Talk:Battle of Vinegar Hill

NPOV

There appear to be a few POV statements that are not backed up by citations in this article; e.g. "and a massacre of stragglers ensued, mainly women and children, causing hundreds more deaths. The infantry followed and were guilty of more atrocities." Statements like this need to be rewritten in a more NPOV way, or backed with citations. DrFrench 11:59, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

This happened and I will find the sources, they are not only from the Irish side, a soldier from the Dumbartonshire regiment, ArchibaldMacClaren, bragged about it in his memoirs. In future put a tag requesting sources instead of assuming POV, you may not believe the british army were capable of any wrongdoing but the facts tell otherwise. --Ponox 11:28, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

Last sentence unnecessarily aggressive, IMO. A request for citations isn't unusual or offensive. Additional citations would also be useful if/when status reviews are requested. See Wikipedia:Assume good faith and Wikipedia:Civility. Nice article, BTW (see comments, below). Folks at 137 21:52, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

This was not just a request for sources, POV was alleged and a "controversial topic" tag slapped on the article. --Ponox 09:41, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

More info

Some more detail, if available:

1. why were there so many non-combatants on the hill?
2. where were they from?
3. apart from the bombardment at "dawn", there's no indication of timescale: did it take a morning, a day?
4. what was the composition - order of battle - of each side, ie, units, type?
5. the British commander, Lake, is mentioned elsewhere for his brutal attitude towards Irish rebels and the differing attitude of his commander, Cornwallis. These would add background to the treatment of the rebels (with citations, of course).
6. the pic of Vinegar Hill shows it to be defensible. How then did the British troops, heavily outnumbered, suffer only 100 casualties?

Folks at 137 21:52, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

I will try to answer off the cuff, I can provide sources but not at hand.

why were there so many non-combatants on the hill? For safety mainly, the fighting had ravaged the countryside and there was an enormous fear of the military who had carried out atrocities, including widespread rape (sources I have plent of). Vinegar Hill was not only a military camp it functioned as the de facto rebel capital, supplies were available there and non-combatants carried out vital support roles.

where were they from It was estimated by Castleregh that virtually the entire population of Wexford had joined the rebellion.

apart from the bombardment at "dawn", there's no indication of timescale: did it take a morning, a day?

The fighting lasted between three to four hours so the battle would have been over by midday.

what was the composition - order of battle - of each side, ie, units, type?

The British advance in four colums, three from the west, one into Enniscorthy . I do not have full details to hand but will locate.

the pic of Vinegar Hill shows it to be defensible. How then did the British troops, heavily outnumbered, suffer only 100 casualties?

Mlyes Byrne one of the rebel leaders lamented the indefensibility of Vinegar Hill and that nothing had been done to improve it's defensibility. The approaches offered cover and the British were able to bring their cannon within range of the rebels and sit back until the rebels were forced to attack. They were greatly outgunned and under attack from two sides. In addition one of the rebel colums due from the south did not arrive until the battle was nearly over. The casualties were probaly higher than 100 as these figures are taken from the offical return shortly after the battle and cannot be said to be totally accurate. In addition commanders often only gave casulties for their own regiments.--Ponox 09:59, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

Date

Was it the 21st, as a lot of sources date the 12th, I can gather and post them if you'd like. I just want to be clear on the correct date. -RiverHockey 19:45, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

More NPOV

as noted above this article stinks!!!

there are no independent sources supporting any of the claims of the atrocities alleged to have carried out by British troops

besides there are just four sources used for the whole article

it appears these assertions are based on books of which, they themselves, have dubious veracity —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.130.122.97 (talk) 15:37, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

What exactly do you mean by "dubious veracity"? If you allege something to be untrue, provide sources to back up your allegation. The sources provided are "independent" and reference contemporary accounts - one was written by a british soldier.

I agree with the starter comment. "Dubious veracity" is probably there to mean propagandist material. Are there any independent sources? The women and children point just seems to be ridiculous and is not sourced properly. This article is more of an allegation than fact.--Theosony (talk) 15:51, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

Here we go again...the sources are factual and not propogandist - look at them, they are from contemporary reports both rebel and british. Provide evidence for your opinion that the article is more allegation than fact. --Ponox (talk) 00:26, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Calm down :)

I'm just discussing the article. The facts of the event are disputed. They cannot be stated as hard fact unless neutral sources are given. The edits you made provided much better sourcing.--Theosony (talk) 06:49, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

I am CALM!!! :) Can there be "neutral" sources as such anywhere?? (not to say that the sources given are "propogandist" or whatever) -all history being written by the victor etc.............though Lake himself stated in his report that the behaviour of his troops at Vinegar Hill went "beyond description and needs much correction"--Ponox (talk) 00:00, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

Bias

This article lacks objectivity and uses some contempory American terms which do not apply to the historical situation. Examples are "republicans" this is IRA speak, "military" to mean "armed forces".

A geat deal more is needed on the objectives, composition and operations of the forces of the Crown.

Bwalker (talk) 11:24, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

I agree that the use of "republican" all the time is overkill and POVish but don't see a problem referring to the Crown forces as the military or vice versa, what do you suggest instead? There is info on deployment etc of the British and their objective but feel free to add more.--Ponox (talk) 22:22, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

Confusing

Ladies and gentleman, I tripped over this article when rambling through history articles on wiki - I have no particular understanding or interest in Irish history. I read it and found it (although very well written), rather confusing. At first I thought it was just weird style, but having come to the talk page there's lots of description of POV issues.

I certainly find it weird that the rout of the Irish forces, pursued by cavalry, is described under the heading "Atrocities", when pursuing a routed army has always been standard tactics. What were the British supposed to do when an enemy army routs, let it retreat and reform? Might I suggest that the atrocities heading be removed and the description of the rout be amendend and included in the description of the battle itself?

Also, the description of a general massacre is at odds with the numbers of casualties. 500-1000 killed in the whole battle yet "hundreds" of stragglers killed in the rout and "hundreds" killed by heavy artillery fire. It's also odd that the British only lost 100 men, particularly given the description of a serious battle in which the Irish inflicted "heavy casualties" in the battle and then "heavy casualties" in the town.

If 38 000 people are involved in a pitched battle and a maximum of 1100 are killed, well it's hardly a battle, more a skirmish or a stand-off, and the idea of a general massacre certainly does question the NPOV.

I wouldn't doubt that the refs are correct, but the general picture of the battle (although well written) comes across as confusing to the casual reader and I would invite the writers to consider a rewrite.

However, all this said with the greatest respect, I certainly couldn't have written this myself and applaud the effort so far. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.107.225.202 (talk) 21:20, 25 December 2009 (UTC)

Not So Confusing

I've just revisited this article after a year and a half. I can see there's been a bit of to-ing and fro-ing amongst the edits but can I just say that it reads really well and really clearly now and well done to everyone who has contributed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2.127.31.226 (talk) 18:26, 6 July 2011 (UTC)

I agree that this is a well-written article, but it still has an unmistakeable whiff of anti-British bias. The United Irishmen Rebellion was part of a Europe-wide (and even trans-Atlantic) upheaval against the established order, largely inspired by the French Revolution, which included Protestants and Catholics alike. It wasn't simply an Irish versus English (or Catholic versus Protestant) affair. Both sides behaved aggressively, and the government forces were fully entitled to use such military methods as were being used elsewhere in the world, not to mention in Ireland by their opponents. The use of terms like "atrocities" to describe standard 18th century military practice in the face of a fleeing enemy is needlessly provocative, and might equally be used to describe the behaviour of the United Irishmen themselves. In the end, the UIs lost, not because because they were nicer and more honourable, but because they were outmatched.