Wikipedia:Peer review/77th Infantry Division (United Kingdom)/archive1

77th Infantry Division (United Kingdom)

I've listed this article for peer review as the article has been completely overhauled over the last few months. Any and all comments are welcome to help further improve the article, and get it ready for a GA review. Kind regards EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 23:28, 29 July 2015 (UTC)

Comments from RO

Lead

• it was responsible retaining soldiers who had been on medical leave.

Should this be retraining?

Yes it should, addressed this.EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 02:58, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

Background

• with the possibility of invasion again rearing its head for 1941

"rearing its head" is not very encyclopedic.

Reworded.EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 02:58, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

• allowed the War Office to begin steps "to create a better balanced army" due the large number of infantry units formed during the preceding year and a half.

Should this be "due to"?

Addressed.EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 02:58, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

Home defence

• "Higher Establishment" and "Lower Establishment" formations

Is it worth explaining what is meant by higher and lower? Does this pertain to priorities, or quality of the units?

I believe it is worth explaining as both terms are used throughout the article, and help explain the roles this division undertook as an actual formation and its intended use as a phantom one.EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 02:58, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

Training formation

• additional training to new recruits to the regiment

This could benefit from a copyedit.

Made a change, does this work?EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 02:58, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

• the 14th Durham Light Infantry was converted from a regular infantry unit "into a Rehabilitation Centre."

The quote marks seem unnecessary.

Removed, old habits die hard!EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 02:58, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

• Men who were "of low morale and poor physique, including repatriates and ex-prisoners of war" were sent to the battalion were they underwent medical, physical, and military tests.

Either paraphrase this to avoid the quote marks or attribute the speaker inline.

Addressed.EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 15:00, 24 August 2015 (UTC)

• Additionally, the 11th York and Lancaster Regiment role in the new organisation was "to hold and retain officers and other ranks who had returned from long services overseas."[25]

Same here, this should be paraphrased or attributed.

Addressed.EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 15:00, 24 August 2015 (UTC)

Deception

• This needs explaining. I think I get your drift, but it reads too much like insider/military buff lingo, which is okay for parts, but this sounds quite interesting if it were only a little easier to understand.

I have expanded this section some, please let me know what you think (as I want to copy the opening over to similar articles).EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 15:00, 24 August 2015 (UTC)

General officer commanding

• I would work this into another section, as its too brief to justify its own header.

I could, although I have been attempting to standardize the British infantry division articles. In addition, another article - with a similar small scale section as this - has thus far passed its GA and A-Class review. I would prefer it stay, for the moment at least.EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 15:00, 24 August 2015 (UTC)

• I'm seeing a harv error for ref#5: ([1]) and two harv errors in the references section, one of which is tied to ref#5, but it looks like Holt, Thaddeus (2004). The Deceivers: Allied Military Deception in the Second World War. Scribner. ISBN 978-0-743-25042-9 is not currently cited to in the article.

AustralianRupert has fixed the Churchill ref for me, and I have removed the Holt ref (I used it on similar articles, and copied it over here ... but didn't end up using it).EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 15:00, 24 August 2015 (UTC)

Conclusion

This is a great little piece overall. Its well-written and well-presented, and other than a few minor spots reads pretty well for someone like me, who knows next to nothing about military topics. Nicely done. Keep up the great work! RO^(talk) 22:12, 19 August 2015 (UTC)

Thank you for your review. I have addressed some of your comments, the rest I will attempt to address tomorrow.EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 02:58, 20 August 2015 (UTC)

Comments from AustralianRupert

G'day, just a quick one from me. The work by Holt is showing up as a harvn error with script I run as it doesn't appear to be specifically cited. It might be best to drop this one into a Further reading section. Cheers, AustralianRupert (talk) 00:55, 22 August 2015 (UTC)

Thanks for the fix, although I have removed the Holt ref as it does not really say anything on this division.EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 15:00, 24 August 2015 (UTC)

Comments from Dank

• "The 77th Infantry Division was an infantry division of the British Army formed on": Per LEAD, which says to avoid redundancy, I recommend: The 77th Infantry Division of the British Army was formed on. Linking infantry division is a good idea, but you can do that wherever it comes up.

