Talk:Army of Northern Virginia

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You've been referenced by the media! See [1] "According to wikipedia.com (sic), the Army of Northern Virginia, led by Gen. Robert E. Lee, was the primary military force of the Confederacy in the eastern theater of the Civil War." - Ta bu shi da yu 02:55, 30 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Lee naming it

Beauregard and Johnston commanded the army itself beforehand, but Army of Northern Virginia, as a name, was created by Lee just after he was appointed to command. --Chr.K. 21:57, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

I have souped up the description a bit. I have a high degree of confidence in the Eicher citation; their Civil War High Commands reference contains an exhaustive history of unit lineage. I think what we have here is renaming retrospectively. It is probable that Eicher has documentation showing the name was assigned effective March 14 simply because some of those records were created after Lee assumed command. This is very similar in nature to other armies that had later more famous names. A prime example is the Army of the Tennessee, which is almost universally cited as fighting in the Battle of Shiloh, although that name was not formally designated until October 16, 1862. Hal Jespersen 00:21, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

This is incorrect. The Official Records have a telegram from Joe Johnston in February of 1862 referring to himself as "commanding the Army of Northern Virginia." http://digital.library.cornell.edu/cgi/t/text/pageviewer-idx?c=moawar;cc=moawar;q1=Army%20of%20Northern%20Virginia;rgn=full%20text;idno=waro0005;didno=waro0005;view=image;seq=1097 It's unclear when that name came into use, but it was most certainly prior to Lee assuming command. The Frog (talk) 05:29, 15 November 2009 (UTC)

edits of May 5, 2009

I don't attempt to maintain this article and don't feel like going through an extensive editing process to address the edits of today, but don't you think:

• The detailed order of battle data belongs more appropriately in the individual battle or campaign articles? (I hate to think that someone might try this for Army of the Potomac.) If a reader wanted to know who commanded an artillery unit at Gettysburg, would he really go here to find out? Why not just link to the many OOB articles that are already written and maintained by people familiar with those battles?
• Footnotes should be in English for this version of the article?

Hal Jespersen (talk) 14:52, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

• I don't agree to your point about where the data about the units belongs; The people looking for data about the army will especially look for the basic history and structure of the army. This belongs clearly here. Shifting through all individual battles is counter productive to find that out. This provides a good basic overview with clear and simple tables. I agree that someone who wants to find out more about the individual campaigns will go and look there then, but this point got nothing to do with the history of the army itself. Linking to the OOB articles is a good additional idea, I'll see to that when I find the time.
• Footnotes should be in english, of course. Thanks for pointing that out. Fixed.
• Fixed some spelling.

Shibirian —Preceding undated comment added 16:45, 16 June 2009 (UTC).

Well, one more data point. If you consult any of the books published about the Army of Northern Virginia, I do not believe you will find any that provide comparable tables, even though those books are obviously much longer and more detailed. Such tables are typically found only in books about the battles. And since Wikipedia has a rich collection of methods to create links pointing to other articles, the details could easily be handled using, say, {{Further}} templates pointing to the more complete order of battle listings. Hal Jespersen (talk) 15:27, 17 June 2009 (UTC)