Talk:Henry Nock/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: Mike Christie (talk · contribs) 03:43, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

An interesting article. I have a few questions and comments; overall my only real concern is criterion 3, broadness/comprehensiveness. The article is neutral, stable, well-written, complies with the manual of style and has a suitable image.

• The link to the Wainwright article doesn't work for me. A bit of Googling found some alternative sources such as this; perhaps we could change the link? I'm not sure if the Wayback Machine will archive PDFs, but if it does that would be worth doing if the asoac.org site isn't going to keep it online.
  • The asoac site seems to be undergoing some reorganisation, but their stated aim is to place the bulletins online, and many of them already are. I have changed the link to the asoac index page in the expectation that they will do what they say and the document will return to being online. When that happens, readers will be able to find it through the index page. I have also added your link as an alternate, but I think we should leave the asoac link in place, even though it currently does not lead to the article online, since they are the source of the information. Nowadays I usually automatically archive all online sources at WebCite but either I was remiss here or it predates my current practice. Webcite will definitely archive pdfs, I think Wayback Machine will too, but I'm not sure. However, both sites are currently refusing to archive the Readbag pdf page, apparently because the site is preventing them from doing so by refusing a licence. The Wayback Machine has an archive of the page, but minus the pdf. The garbled machine reading of the pdf is there, but without the images and lots of unresolved markup. I don't see much benefit in adding that—it can always be retrieved again if everything else goes dead. SpinningSpark 17:32, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

    OK; that looks fine to me. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 22:18, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

• The article seems a bit short to me. Just from the Wainwright article there seems to be a fair amount of interesting material that could be added. For example, the mention that one of his guns remains in the Queen's collection; the fact that he worked on locks when demand for guns went down after the American Revolution, and that for the same reason he turned to sporting guns instead of military guns; the references to Bolton's design, which apparently was superior but which Bolton was too aristocratic to promote; Nock's appointment as gunmaker to the king (you don't specifically mention it in the body--you just allude to it in passing). His appointment as a master gunmaker was apparently a significant event, validating his work, but this is not apparent from the plain mention in the article. The codicil to his will is a lovely human touch and is surely worth mentioning.
  • The Royal set of guns was already mentioned, but I've expanded on that and added a ref to the Royal Collection which has a bit more information. Added more on activities between the American War and the Napoleonic Wars. I've declined to say anything about Bolton. This article is about Nock, not Bolton, and Bolton's activities had no effect on Nock as far as I am aware. That would belong in an article on gun locks (lock (firearm) is currently in a very sad state considering its historical and technological importance) but it does not belong here. I'm missing where Wainwright says he became gunmaker to the king. Are you sure you are not confusing that with Wilkinson? His appointment as master gunmaker is indeed a big deal, but I don't see how more can be made of it without running afoul of WP:WTW, WP:EDITORIALIZING, WP:POV or numerous other guidelines. Besides, this is the regular career path for a craftsman in any trade in that period to get to the top of their profession. It would be a bit like making a big deal of a PhD in an article on an academic. Not sure about the will. Leaving money to employees and retainers was surely not unusual in this period. It is especially unsurprising that Wilkinson was in the will as he is Nock's son-in-law. SpinningSpark 18:52, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

I've now put the will bit in. SpinningSpark 19:03, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

On him being made gunmaker to the king, it was in the lead but uncited and not in the body. The history shows that I wrote that, but I've now no idea where I got the information from (apparently not Wainwright). Found a couple of sources to confirm it (snippet only unfortunately) and put a bit more meat in the article. SpinningSpark 20:34, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

I don't know where I got that, but it's certainly serendipity that it's correct. Your other additions look good. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 22:18, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

• I'm also not convinced that the article has the right structure. It jumps right into his gun-making and leaves his career to last, so that we only find out who he is and his background after we hear about his guns. Wouldn't it make more sense for a reader unfamiliar with the topic to get a sentence or two of context and a paragraph about Nock himself before we go on to his achievements?
  • Nock is known as a gunmaker and I came at this article from that perspective so naturally put the gunmaking first. If you just mean you want the career section in front of the guns section then I'm cool with that. If you mean you want a summary to go first, surely that's what the lead is for? SpinningSpark 20:34, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

    I think I see more cases where the lead is an overview of the whole article, with the body essentially restarting the story, than I do cases where the lead is treated as an introduction. WP:LEAD says it should be both, so I'm OK with leaving it the way you have it. My preference is to make the body coherent without the lead, but since that's just my preference we can skip this. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 22:18, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