Made the change to the lede as suggested, and move the links elsewhere.EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 14:23, 9 September 2015 (UTC)

• "Division: a division that trained": Division, training

Amended.EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 14:23, 9 September 2015 (UTC)

• "the division was disbanded. Following the division's disbandment, it was reformed": the division was disbanded and re-formed

AmendedEnigmaMcmxc (talk) 14:23, 9 September 2015 (UTC)

• "a deception unit": Link it. You might or might not want to add a quick description of what that means.

I have added an extra line, does this work?EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 14:23, 9 September 2015 (UTC)

I tweaked it. - Dank (push to talk)

• "They lacked mobility, divisional troops including artillery, engineers, and reconnaissance forces.": I'm not sure what that means. - Dank (push to talk) 15:45, 29 August 2015 (UTC)

I have made a change, is this any better?EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 14:23, 9 September 2015 (UTC)

Great. - Dank (push to talk) 14:38, 9 September 2015 (UTC)

Comments from Nick-D

• "As the year progressed, the size of the British Army increased dramatically as 140 new infantry battalions were raised.[3] Late in the year, with the possibility of a German invasion during 1941, these new recruits were formed into independent infantry brigades that were then loaned to newly created County Divisions" - this is a bit questionable, and looks to be an over-simplification. Did the British Army really have 140 unbrigaded independent infantry battalions?

Per Perry: "...140 battalions were formed ... . Designated originally for coast defence, the new battalions were at first grouped into Infantry Training Groups which became Brigades in October 1940. Later they were gathered into 'County' Divisions, still with a local defense role." Forty is the one who clarifies that the brigades were loaned to the County Divisions. However, I can do some more digging later on to see if that is the whole story.EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 14:11, 9 September 2015 (UTC)

• "In late 1941, the arrival of autumn and winter weather meant that the threat of German invasion again subsided" - shouldn't it be noted that there was no threat of invasion at this time as almost all of the Germany Army's offensive units were in the USSR?

While wording can be changed, Perry makes the point "The possibility of invasion had still to be considered and although this consideration was, in practice, removed by the German invasion of Russia ... this could not be known at the time. The relative ease with which Germany could have transferred forces to the west if Russia collapsed kept this issue alive well into 1942."

Would a paraphrasing of the above suffice?EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 14:11, 9 September 2015 (UTC)

• What units did the 77th Division comprise of upon formation? (if this isn't available, what was the structure of lower establishment divisions?)

Brigades or battalions? I have Joslen, so I can be as detailed as needed. Structure wise, while Joslen provides detailed information on the number of vehicles and weapons etc. that a higher establishment division would have he does not do the same for the lower.EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 14:11, 9 September 2015 (UTC)

• The Deception section repeats some material which is covered in the previous para, which is a bit confusing

Can you clarify what part is confusing so I can make amendments?

• Can more be said about the deception involving this unit? How was it conveyed to the Germans and did it convince them? Nick-D (talk) 08:20, 30 August 2015 (UTC)

The 77th is one of the deception units that has scant information available. I will do some digging.EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 14:11, 9 September 2015 (UTC)

Dank and Nick, thanks guys for the reviews. I probably will not be able to address your comments until early next week.EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 22:31, 2 September 2015 (UTC)

@Nick-D:: Hi Nick, Just sending a ping in case you missed the above. Your feedback is much appreciated.EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 00:39, 21 September 2015 (UTC)

I'm currently travelling and not really able to monitor Wikipedia I'm afraid Nick-D (talk) 18:07, 22 September 2015 (UTC)

No probs dude :) EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 19:16, 22 September 2015 (UTC)

If I have time I'll try to follow up, but I doubt that I will have time! Nick-D (talk) 09:38, 23 September 2015 (UTC)