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Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Battle of Öland/archive1

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The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted by Ian Rose 01:51, 8 August 2014 [1].


Battle of Öland edit

Nominator(s): Peter Isotalo 05:33, 7 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Hot on the trail of Kronan (ship) (TFA 23 June) comes the battle it sank in. This article shares content with the article on Kronan, but it has more details on the aftermath as well as the Danish and Dutch perspectives. It's a relatively minor battle and far less notable than Køge Bay later in the Scanian War. But it was significant for since it paved the way for the Danish invasion of Scania and the resulting Dano-Swedish slug match, including the battle of Lund, the bloodiest battle ever fought in Scandinavia.

It's currently a GA and recently became an A-class WP:MILHIST article. I've had some very nice help from both processes and I think it's up to par to become an FA. I'm looking forward to a thorough review.

Peter Isotalo 05:33, 7 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Comments and support from the Princess of Science edit

@Peter Isotalo: Hello there! I'm Parcly Taxel and you're hereby invited to comment on fluorine's FAC. I am part of the WikiProject on chemical elements.

For the length, media, lead, structure, citations, stability and neutrality (points 1B, 1D, 1E, 2, 3 and 4 of the FA criteria) they're all fine – this is a well-documented historical event from a long time ago, and it even comes with paintings! As well as that, the overall structure is all chronological and neat, delving into details here and there to reinforce the points made, but not too much so as to diverge from the central topic. The prose and grammar (1A) are impeccable. I couldn't "stop" reading the article, there were no bumps, I just kept going like I was hypnotised (except for the list, which is clearly allowed by the MOS anyway). Finally (1C), how many dubious sources can I count? Zero. It's short, sweet, consistent and wrapped in a package of cuteness and terseness. What do you get, Peter, for doing all this work? A pony and a support. Parcly Taxel 06:13, 7 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you very much for the support. I should add that I've had help-a-plenty with fine-tuning the prose, so kudos to everyone who has contributed.
And yay for ponies!
Peter Isotalo 09:58, 7 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Comments

In general, a comprehensive and well-referenced article that meets the FAC as far as I can tell. However, there are some minor details that I would like to address:

  • As the date of the battle is according to the Julian calender, I would suggest to add the Georgian date as well (since at least one participant used it at the time)
  • Also Charles CI should be linked in the lede.
  • In the chapter Background, I am not sure whether wages is the appropriate term for soldiers' pay - if that is what is referred to.
  • Since the Sound Toll was a Danish institution, I am not convinced that the English fleet was sent to "keep it out of Danish control". The English wanted it gone, at least at the time.
  • "the war revealed" - I assume it refers to the Danish-Swedish war of 1657-8, not the Scanian War mentioned earlier.
  • The Holy Roman Empire is suddenly involved. Maybe a sentence or two might be added how that came to be. And this might include a mention of the Franco-Dutch war going on at the time.
  • In the chapter "Prelude" the Danish fleet is mentioned sailing from Gotland (Visby), which was last mentioned being ceded to Sweden by Denmark. It seems they somehow got it back.
  • The two Swedish vessels mentioned in the first paragraph were actually taken by Brandenburg/Prussian warships. They were however not involved in either battle, but it might be worth mentioning.
  • In the chapter "Forces" the numbers of guns differ from the ones given in "Battle of Møn", although the sources remain the same (eg Churprindsen had 68 at Öland and 74 at Møn). Incidentally, Zettersten was published in 1903 according to the bibliography, and in 1997 according to the reference. Which is it?

ÄDA - DÄP VA (talk) 15:24, 7 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I've been a tad busy with switching jobs, but I'll get cracking on updates later today. I'll address two issues right now:
  • First sentence of "Prelude" mentions the Danes capturing Gotland. Could it be made clearer?
  • The battle of Møn was a year later. Ships might have been up-gunned. Or it might be a completely different ship. Either way, that's what the sources say. I Fixed Zettersten, though.
Peter Isotalo 06:13, 11 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
@ÄDA - DÄP:, I specified[2] who captured what at Bornholm (it wasn't just the Prussians). I forgot to point out that I added info on the motivations of Emperor Leopold I.
Peter Isotalo 13:52, 19 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Comment: I copyedited the article per my copyediting disclaimer. These are my edits. - Dank (push to talk) 16:50, 7 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Comments
  • The background section covers the Scanian war in two different parts; one directly under the background section, and later under the title Scanian war, with an interlude about the state of the navies in between. This should be rearranged to be clearer.
  • The entire background is also very much written from a Swedish perspective. It would be good to expand it to cover the Danish and Dutch situation as well. In particular, it would be worth noting how the Dutch (and English) had a long standing strategy of trying to balance Sweden and Denmark against each other (but more importantly to try to control France!), which had started much earlier and would continue through the Great Northern War.
  • The aftermath section could also mention the naval reforms that were made in Sweden after the war.

