The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was speedy delete. Hoax (see others) seicer | talk | contribs 18:37, 11 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Sir William Spring II (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) (delete) – (View log)

Hoax Kittybrewster ☎ 15:29, 10 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete as hoax, per Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Baron Lavenham and Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Peerage_and_Baronetage#Baron_Lavenham
  ~~ Phoe _talk ~~ 15:40, 10 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  Keep, Rename probably to William Spring and Tidy Up the fantasies.
  ~~ Phoe _talk ~~ 11:42, 11 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep. Verifiable as an MP, see e.g. [1]. Choess (talk)

No. Rayment says that is Sir William Spring, 1st Baronet. Kittybrewster ☎ 09:29, 11 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Different people: in 1625, Sir William Spring, 1st Baronet was only 12 years old, so the MP, mentioned in Choess' source has to be another one.

~~ Phoe _talk ~~ 11:42, 11 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

• Comment. I was asked to comment here in a note from Kittybrewster on my talk page. My first thought is that MPs from before the late 19th century need a lot of caution, because of the proliferation in many areas of identically-named members of the same extended families. In this case, the two sources we have are:

• Choess's link to the table in the 1856 paper by Rev lord Arthur Hervey which lists a "Sir William Spring" as MP for Bury St Edmunds from 1640 to some point before 1654.
• Kittybrewster's pointer to Leigh Rayment's page listing Sir William Spring, 1st Baronet as MP for Bury St Edmunds from 1646 until his death in 1654.

So those two sources are in broad agreement that a "Sir William Spring" was MP for Bury in the Long Parliament, differing only on whether a William Spring was returned to the start of the Long Parliament or later. Matters get somewhat tangled here, because of the complex parliamentary history of the civil war era: dates alone may be an inadequate indicator, because of the overlap between the Long Parliament and the First Protectorate Parliament and its successors. I can see that a bare listing of MPs by date in that period might get tangled by different perspectives on the legitimacy or otherwise of the three Protectorate Parliaments, the third of which was replaced by the Long Parliament in the prelude to the restoration in 1660. On that basis, I'd be inclined to proceed with a lot of caution and seek further sources, but it's important to note that the article on Sir William Spring II does not claim that Spring II was the Bury MP. Instead it claims that he was the republican father of the royalist Sir William Spring, 1st Baronet, and that does seems possible.

The least plausible possibility so far seems to me to be Choess's suggestion that the Sir William Spring II was the Bury St Edmunds MP. Neither of the sources unambiguously supports that, nor is it claimed in the alleged hoax article.

As to the rest of the article, I think that the essence of its claim is possible: republican father of a royalist son.

However, I am very suspicious of the article's apparent reliance solely on local history sources, which can be of highly variable quality. All too often, the authors fascination with their subjects outweighs their scholarly rigour; their selection and interpretation of the primary sources can be flawed, and in some cases closeness to the subject can bring severe bias.

In this case, the article on Sir William Spring II refers to the arrest of "his royalist son" in 1656. Rayment lists the first son as having died in 1654, so either this is simply wrong, or the father had two royalist sons; possible, but less likely.

As to the reliability of Rayment as a source, I have at times queried Rayment's accuracy wrt to MPs from Baronet families, but 9 times out of 10 I have been persuaded that I have misread things. However, the scanty nature of Rayment's bare listings makes it difficult to check in ambiguous cases.

So my best suggestion is to delete both Sir William Spring II and Sir William Spring, 1st Baronet. So far I don't think that we have enough unambiguous reliable sources to support the central claims of either article with anything near enough certainty to justify publication. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 12:16, 11 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

• Strong delete. For the reasons outlined in my comment above, and because the creator of the article on Sir William Spring II (and supplier of its sources) is 00vis (talk · contribs), who has demonstrably used false references in the article on Baron Lavenham: see Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Baron Lavenham. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 12:22, 11 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
• PS Note a further inconsistency in Sir William Spring II. It claims that Spring II was born in 1610, and was father of the 1st Baronet; but Rayment's baronets page lists the first baronet as having been born in 1613. Spring II may indeed have been a precociously virile lad, but if he was a father at age 3 he'd be a celebrated case in medical histories. This thing has hoax written all over it. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.