Talk:M1841 12-pounder howitzer

GA Review

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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This review is transcluded from Talk:M1841 12-pounder howitzer/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Hog Farm (talk · contribs) 00:01, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

I'll take a look at this one soon. I have a copy of the Ripley book listed in the further reading and will check to see if that has anything of note. Hog Farm _Talk 00:01, 30 March 2023 (UTC)

A detail that might be helpful to note here: in March 1863, the Confederate Army of Tennessee had 123 cannon, of which 40 were 12-pounder howitzers. The same page also provides the direct statement that The 6-pounder and 12-pounder howitzers, standard weapons of the western Confederate field artillery, were continually being out-matched by the more powerful long-range guns of the enemy. (Both facts are Daniel, p. 77) I think working in this statement would be useful to indicate that as the war went along, these pieces were becoming closer and closer to junk status. Daniel, p. 79 also notes that as of May 1, 1863, Rosecrans's army had only 27 6-pounders or 12-pounder howitzers combined out of 181 guns. Also from Daniel - p. 109: Bragg captured 6 12-pounder howitzers from Federal forces at Chickamagua. pp. 96-97 include a table that indicates that while not all Confederate battery armaments are known, that the Confederates had at least 31 12-pounder howitzers at Chickamagua. Per Daniel pp. 116-117, Bragg had 145 guns in his army, which included 28 12-pounder howitzers. Per Daniel p. 140, there were still 27 12-pounder howitzers in the Army of Tennessee in March 1864. Per pp.156-157, the Army of Tennessee had 36 12-pounder guns out of 187 guns. Per Daniel p. 179, Hood still had 12 12-pounder howitzers as of September 1864.

This is the same Daniel source cited at Barrett's Missouri Battery. The book is available via WP:TWL with Project MUSE, which is how I've accessed it in the past. I don't know that all of the above will be useful, but there's some potentially good information in there. I'll take a look and see if there's anything further in Ripley later today. Hog Farm _Talk 17:54, 1 April 2023 (UTC)

Ripley p. 45 - the trunnions were generally made to match those of the 6-pounders, which resulted in 3.67-inch diameter trunnions. Ripley says that the Confederate-made variant (which he calls the Model 1862) "differed materially" and says that Confederate official specs gave 64.4 inch overall length, 4.62 bore diameter, 3.67 inch trunnion diameter, and specified weight of 850 pounds (Ripley p. 46). Ripley p. 367 then goes on to say that the Confederate model had a bore length of 56.8 inches and was made of iron.

I think there needs to be some reference made to the related M1841 mountain howitzer.

Ripley p. 367 has some slightly different figures from Hazlett et al. - it has the 1,072 yard range at 5 degrees for shell as being 0.75 lb charge, instead of 1 for Hazlett. The same page also gives the weights for the models differently - the 1835 one (which Ripley calls the M1836) as 785 lb, the 1838 (Ripley's M1839) as an estimated 700 lb, and then the M1841 as 788 lb. Same page of Ripley also gives the range for case shot as 1,050 when fired at an elevation of 3 degrees 45 minutes with a 0.75 lb charge.

@Djmaschek: - I'll let you decide how much of the above you think warrants inclusion in the article. Once that gets sorted out, I'll take another look. Hog Farm _Talk 19:53, 1 April 2023 (UTC)

@Hog Farm: I have a copy of Ripley's book. I've found that the Hazlett book has more detail, since it only discusses field artillery while Ripley attempts to cover all CW artillery. Ripley does include a lot of data. The article is about the U.S. bronze M1841 12-lb. howitzer. The CSA had a number of originals in their arsenals, plus captures. The CSA also manufactured some copies and near-copies, which I mentioned. I did not want to get dragged into a fuller treatment of the CSA versions, since that is getting away from the main topic. I will see what I can work into the article. Djmaschek (talk) 02:11, 3 April 2023 (UTC)

@Hog Farm: Aside from very minor tweaks (capitalized Eastern Theater), I made the following edits. (1) Added a short paragraph about the mountain howitzer at the end of Background. (2) Added trunnion data to the 3rd line in the Spec table. (3) Added gun totals in Armies of Cumberland and Ohio in the last paragraph of History. Since I don't have access, I would rather not add the Daniel data. You are welcome to add it later. Djmaschek (talk) 03:34, 5 April 2023 (UTC)

I've added the Daniel information, although that'll mean I'll need to ask for a second opinion on the review since I've contributed a paragraph to the article (basically a disclaimer of opinion due to independence issues). Going back through

• As to the Ripley CSA stuff, I think a single sentence using Ripley indicating that the Confederate versions had some differences from the original model is sufficient for that

•  Done -Added Ripley material and citation near end of Background.