Andejons (talk) 19:40, 8 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]

The awkward order of sections in the background is fixed.
I'm looking for suitable sources regarding the Danish foreign policy situation, but Dutch and English foreign policies seem off-topic to me. The Dutch were auxilliaries of Denmark and the English never even fought. Besides, there's already content about the reasons for Dutch and English involvement. In an FAC of Scanian War it would be quite appropriate with a brief summary, but this is a single battle of that war which in itself part of the Franco-Dutch War.
I added some information about the founding of Karlskrona, but as with the foreign policy, is this really relevant in this article? It would be either the Scanian War article or Køge Bay, not Öland.
Peter Isotalo 08:49, 15 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I seem to have missed this reply. The first point is OK now, and the second has been addressed below; I'm satisfied with the background; England was mostly an aside that I thought could be easily included together with the Netherlands since they had similar aims and policies.
The naval reforms were not only the new naval base, but also the new allotment system. I agree that there is no need to cover this in any depth: a sentence or two should be enough.
Andejons (talk) 07:08, 23 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Comments edit

It's a lovely article. I will probably support once User:Andejons's points are answered. Good work! --John (talk) 23:11, 8 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]

  • Support, it's looking great. --John (talk) 12:55, 31 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • But how the hell did this get in there? --John (talk) 15:48, 31 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    • I believe mere mortals call them "typos". :-) Thanks for spotting it. Peter Isotalo 16:47, 31 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
      • The greengrocer's apostrophe is the typo of typos. Can you tell us about this, please? --John (talk) 18:32, 31 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
        • Nah, I'll just save us the effort and self-revert. Peter Isotalo 11:14, 1 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Comments from Jakec edit

Mostly a decent article, but a few things need fixing before I can support (most are minor).

  • In the lead, "Just as the battle began, the Swedish flagship Kronan sank with the loss of almost its entire crew, including the Admiral of the Realm and commander of the Swedish navy, Lorentz Creutz" makes it sound like the loss of the entire crew sank, not that the entire crew sank. Suggest "Just as the battle began, the Swedish flagship Kronan sank, killing almost all of its crew, including the Admiral of the Realm and commander of the Swedish navy, Lorentz Creutz"
  • Is there any information on how many combatants there were on the Dutch side?
  • Not really sure what the sentence "By early 1672 Swedish relations with France had improved and an alliance with the most powerful state in Europe was joined" means.
  • "After about an hour-and-a-half to two hours of hard fighting Svärdet's mainmast went overboard and Uggla had to strike his colors (surrender) to Tromp". Just saying surrender would be fine.
  • "Despite the astounding success, several allied officers were displeased with the conduct of their forces." Is there a source for the claim "astounding"?
  • Finally, one comment on the structure/balance of the article. It seems that there's a lot of background and I can't see how most of it ties in with the main event. The battle section has the opposite problem: comparatively little information. It's my opinion that the event section of an article on an event should generally be the largest section, while the background and aftermath sections should be smaller or at least approximately the same size.

