Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Assessment/Miles Dempsey
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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Miles Dempsey[edit]
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After Harry Crerar comes Monty's other army commander: Miles Dempsey.* Dempsey is "a shadowy figure and a general almost completely unknown to the general public". I overhauled the article in 2021. A curious fact is that all four of the 21st Army Group's British corps commanders had commanded a corps before he had; but John Crocker and Brian Horrocks had been wounded, Richard O'Connor had been captured, and Neil Ritchie had been sacked after losing the Battle of Gazala.
- Strictly speaking, American generals Omar Bradley, Courtney Hodges and William H. Simpson also served as army commanders under Monty. I've fixed up Simpson, but good luck finding an American to do Bradley or Hodges. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 22:30, 3 October 2022 (UTC)
- Made a few small tweaks but seems pretty good. Re the above comment, I don't think Ritchie had directly commanded a corps before Dempsey - he was briefly a division commander, then a senior staff officer in the Middle East, then GOC Eighth Army. He was then demoted to division command, then promoted to corps command after Dempsey had reached that level.
- I remember some comment to the effect that Monty treated Dempsey like a corps commander which might be worth including if it can be traced. It might be in Carlo d'Este "Decision in Normandy" or Nigel Hamilton's Monty biog, neither of which I've read in more than 30 years. My view is that their relationship in 1944-5 was a little like that of Grant and Meade (commander of the enormous Army of the Potomac) in 1864-5, but we can't really put that in the article.Paulturtle (talk) 04:26, 5 November 2022 (UTC)
Pickersgill-Cunliffe support[edit]
- Link County Offaly and County Laois
- "He also attended Officers' Training Corps (OTC) camp at Rugeley with the rank of sergeant." Strange way to word it. Unless I've misread, would be better as "He joined Rugeley Officers' Training Corps, reaching the rank of sergeant by 1914" or something along those lines. You don't need the acronym because you don't mention it again
- Using "First World War" instead of "Great War" might be more appropriate for a wider, non-anglophone, audience
- "August 1915" no need to repeat the year
- "serve at the front"; "to see combat" or similar might be better and avoid having too many "fronts"
- Not too sure why a history of Dempsey's first battalion and what brigade it was in before he joined it is useful for his biography
- "first saw action..." another repeated date here
- "although successful in its role" what role?
- Link leave
- I understand the need for some context, but is James Welch really necessary? Would be more useful to describe what these "attacks near Miraumont and then Oppy" were. Don't need the VC acronym either way as you don't mention it again
- "badly understrength" this sounds rather passive, I assume this means it had had high casualties but it might be made more obvious
- The paragraph beginning "Following attacks near..." goes 11 months without providing a date for any of the events
- Similar comment as above with MC acronym - can you say for what action/period he got the MC as well?
- "in June 1919" repeated year
- I won't mention any more of the acronyms that are used only once, assuming you have argued your case one way or the other further up this list!
- "under very different circumstances" a little too teasingly theatrical?
- Does Dempsey stay with BAOR between 1927 and 1930?
- "His fellow students..." this begins a rather humongous list of British Army officers, most of which I assume won't be mentioned again here and whose significance is, in a nutshell, "they were at college the same time he was". Suggest paring down the list to those most significant or that Dempsey would later work with
- Name the particular Military Secretary?
- "became responsible for the careers of all officers below the rank of colonel" not how I would describe his role, sounds like he was babysitting them! Suggest elaborating on the Military Secretary's role in appointments, promotion, etc, to make Dempsey's role clearer
- Move lieutenant colonel link to first mention (Eric Miles)
- Link reservists
Have only gotten to the beginning of the Second World War section and will add more soon. Pickersgill-Cunliffe (talk) 19:51, 30 November 2022 (UTC) "two months before" two months before what?
- Link rearguard
- "July 1940" repeated year
- Suggest specifically saying how the brigade got out of France; I assume this was through Dunkirk
- "Soon after, Franklyn was replaced by Berney-Ficklin." this isn't a unit history, why is this useful? Dempsey isn't even there for Berney-Ficklin's command!
- "July 1940" another repetition of this year
- Any explanation available for what his role was as BGS?
- What's your process behind naming units? You've got "46th Division" instead of "46th Infantry Division" (while the unit article uses the latter) but in the same sentence use "42nd (East Lancashire) Infantry Division"
Changed to 46th Infantry Division. Some divisions had territorial titles and some not.
- Link armoured division
- "12 December 1942" repeated year
- Why stipulate that it's the "British" Eighth Army?
- "found his corps HQ in reserve" this sounds as if it was just his HQ that was in reserve, but I assume it was the entire corps?
- Algiers might be worth a link
- Link chief of staff
- I assume that it was at least partially Dempsey's objections that brought about Montgomery's revisions, but this isn't made totally clear
- Yes. Tried to make this more explicit. Of course, de Guingand and Montgomery
- What was the revised plan?