• " Eisenhower 1989, pp. 185–191." - want to double-check to make sure the pagination isn't different in the copy you used, but in my (reprint edition) copy of Eisenhower, some of the information cited to this is actually on p. 183 as well

•  Done -Good catch. Changed to pp=183-191.

• "and the weapons were organized in mixed batteries." - I think this should be qualified as most batteries were mixed. Shea & Hess list on the Confederate side as Hart's Arkansas Battery, Clark's Missouri Battery, the Jackson Missouri Battery (aka Lucas's Battery), and Gorham's Missouri State Guard Battery as all having the same armament, so I don't think this conclusion can be as strongly drawn for the Confederate batteries.

•  Done -Added: "and most of the weapons were organized in mixed batteries". By my count there were 4 Confederate batteries with the same guns and 11 with mixed guns.

• "Morgan, James (2002). "Green Ones and Black Ones: The Most Common Field Pieces of the Civil War". civilwarhome.com." - are we sure this is a reliable source? Busey & Martin, Regimental Strengths and Losses at Gettysburg, p. 120 would probably be a better citation for this (long citation for the edition & pagination of the copy I have at 6th Louisiana Infantry Regiment (Confederate)).

•  Done -Removed Morgan citation and replaced with Cole, p. 86.

I think that's all from me. In accordance with the new GA reviewing requirement to spot-check sources, I checked the Eisenhower and Shea & Hess citations. Hog Farm _Talk 23:04, 9 April 2023 (UTC)

@Hog Farm: Please see the four corrections listed above. Djmaschek (talk) 21:19, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

The changes look good to me; I've posted at WT:GAN to get a second reviewer since I'm not longer independent enough to close the review myself. 23:04, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

Buidhe

The paragraph and source added by Hog Farm look just fine to me. However, there are some points on the lead that seem unnecessarily contradictory/confusing:

1. employed from the Mexican–American War to the American Civil War vs the weapon was not officially discarded by the U.S. Army until 1868

    Done -Changed to "employed during the Mexican–American War and the American Civil War." This should not contradict discarded in 1868.

2. The Confederate armies used the outmoded howitzer for a longer period. can't also be true since the Confederacy did not exist in 1868.

    Done -Removed as not really focused on the main subject (Model 1841 version): "The Confederate armies used the outmoded howitzer for a longer period."

3. The service dates are unsourced. Yes, it's called a 1841 model but it never says directly in the text that this was when the howitzer started to be used, unless I'm missing something.

    Done -Added sentence: "Ames and Alger each delivered their first 6 Model 1841 howitzers in October and November 1841."

4. I'm not sure what sources are supporting this other content I've flagged above. For example, you might get the impression of #2 from the last paragraphs of the article but I would consider it original research unless sources are making this direct comparison.

    Resolved -Removed vague sentence. See #2 above.

5. I'm not sure that the table "Civil War artillery" belongs in the article. To me, this is content that is not directly related to the article subject and would better be moved to the linked article Field artillery in the American Civil War.

    Disagree Several articles that I've written on Civil War field artillery have this table. Two have already been approved for GA class: M1857 12-pounder Napoleon and 3-inch Ordnance rifle. The others are 10-pounder Parrott rifle, 20-pounder Parrott rifle, M1841 6-pounder field gun, 14-pounder James rifle, and M1841 24-pounder howitzer. I understand that the Wikipedia standard is to avoid repetition, but I think the table is an immediately useful way to compare the different weapons.

I think that the article would benefit from revising the lead and infobox to more closely follow the sourced content in the article. (t · c) buidhe 23:47, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

1. @Buidhe: Not sure About your comment, "revising the lead and infobox to more closely follow the sourced content", if there is unsourced data in the introduction and infobox, please point it out. Thanks. Djmaschek (talk) 02:59, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

   Well, I wouldn't fail the GA over the table.

   Like AirshipJungleman29 I think Hog Farm can pass the review since both of us checked the part that Hog Farm contributed to. (t · c) buidhe 05:56, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

Per above, I'm going to go ahead and pass the review. Hog Farm _Talk 17:46, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.