--Jakob (talk) 19:24, 10 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Good points regarding prose. There aren't really that much more to add about the battle, though. I generelly agree about the balance of content, but it will always depend on the event. There are no simply no blow-by-blow accounts of this particular battle. The info about the proceedings of the commission also ties in to the explanation of the battle.
I haven't seen any estimates of Dutch or Danish number of men, but I'll double-check my refs.
Peter Isotalo 06:13, 11 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I think this[3] should address your other concerns.
Figures for the manpower of the allies fleet seems to be very elusive. It doesn't seem to be specified even in Barfod (1997).
Peter Isotalo 12:38, 12 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
@Peter Isotalo: Sorry it took this long to get back. It kept slipping my mind to reply. The prose is good now, and I'm fine with the shortness of the battle section and the lack of info on the number of men since there aren't sources to support extra info. I still think the background section is too long for the rest of the article. Even shortening it by about 30% would be a great improvement. BTW I have an open FAC if you're interested: Wikipedia:Featured_article_candidates/Fishing Creek (North Branch Susquehanna River)/archive4. --Jakob (talk) 13:13, 15 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Here are two other battle FAs with similar or more extensive backgrounds: battle for Henderson Field and battle of the Bismarck Sea. They have more info on the action itself, but that's because they're blessed with highly detailed, modern sources. The relative importance of those battles is comparable to this one. And andejons is asking for more background above. I could very well be wrong, but both of you obviously can't be right at the same time. So how do we solve this?
Peter Isotalo 18:25, 15 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I'll defer to andejons since I am not familiar with this type of article. Support. --Jakob (talk) 12:31, 22 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I actually wouldn't mind if some of the material was cut, but it should be rewritten to cover at least Denmark and Sweden on more equal terms; if the policies of Sweden leading up to the war is covered, the same should be true for Denmark. I think the background would gain from a rewrite; it comes from an article dealing more with Swedish matters and it shows. I think the second paragraph, and the sentences leading into it, could be cut completely without the article suffering. The second Dano-Swedish is mostly interesting in this context for what it reveals about Dutch policies, but it is not as necessary to know the details of it as the fact that Sweden had grown at the expense of Denmark and that the Danes were looking for a chance to take back what had been lost.
Andejons (talk) 21:15, 22 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I found Dyrvik (1998) today. How's this?
Peter Isotalo 22:47, 22 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I think that's much better balanced. There are a couple of things that could still be cut, but it does a much better job of explaining why there was a war and why the Dutch were allied with the Danes.
Andejons (talk) 06:56, 23 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Excellent. Do you feel there's need for further cuts for FA status?
Peter Isotalo 07:49, 23 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
No, there is a sentence or two that I believe could be cut if you want to shorten it further, but it seems rather more well-balanced now. I did find another thing, though. In the battle section, the text seems to contradict itself "Several Swedish ships attempted to assist Uggla, but they were in a lee position and could not provide effective support [...] Only Hieronymus, Neptunus and Järnvågen, an armed merchantman, had tried to support Uggla."
Andejons (talk) 19:16, 23 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Should be clarified now.[4]
Peter Isotalo 15:55, 24 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Image review

  • Map and sailing order could both be larger
  • File:Ortus-imperii-suecorum.png (map source): were any pre-existing images used to create this one? Where did this map get its data from?
  • File:Svenska_flottans_seglingsordning_1675.jpg: possible to translate the image description? Nikkimaria (talk) 12:30, 11 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • I pretty much always go for default size, so I don't have a sense of what's appropriate. Would you mind doing the size tweaks to what you feel is better?
  • I don't know exactly what this is based on, but it matches the sources I've added. As pointed out in the FAC of Kronan, it's a very standard map of the territorial expansion of Sweden during it's time as a Great Power.
  • Added image stranslation.[5]
Peter Isotalo 12:38, 12 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Status?

I don't have any further comments. Don't know enough about FA process to really comment on that. Andejons (talk) 07:59, 3 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Sources review I can only do a very superficial review, as the sources all seem to be books in Swedish (presumably) about which I can offer no opinion. I will take on trust that they are of appropriate quality and reliability. Likewise, no spot-checks are possible. A few minor points:

  • The languages of all non-English sources should be indicated.
  • Footnotes that are merely comments, e.g. 1, 2, 43, should be listed separately from citations. For example, n.2 could be listed as an external link
  • Check page range format consistency, e.g. n.32
  • Check your "p." and "pp." usage
  • n.7: inconsistent format – why not include the page ref?

That's all I can do. Brianboulton (talk) 18:59, 3 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Thank your for the review. Concerns should be fixed with this edit. I have some retorts, though:
  • WP:CITEVAR applies to separation of commentary notes as far as I know. My preference has always been just one set of notes.
  • I don't think it is best practice to mix general, uncited observations with actual citations to sources, but I'll leave that to you. Incidentally, in the case of note 43, this information should be cited.
  • Fixed 43 and the other stuff.[6] I stand by my preference for simplicity (and a healthy dose of typographical conservatism). :-) If it works and is widely used outside of Wikipedia, I prefer to use it here as well. Peter Isotalo 01:21, 7 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Page ranges as those in note 32 are intentional. Is it an issue?
  • Sorry, I meant 14, not 32. In 14 you have 118–19, which is the inconsistency.Brianboulton (talk) 00:11, 7 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Note 7 (Glete 2005) is two pages long. There's nothing to specify.
Peter Isotalo 21:16, 3 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Comments

  • This is a first rate article which I supported at A-Class. A couple of additional comments.
  • "This emboldened Sweden's enemies, and by September 1675, Denmark, the Dutch Republic, the Holy Roman Empire and Spain were all joined in war against Sweden as an ally of France." I had to read this twice to work out who was an ally of who. I think "Sweden and France" would be clearer.
  • "putting themselves on the allied fleet's lee side and gaining the tactical advantage of holding the weather gage." I thought the fleet on the windward side had the weather gage, not the one on the lee side.

Dudley Miles (talk) 11:55, 4 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]

  • Support. It does not solve the problem that it took me a second to work out which side France was an ally of but it is no big deal. Dudley Miles (talk) 13:08, 4 August 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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