the original proposal called for a cenotaph but in the event an obelisk was employed. This is one of six obelisks Lutyens designed for war memorials in Britain and especially resembles those created for Northampton and for the North Eastern Railway. Rather than carving them on the memorial, the names of Southend's 1,338 dead are recorded on plaques fixed to the walls of Prittlewell Priory.The memorial was augmented by statue of a soldier in 2019.


 * Kyriakos Pittakis : In the words of nominator UndercoverClassicist, "Following my previous nomination of Panagiotis Kavvadias, this article is about another Ephor General of Greece. Where Kavvadias was a bureaucrat, professionaliser and master politician, Pittakis... wasn't. This story involves revolution, forgery, academic intrigue and at least two cases where Pittakis was almost killed by the ancient monuments he obsessively loved. [...] His early life in particular is obscure, thanks in part to his very ordinary origins, which put him into contrast (and sometimes conflict) with the well-to-do archaeologists that often surrounded him."


 * Fort Phantom Hill (Vami IV) : In the nomination statement Vami noted that "in a time and place with a lot of bad jobs and offices, Fort Phantom Hill was maybe the worst. Isolated, barren, and abundant in nothing but boredom, it was quickly abandoned, unfortunately setting a tone for Jones County, Texas. This is another National Register property, too, and a rather unique one, too. A dozen chimneys and tree stone buildings in the middle of nowhere, on a ghost hill."


 * Battle of Grand Gulf (Hog Farm) : This article covers an April 1863 battle fought during the American Civil War's Vicksburg campaign. As part of operations to bring Major-General Ulysses S. Grant's Army across the Mississippi seven US Navy ironclads attacked Confederate positions at Grand Gulf near Vicksburg. The attack was driven off, and Grant decided to cross the river elsewhere; he did so successfully the next day.