Talk:Sugarloaf massacre

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NPOV dispute & Accuracy dispute - Factually inaccurate information in the article

Recent research has raised some questions about the factual grounding of this topic. Most of it is based upon Rogan Moore's book which, as is pointed out in this article from the Journal of the American Revolution, contains a lot of mistakes. Moore mostly repeats what he has read from secondary sources without vetting or fact-checking them. For example, based upon the research in this article:

(1) Captain Daniel Klader probably never existed. He is a legendary heroic figure without any supportive evidence. He is also not listed in any extant muster roll from the unit. The actual commanding officers of the militia detachment were Lt. John Moyer (or Myer) and Lt. John Fish (both are attested to in pension files and in primary sources).

(2) A handful of those presumed dead at the site actually lived through the massacre. One even filed for a pension in 1833. Earliest accounts indicate 10, not 15, were killed and based upon surviving primary evidence that is likely the most accurate count.

(3) The only militia present were Northampton County militia. No Northumberland County militia were involved in the Sugarloaf Massacre. This is confirmed in the primary sources. But also see this article from the Hazleton Standard Speaker which disputes the claims that there were Northumberland County militia present.

This article needs revising; less needs to be taken from Rogan Moore's book and more from the primary sources.

Revhist1 (talk) 19:18, 6 July 2015 (UTC)

Wikipedia prefers secondary sources over primary sources, see this. Additionally, you have not specified any reason why this article is not neutral, so I have removed both tags. --Jakob (talk) aka Jakec 19:56, 6 July 2015 (UTC)

So basically, rather than dealing with the facts, you would just ignore them? Moore's book has tons of inconsistencies and makes claims not based on any extant evidence; it's all from second hand accounts. For example, he writes about things that came from late 19th Century fluff pieces that are unsourced, written after all eyewitnesses were dead, and whose information is not present in extant evidence. In other words, it's all based upon legends and folklore. But you would have to actually read the research to know that; which is why I linked to the article above which actually takes apart the claims in Moore's book and in the sources used on this page (it's all readily available there--you just have to take the time to read it). So I'm reinstating the tag for inaccuracy. Please support your claims, as I am supporting mine. Also it is not neutral since it only gives one perspective--that given by Moore (all additional sources are either used by Moore and also problematic for being folkloric or are not based in any methodology). Please revise the article to account for the problems given in the articles linked above. Revhist1 (talk) 21:07, 6 July 2015 (UTC)

I would also add that the policy for Wikipedia is that the secondary sources "rely on primary sources for their material, making analytic or evaluative claims about them." The dispute hereis that the secondary sources that are used in this article DO NOT rely upon primary sources and do not analyze the claims. Thus, the new article on the Sugarloaf Massacre (published 7/6/15) proves this and therefore is more reliable as a secondary source than Moore's book and books from the 19th and early 20th Century. SO you should defer to the more reliable secondary source material. Revhist1 (talk) 21:14, 6 July 2015 (UTC)

Oh, hey, and one more thing wrong with this page; the Moore book was published in 2000. Not 2009. Moore died in 2005. I'm trying to make this page at least somewhat fact-based. Don't shoot the messenger for raising attention to the errors on the page. Just consider fixing them. Or I can do it, if you'd like. Revhist1 (talk) 22:59, 6 July 2015 (UTC)

Nevermind. I just went ahead and fixed the article. I've removed the dispute tag. Revhist1 (talk) 01:00, 7 July 2015 (UTC)

Klader's men traveled to a town that did not exist for decades?

The article reads, "... Klader's men crossed the Lehigh River and traveled to the community of Jim Thorpe, Pennsylvania ..." However, as the Wiki article says, Jim Thorpe was not founded until 1818 and wasn't named that until 1954. IAmNitpicking (talk) 18:39, 11 September 2019 (UTC)

Yeah something is really wrong there. That sentence is also the only mention of "Klader" until the big section disputing whether he existed at all, so it confusingly comes out of nowhere and is also in conflict with the strong overall implication the article gives that he never really existed. -Elmer Clark (talk) 22:49, 18 September 2019 (UTC)

I removed the initial reference to Klader and simplified the Controversy section.IAmNitpicking (talk) 14:09, 19 September 2019 (UTC)