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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 Graham Colm (talk) 18:15, 29 June 2014 (diff).

Roy Phillipps

[edit]
Nominator(s): Ian Rose (talk) 11:15, 25 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Fairly short but I think comprehensive, this follows on from Elwyn Roy King, another article on an Australian fighter ace of World War I that I took to GAN a couple of years ago and expanded recently with some new sources. Like King, Phillipps left military flying after the armistice to run a business and raise a family, but joined the RAAF after the outbreak of World War II and died relatively young while commanding a training unit. Thanks to everyone who took part in the article's MilHist A-Class Review not long ago, and in advance to everyone who comments here. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 11:15, 25 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Images are appropriately captioned and licensed. Nikkimaria (talk) 12:53, 25 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Support on prose per standard disclaimer. I've looked at the changes made since I reviewed this for A-class. These are my edits. - Dank (push to talk) 13:19, 25 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks Nikki and Dan! Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 14:48, 25 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]


SupportComments from Nortonius

[edit]

Lead

  • "He finished the war a major, commanding No. 6 (Training) Squadron in England. Leaving the AFC in 1919, he was managing a rural property when he enlisted in the RAAF soon after the outbreak of World War II." I think the beginning of the second sentence belongs at the end of the first: "... in England, and left the AFC in 1919. He was managing a rural property ..." I think you need to clarify where the rural property was here: he could still have been in England.
    • Tweaked to make clear he returned to Australia after the war.

Early life

World War I

  • In the middle of the first sentence I would replace "; he" with just "and"; and I think "Successfully applying for a commission, Phillipps departed ..." would read better as "He applied successfully for a commission and departed ..."
    • Okay.
  • "the next month" and "the following month" – why not just name the months? I think it would read more easily.
  • Could "was not discharged from hospital" be shortened to "remained in hospital"? I looked at the refs and didn't see any reason why not; I fixed a page number while I was there and hope you agree with the change.[1]
    • Yep, no prob with that.

Australian Flying Corps

  • In the first sentence, I think "managed" looks a bit loose, something like "contrived" or "engineered" would be clearer.
    • Why not?
  • At the end of the second sentence, I think "to do so" looks redundant given the following: "The official age limit for pilots in the AFC was thirty, but the preferred age was under twenty-three." How old was Phillipps at this point? I would change that to "Phillipps was then aged twenty-five, and the official age limit for pilots in the AFC ..."
    • Since the bit about falsifying his age and the clarification about the age preference are from disparate sources I preferred to keep the statements separate.
      • I see what you mean. My main concern is that these statements beg the question of Phillipps' age at the time, which would be a simple statement of fact, no synthesis involved: he left hospital the day after his birthday, and his application was accepted a couple of months later. If you could work that in somehow I think it would be a help to the reader, perhaps add it in the sentence "After getting a taste of flying as a passenger ..."? Nortonius (talk) 14:16, 28 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • "Phillipps' application was accepted in May ...": I would add the year here.
    • Agree, done.
  • "he had been forced to crash-land" – did he have a choice? If not, "he crash-landed". That sentence might read more easily as "Within three days of arriving he crash-landed his Airco DH.5 after it was hit by anti-aircraft fire near Ypres, but he escaped injury; by the time his attachment was completed in September he was leading combat patrols." Or you might split it.
    • Used your version.
  • About Phillipps' marriage, I see that St Mary Abbots is linked, but I note that there's a Kensington in NSW: maybe say "at the church of St Mary Abbots in Kensington, London".
    • Agree, done.
  • "Rejoining No. 2 Squadron the same month as a flight commander": this looks ambiguous to me (was someone else the flight commander?), and I'd change it to "Rejoining No. 2 Squadron as a flight commander within the month".
    • A squadron generally has at least two flights, and often three, so yes there would've been other flight commanders.
  • A question, but one which needs no reply: have you considered bundling your references?

