Talk:Paul Revere

"trumped up by enemies"?

"A variety of charges were made against Revere, most of them trumped up by enemies he had made in his command at Castle William." Sounds very subjective to me, evidence? OdyLankenau (talk) 16:06, 30 July 2011 (UTC)

The evidence would be in the cited source, feel free to look it up. (Exaggerated charges laid by rivals for promotion and position were not uncommon in courts martial during the revolution.) Magic♪piano 14:56, 31 July 2011 (UTC)

As stated below, there is a factual afterword in The Fort where Cornwell states quite clearly the evidence for both Revere's cowardice and further shows it's likely he was exonerated as a matter of politics (blaming Saltonstall, and thereby reducing Mass. debt) rather than lack of guilt. Where does Wikipedia stand when there are two contrasting pov? I'm aware Wikipedia is an American venture, and Revere an American hero, but shouting "LA LA LA I CAN'T HEAR YOU" every time his cowardice is mentioned in the only fight he was involved in isn't very exacting. 62.255.248.225 (talk) 13:19, 14 September 2012 (UTC)

As a rule, when sources disagree on something, one presents the disagreement in the article ("The historical record is unclear on whether Revere behaved in a cowardly manner, and historians have reached different conclusions on the matter." etc...). You then present the uncontroversial facts and discuss the differing assessments.

I don't see anyone attempting to paper over the accusations or evidence of cowardice or other malfeasance here -- if you have sources that make specific accusations, feel free to propose well-sourced changes (see {{Edit semi-protected}} since as an anonymous editor you cannot make edits to this article). If you want to cite Cornwell specifically (rather than his sources, which it would be useful if you identified those), you'll have to be very specific (provide page numbers) so that it is clear you are not citing the fictional portion of the book.

Oh, and English Wikipedia is an international endeavour, with editors from all over the world contributing to it. American editors (like those of other nations) also sometimes know how to write unbiased articles. Magic♪piano 14:12, 14 September 2012 (UTC)

The book The Fort by Bernard Cornwell (writer of the Sharpe series), mentions sources that describe Paul Reverse as having been responsible (in part) for the failure at Penobscot Bay due to being generally uncooperative and mismanaging the artillery. It also mentions that his presence in Midnight Ride is incorrect as, while he was one of the men ordered to relay news of the British arrival, he did not in fact complete the mission while the other men did. Unfortunately the novel itself doesn't cite many sources which has made the claims difficult to follow up, which is why I wanted to mention it here in case anyone is better able to verify the claims.

On a related note it is also mention that Paul Reverse's charges may have been dropped in order to allow Massachusetts to claim the fault was with the naval force under Saltonstall. Again, I'm unsure of the source(s) for this. These are all however things mentioned in the closing notes of the novel, and so should not be fabricated by Cornwell himself. It's possible his sources were part of the exaggerations against Revere but I wanted to mention all this in case the sources are something worth including in the descriptions here, as Bernard Cornwell does use actual historic sources for his novels so some of it may be verifiable. Haravikk (talk) 16:34, 14 August 2012 (UTC)

Edit request on 28 March 2012

In the "Later Years" section, it mentions that " Revere became a pioneer in the production of copper plating, opening North America's first copper mill south of Boston in Canton, near the Canton Viaduct. Copper from the Revere Copper Company was used to cover the original wooden dome of the Massachusetts State House in 1802."

Revere was also heavily involved in developing copper sheathing for ships. Indeed, Revere refined his process explicitly around the problem of ship sheathing (see Robert Martello's book 'Midnight Ride, Industrial Dawn', page 225-238).

A more immediate problem is that the page currently links "copper plating" to an article about electrolytic plating. Technically Revere made "copper sheets". The most appropriate article to link to would therefore be http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copper_sheathing

Browley (talk) 18:17, 28 March 2012 (UTC)

Can you clearly state what sentence (with reference) you'd like added and where? Achowat (talk) 18:23, 28 March 2012 (UTC)

I (as the editor who wrote the material being commented on) had actually intended to revisit this particular section at some time, and have located a copy of Martello's book that I will eventually be able to borrow. I really would like to better understand Revere's impact on industrial development, which is why this particular section has languished. The commenter is correct that what Revere developed was the rolling of copper, not electrolytic plating. I have in the interim corrected the link (even though the linked article is mainly about the naval uses of rolled copper). Magic♪piano 18:43, 28 March 2012 (UTC)

I've deactivated the template so that it is easy to tell that this request is being handled. PLease reactivate it when you answer Achowat's question. Thanks, Celestra (talk) 04:31, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

Gill, (references)

In ref 1 we are given Gill 1891, pp. 10–11. but there is no Gill in the bibliography; however there is a Goss, Elbridge Henry (1891). Is Gill a typo? Jodosma (talk) 11:48, 14 June 2013 (UTC)

Revere's dentistry tools?

The first picture on the left side of the screen has the caption "Revere's dentistry tools". Shouldn't this say "Revere's silversmithing tools"? 107.2.249.138 (talk) 03:07, 7 August 2013 (UTC)

No. The photo is captioned as dental tools by the source (a museum collection on Flickr). Revere is known to have done dental work. Magic♪piano 12:14, 7 August 2013 (UTC)

• This article refers to Revere's horse in the famous ride. However, historically he did not own a horse, and used one borrowed from John Larkin, who as Deacon of the church where the lanterns were hung. Shouldn't this be corrected?Tham153 (talk) 20:39, 21 September 2013 (UTC)

The British are coming

We have the account of Paul Revere written in 1775. In his own account he calls the British the Minesterial Troops but he never once use the words regular troops. We also have the written letter of Paul Revere from 1798 were he call the British, the British. Unless we have a manuscript from Paul Revere were the words The Regular's are Coming some obscure reference is not enough to support that claim. As for the paragraph that says that the Americain considered themselves British, this is nonsense. In every letter of the time the american never call themselves British, and the British never call the american British. It was the Continental Army, not the British army of America. British and Canadian try to rewrite history to present the revolution as a civil war among British. Basicaly they continue to pretend the american did not exist. The american considered themselves Colonists, patriots and Son's of Liberty. The war is between colonists who increasingly considered the British as foreigner trying to rule them from England and British born soldiers. Saying All the American considered themselves British is not true. They knew England was not their country. EMvague (talk) 04:19, 12 November 2013 (UTC)