- "10 July 1943" repeated year
- Link commandos
- Give Bucknall his rank
- Link landing craft
- Adequate number of landing craft for what exactly? Link between inadequate intelligence and more landing craft not too clear
- "Corps'" doesn't need a capital
- "Combined Operations" does not need capitalising
- Was Dempsey involved in the planning/build up for D-Day?
- You've already introduced "Brigadier Maurice Chilton" in the long list of college names earlier on, so either remove him from that or shorten the format here
- Link Adjutant General
- Link Quartermaster General
- Two "The result was..." in a row here
- Give Cobra and Goodwood a date
- Better to use "tanks" rather than "panzers"
- "some of its tactical flaws" a little explanation of what exactly Dempsey messed up with would be good
- "Relief of a corps commander..." the following paragraph seems only loosely related to Dempsey. I was going to suggest that it could be simplified into a sentence saying that the resulting changes meant that 3 of the 4 British corps commanders had commanded for longer than Dempsey, but is any of that really relevant? I would be tempted to call it trivia. Moving straight from Montgomery protecting him after Goodwood to the Horrocks quote would still work
- Suggest adding days to the dates for taking Brussels, Antwerp, and participating in Market Garden. They're all in "September 1944"!
- Move the Rhine link to first mention
- "Operational level of war" remove capital
- Link XII Corps
- "and
toemploy" - Reading all these corps names makes me think that back when Dempsey is given command of Second Army would be a good time to actually list exactly what corps it was made up of
- Why do you switch between, e.g. "the XXX Corps" and ..."XXX Corps"?
- You link with First World War "Western Front" when having Dempsey discuss 82nd Airborne's performance in Market Garden
- "15 October 1944" repeated year
- I'm not sure if this is something with a readily available source, but I've read somewhere that Dempsey's knighthood was the first to a general in the field for 200 years or something of the like, and that Dempsey was incredibly proud of that. Don't know if you can find anything about it though..!
- "in the field with his award of the" would be better as "in the field as a..."
- "Guy Simonds's" no need for his first name again imo
- "7 April 1945" repeated year
- "July 1945" ibid
- "4 July 1945" ibid...ibid!
- "Brooke was disappointed with Dempsey's attitude" which was?
- "British Fourteenth Army" as with the Eight Army, is British needed?
- "Within South East Asia Command there were 122,700..." why are we being told this? Did Dempsey have a part in organising/repatriating them?
- "October 1946" repeated year
- When does Dempsey leave Middle East Command?
- Not sure what is meant by "shadow" appointment, or what "British Home forces" actually was?
- "the bride was Catholic" Dempsey's own religion is not mentioned, so the reader is left to infer that he was...something else?
- Link lord lieutenant
- "
Buthe declined" - A label as military historian or something similar would be good for Caddick-Adams
- Duplicated links: Military Cross in the lede, Royal Berkshire Regiment, 6th Brigade, Western Front, acting rank, staff (military), II Corps, mentioned in dispatches, Richard O'Conner, George Hopkinson, Neil Ritchie, George Erskine, Sidney Kirkman, colonel, brigadier, 1st Airborne Division, Battle for Caen, VIII Corps
- His service number (in the infobox) is not referenced anywhere
- Don't need to repeat his forename in the lede
- The lede comment that "he remains less well known than Montgomery or subordinates like Brian Horrocks and Richard O'Connor" is not specifically mentioned in the main text
That's my read-through done. Pickersgill-Cunliffe (talk) 23:08, 30 November 2022 (UTC)
- @Hawkeye7: A couple of unanswered points above (or in one case, just a tick?); can you confirm that you've finished with these? I'll have another look over then. Pickersgill-Cunliffe (talk) 15:58, 2 December 2022 (UTC)
- I thinks all points have been addressed. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 18:17, 2 December 2022 (UTC)
- I've made a few edits that are minor enough to hopefully be uncontroversial, and even if you disagree I'm happy to support this as is. Pickersgill-Cunliffe (talk) 19:10, 3 December 2022 (UTC)
Image review - pass[edit]
- Images are fine - either UK military works with the Crown Copyright expired or a wikipedian photograph of a stained glass window that's ok with freedom of panorama for the UK. Hog Farm Talk 00:29, 28 December 2022 (UTC)
Support - SC[edit]
Interesting guy and nicely written up. A few very minor quibbles, mostly stylistic, but with some MOS bits in there too:
- Between the wars
- "visiting old battlefields of old wars": doesn't need the first "old"
- "handed over to Brian Horrocks"; "handing over again to Brian Horrocks": these are the second and third reference to Horrocks, so we can drop "Brian" on both
- "as Commanding Officer": "as commanding officer"?
- Second World War
- "re-roled" doesn't appear in the OED (and "roled" only in connection with computer programming). "reassigned" works in British English and avoids jargon
- "Re-assigned" would be incorrect though. It's in the Wiktionary, so
- "Unlike a division, which had a set structure, a corps was ": had or has/was or is? Has used changed over time?