• Given that we're talking about comprehensiveness, do you happen to know if there's any additional material available in the works cited by the articles used? For example, Wainwright cites Neal and Black's Great British Gunmakers 1740–1790; I can't see any contents on Google Books so perhaps there's nothing useful there, but it sounds like it might be useful. (This is not really a GA review question, of course; I can't very well make a case that you should have checked a book I know nothing about.)
• Pardon my ignorance of the topic, but what does "pattern 1796" mean?
  • It's just the name of the design. The form "pattern xxxx" is military jargon where xxxx is the date of introduction. Compare, for instance, Pattern 1914 Enfield. Sadly, we don't have a pattern 1796 pistol article to link to, although we do have two articles on pattern 1796 sabres. Making weapons to a pattern came in around the time of the Napoleonic wars when mass production and standardisation first started to become issues. The craftsman might be supplied with an actual physical pattern to work to. There was particularly a standardisation problem with guns. Gun locks required a master craftman to make, but the other parts might be ordered from other (cheaper) workers. Also, in wartime it might be necessary to split the order between several craftsmen. It was essential that all these parts were interchangeable, hence the need to make to patterns. This is yet more stuff the lock article should be telling us, but doesn't. SpinningSpark 20:57, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

    That helps a lot; thanks. Is there a possible target for "pattern" to link to? Even a redlink would be good. I'll let this go if you don't think there's a good target, but for readers like me even the redlink would tell me it's a technical term. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 22:44, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

    I'm not even sure that there could ever be an article on this. That would require it to have firm definition or specified usage. I don't think it does. It's just one of those contorted military forms of speech like "beans, for the eating of". The best we can do, I think, is redlink the pistol article. That's the thing that should have an article. There certainly seems to be enough of them around. SpinningSpark 00:39, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

-- I'll place the article on hold; I think the above points are easily fixable. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 03:43, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for reviewing, I'll work on your suggestions. You seem to be assuming that I'm some kind of expert. I'm not. I created this article after reading about the volley gun (I had just watched The Alamo and was trying to answer the question did Jim Bowie really use a volley gun in the battle—apparently the answer is no, like much of the detail of the film it was made up by the filmakers, despite the much vaunted claims of historical accuracy by Wayne). It was just a case of thinking that this guy really ought to have an article. SpinningSpark 09:55, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

Yes, I did assume you were an expert, but other than the question about Neal and Black's book I don't think the questions require expertise to fix. One thing I should mention is that I review a lot more at FAC than at GAN so my reflex is to set the bar quite high on comprehensiveness; if you feel I'm asking for more than GAN requires, please say so. The GAN "broadness" requirement has this comment: "This requirement is significantly weaker than the "comprehensiveness" required of featured articles; it allows shorter articles, articles that do not cover every major fact or detail, and overviews of large topics." I do think a bit more could be added, but if you feel it's already broad enough I'll look through again and see if I think anything really important is omitted. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 10:40, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

I'm not going to wikilawyer over whether or not your comments are precisely within the GA criteria, within reason. Anything that can easily improve the article, I'll get it done. On the Neal and Black book, the only book of that title I can find on WorldCat[1] or through my local library search is subtitled "the history of John Twigg and the Packington guns". That does not sound too promising. Possibly this book was just one of a series, but I can't find any other examples. There is a copy in a reference library reasonably close to me, but at the moment it does not sound like it is going to be worth the trip. I suspect all we will get, if anything, is a passing mention and that any useful information has already been extracted by Wainwright in any case. SpinningSpark 11:18, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

Agreed; I've struck that point. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 11:52, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

Apart from the request above to link "pattern" if possible, everything is deal with. I did see two minor new issues, one of which was introduced by the recent edits. One is that there are now two sources called Hayward; only one appears to be used, but I can't tell which one, and why the other is listed. Second, you say "In 1802 Nock became a Master of the Gunmakers Company"; as far as I can tell from this page there is only one master at a time: "The Company is governed by a Master and Court of Assistants". I think it should be "In 1802 Nock became the Master", not "a Master". Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 22:18, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

The doubled Hayward's is a typing error, now fixed. I think you are right about Nock's mastership. There seems to be two different uses of "Master" here. Wainright refers to Jover as "a Master" which seems to mean "master craftsman" in that case but Nock's Master title is Grand Wizard of the Secret Society (or words to that effect). I was probably misled by the Jover passage coming first. SpinningSpark 00:39, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

Everything looks good. I've passed this; thanks for an interesting read. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 03:18, 24 December 2014 (UTC)