Talk:John Perkins (Royal Navy officer)

Rating and some suggestions

Good work so far with this article. I have rated the article a Start class article because I feel that a few more citations are needed (please see below). I also have the following other suggestions/points that you might like to consider:

• the lead should be expanded to summarise the entire article (it can be up to four paragraphs, I believe);
• the Bibliography section should be sorted alphabetically by author's surname. To make this easier, the {{cite book}} template could be used;
• please consider if all the External links necessary;
• the Bibliography section is very large, please consider if they all specifically related to the subject in question;
• there are possibly a few places that are missing citations (for instance the last part of the Early life section; the last part of the last paragraph in the Early career seciton; the quotations in the Capture and Torture of Domingue section and the last part of the last paragraph in that section; the last part of the Later career section; the third paragraph in the Retirement and death section);
• per WP:MOS dates shouldn't be linked anymore;
• per WP:PAIC citations should be outside of punctuation (I think I've fixed most of these, but please check);
• the headings should be capitalised per Wikipedia:HEAD#Section headings, i.e. "Retirement and Death" should be "Retirement and death";
• ranks should only be capitalised when used as a proper noun, i.e as part of a title (as in Captain John Perkins) but where they are used as an improper noun they should not (as in John Perkins was a captain). An example where ranks have been capitalised incorrectly is in the Retirement section ("Post-Captain");
• do the quotes need to be bolded as they are?

If you would like some more in depth comments, please consider putting the article up for peer review. This can be done by adding it to the list at WP:MHPR. Good work and thanks for your contribution. If/when you wish for a re-assessment, please list it again at WP:MHA — AustralianRupert (talk) 12:27, 27 March 2010 (UTC)

Further suggestions

I've assessed this article as B class as I believe that it covers the subject adequately, is well referenced, etc. I have a few suggestions for further improvement/comments that you might like to consider if you are thinking of taking it towards GA or higher:

• in the lead, the first sentence could make a stronger claim to notability. Currently the opening sentence says that he was a British naval officer, which, although true is not very notable by itself. Perkins status as the first black commissioned officer and as a very successful captain are what make him notable, therefore, the lead might be reworded as such: "Captain John Perkins, Royal Navy (d. 27 January 1812), was the first black commissioned officer in the Royal Navy. Nicknamed Jack Punch, Perkins rose from obscurity to be one of the most successful..."
• the article is in the category of 1745 births, however, this date is not mentioned in the article at all. Are we sure of when he was born? If not, the article should probably be removed from the category. If we are, then his birth date should be mentioned in the article;
• could the citations to the London Gazette be linked? I don't know if the Gazette has online versions of records that far back, but if they do {{LondonGazette}} could be used to format the links;
• I feel that the Citations should be formatted differently. Currently they have title first, but I think it more common to have author first, e.g. Smith 2000, p. 140 or Smith Some book, p. 140. Wikipedia:Citing sources might help with some ideas;
• citation # 27 (Battle of West Kay 1801 ext link) should have publisher and accessdate information. Formatting it with {{cite web}} would enable this information to be included.

Anyway, good work so far. Cheers. — AustralianRupert (talk) 13:57, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

You can add in Perkins's command of HM schooner Spitfire between July 1793 and February 1794. Rif Winfield (talk) 05:19, 29 July 2010 (UTC)

Sorry this continually perplexes me - you call Perkins the first black commissioned officer and yet there is zero evidence of him being black (certainly not a negro). Why this perplexes me is - what the heck is black - someone with a 0-99% Bantu or Niger-Congo (Nilotic, Cushitic, ...) genotype appears in the current age to be 'black'? This is a very diffuse criterion that allows anybody to be 'black' (probably the desired intent). IF he was of mixed race he would be the first mulatto commissioned officer (and doubtful at that).

Just FYI - the source claiming him to be black is not a primary source (and claims him to be a mulatto) - it references an article in the link to Oxford Dictionary of National Biography which again is not a primary source. There appears no period article/resource claiming that Perkins was black and there is no primary source stating the same - presumably somewhere there is a record of births where he is registered as 'mulatto' - as this is his primary notoriety perhaps somebody authoring the article should endeavour to find it! 144.134.56.177 (talk) 03:05, 13 March 2024 (UTC)

External links modified

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