- Yes. The corps is as before, but the 21st century division is not as set as in the First or Second World Wars. Since there are so few of them, they tend to have their own special TOE, although standard tables still exist. But the main reason was to keep the article grammar consistently in the past tense. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 21:06, 8 January 2023 (UTC)
- "was a headquarters,[50] because": the comma doesn't work there – it acts as a stumbling block
- "Eighth Army's part": the Eighth Army's part sounds more natural to my ear (much like "The 50th Division" in the next sentence)
- "chef of staff": cook to the stars?
- "armoured self propelled guns": self-propelled?
- "openly questioned to Montgomery": this doesn't work grammatically
- '
pains to deflate it."
': not a full sentence, so per WP:LQ it should be 'pains to deflate it".
'
- Reputation
- "firsthand": two words, according to the OED – can you check the original quote?
That's it – an engaging read on an interesting man. - SchroCat (talk) 16:03, 8 January 2023 (UTC)
Source review[edit]
- Fn 86 give a page range of 6-62. Is this a typo? If not be more precise.
- Capitalize the title in fn 139
- Notes otherwise properly formatted
- Bibliography properly formatted
- Sources are known to be reliable.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 23:30, 8 January 2023 (UTC)
Comments[edit]
- I've read through it once and only caught one typo which I've fixed.
- I'm going to go through it again in a couple of days.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 00:09, 9 January 2023 (UTC)
- Hi Sturm, did you still want to review? No pressure, I think we have enough commentary but if you're keen... Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 11:34, 29 January 2023 (UTC)
- If there are enough other reviewers, then I'll put my time into another review instead.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 03:40, 31 January 2023 (UTC)
- Hi Sturm, did you still want to review? No pressure, I think we have enough commentary but if you're keen... Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 11:34, 29 January 2023 (UTC)
Comments from Harry[edit]
Hey Hawkeye, I did promise I'd review this so sorry I'm late!
- Dempsey was educated at Shrewsbury School, entering there in 1911, where he captained the first eleven cricket team in the 1914 season when they did not lose a match. Bit of a run-on sentence.
- He was also a school and house monitor, and played in the second eleven football team. He also attended Officers' Training Corps three consecutive sentences starting "he also" or "he was also".
- The battalion, although successful, suffered heavy casualties, including eight officers, and was relieved in the line and saw little further fighting that year another run-on sentence.
- Acting (rank) is possibly overlinking and it's not obvious that it's not one link an article called "acting captain".
- Dempsey, along with 10 officers 10 *other* officers?
- In September it was sent to Iraq and Dempsey with it? It's not clear from the text.
- Can we say briefly what his duties were in Iran?
- Between 1926 and 1932, he also played Minor Counties Championship cricket for Berkshire.[29] He also played football and hockey. He also, he also.
- In October 1938 Dempsey's battalion moved to Blackdown Army Camp The subsection is titled "Belgium and France" but Blackdown is in Surrey; maybe specify that?
- who had been one of Dempsey's instructors at the Staff College in the 1930s Is this really relevant? I'd rather know why he was replacing Willcox.
- The brigade formed part of Major-General Harold Franklyn's 5th Division, although the division was still not fully formed and so the brigade was sent to France as an independent formation two months before, and had spent most of its time on guard duties in the BEF's rear areas. Run-on sentence.
- the Supreme Allied Commander, General Dwight D. Eisenhower sea of blue and the American rank is not so different from the British as to require a link
- In Sicily and Italy, Montgomery's faith in Dempsey had proved justified If this is from the source, it needs attributing; in Wikipedia's voice it's editorialising
- This prompted Montgomery, when he left Italy at the end of 1943 to take command of the 21st Army Group for the forthcoming D-Day landings, to select Dempsey to command the Second Army, the main British force involved (although it also included Canadian Army units). Bit of a complicated sentence.
- Lieutenant General Omar Bradley's U.S. First Army same as Ike above; suggest unlinking LtGen
- But there was no denying that Goodwood had been oversold. Editorialising unless it's attributed to a source.
- It is in the source. Should I use a quotation? Hawkeye7 (discuss) 22:49, 15 January 2023 (UTC)
- If the source says "there was no denying that Goodwood had been oversold", then you can say "According to Reliable Source...<ref>Source, Reliable (2023)</ref>" because "no denying" is editorialising and doesn't belong in Wikipedia's voice. But "Dempsey oversold Goodwood" would be simpler. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 14:12, 17 January 2023 (UTC)
- It is in the source. Should I use a quotation? Hawkeye7 (discuss) 22:49, 15 January 2023 (UTC)
- This meant that three of the four British corps commanders in the 21st Army Group had commanded a corps before Dempsey had, but Horrocks (XXX Corps) and John Crocker (I Corps) had been wounded, O'Connor (VIII Corps) had been a prisoner of war; the fourth, Ritchie (XII Corps), had been commander of Eighth Army before being demoted after losing the Battle of Gazala in June 1942. Not sure how this is relevant to Dempsey.
—HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 21:13, 15 January 2023 (UTC)
- Hi Harry, how's this looking now? Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 11:24, 29 January 2023 (UTC)
- Sorry for the delay. There's nothing important outstanding so support. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 18:38, 3 February 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.