That's all for now, my ISP's playing up, or maybe my browser. Nortonius (talk) 15:10, 27 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Further comments from Nortonius:

  • "strafing and bombing missions in the DH.5" – should that be "in a DH.5", or even "in DH.5s" if he didn't always fly in the same machine, or did they fix up the one he crash-landed, in which he continued to fly? If the latter, and the sources allow it, I think that needs a mention: if not, I'd go with "in a DH.5" or "in DH.5s".
    • Heh, that's a bit of militarese I guess -- the definite article is often used for the aircraft model even though it's not meant to mean an individual plane. Happy to change to "in DH.5s".
  • Should "Triplane" be capitalised? There are three examples in the article as I write, all referring to German aircraft. I see that there was a Sopwith "Triplane", where obviously it should be capitalised, but the linked Fokker aircraft is a "Dr.I", where I suppose it shouldn't.
    • I'm pretty sure Fokker Triplane is always capitalised even though it wasn't the official name.
      • I take it you mean in the sources for this article – in which case fair enough. Though, if each of the three instances involve Dr.Is, you might change the first to "Fokker Dr.I triplane" and remove the caps from the other two; it would have the benefit of making the type of Fokker explicit, but I'll leave that up to you. Nortonius (talk) 11:35, 29 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • Three eleven-victory aces in a row! Ripping stuff. But I had to read it twice, seeing "eleven-victory" and "eleven victories" so close together: it might be smoother if you slip a harmless "also" in, saying "The feat also gave Phillipps a total of eleven victories ..." Or something like it.
    • Fair enough, although I'd prefer to avoid "also" in successive sentences. How does ""gave Phillips himself a total..." sound? Or I could say "also gave Phillips..." and then say "further contributed..." next sentence... WDYT?
      • Sorry, I didn't notice the subsequent "also" when I was looking at that, and agree. It would be nice if any of the sources indicate that this feat sealed the deal for his DFC: then you could say it "also gave Phillipps ..." and "It confirmed Phillipps' recommendation ...", which would be much neater; such wishful thinking(?) aside, I'd go with your second suggestion. Nortonius (talk) 11:35, 29 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  • I think "second most successful" might be an improvement, preparing the reader for the fact that Captain Francis Smith was "No. 2 Squadron's most successful ace".
    • Okay -- just trying to think if there should be a hyphen or two in there...
  • "Phillipps rotated back to England per Royal Air Force policy": "per" on its own looks a bit loose, should that be "as per", or "in accordance with"? I would prefer the latter as a bit more encyclopedic.
    • Will go the IAW route I think.

I think this is an excellent article. I admit that I've only checked references when I've felt the need. Otherwise it looks comprehensive: for example, it would be nice to know what sort of Albatros Phillipps shot down, but the related reference that I checked didn't say, so fair enough. It's well structured and I've enjoyed reading it: I'd never heard of Roy Phillipps before, thank you for introducing me so concisely to this interesting character. Nortonius (talk) 15:50, 28 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

A pleasure -- in all honesty, I hadn't heard of Phillips myself until I came to WP and began researching Australian WWI aces in some depth. Thanks again for taking the time to comment. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 09:57, 29 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
One last thing (I think!): the placement of the splendid image of Phillipps with his daughter Helen in England defeats the intended indentation of the "quote" template twice. I think it needs fixing but can't suggest how off-hand, other than to use Template:Quotation instead, but you might not like that for its borders. Nortonius (talk) 13:24, 29 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, I did give the quotation template a try but feel it breaks the flow of the article a bit too much. I grant you the quote template as it is doesn't indent but its font is a bit smaller than the main text (at least with my screen style) so I feel it stands out enough, without looking like a sore thumb... ;-) Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 11:11, 30 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Sore thumbs not required: I think the "quotation" template probably would look out of place in an article of this length, and the text shows smaller for me too. So I'll leave that alone, absent any fix for the indentation from me. No further FAC questions that I can think of, happily changing to "support" given the foregoing. Nortonius (talk) 11:54, 30 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Note -- Normally I try not to augment content during a FAC but while researching a new article on Phillipps' World War II command, No. 2 Elementary Flying Training School, I did find info re. his RAAF career that I think is likely to be more accurate, as well as more detailed, than what was previously in this article, so I decided to incorporate it sooner rather than later. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 15:06, 1 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]

All looks good to me! Nortonius (talk) 12:50, 5 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Source review - spotchecks not done

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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