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Ordonnance Archers Complete !

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Well here we are, this feels like the end of a very long journey !

I've been striving to get this unit just right and, as I'm finding with this army, that has meant a lot of conversion work and scouring of books and the web to create a result that I'm happy with.

The nucleus of that notion began here with an essay of  my understanding of the French lance of the early 1500's; essentially the gendarmes were the easy bit, I really wanted to try and understand the organisation of the Ordonnance Archers. 

Unfortunately I didn't reach a conclusion of any certainty, I found source material of lance composition in the late 15c and from the late 1520's so I went for something in the middle.

Once I had a reasonable idea of where I was going to go I focused my efforts upon trying to find some images and the key source was a series of Flemish tapestries of the early 1520's depicting the story of David and Bathsheba, as discussed in the previous blog post, for ease here's the main source of inspiration;


This piece entitled 'rassemblement des chevaliers' shows cavalry in a progress with a mix of heavily and fabulously equipped gendarmes alongside men at arms in older armour and lightly equipped coustilliers, no archers unfortunately but an interesting mix of arms and armament.

In my effort to replicate the processional nature of this piece in some way I have opted for the Wargames Foundry horses, they're a bit smaller than the Perry plastics but not that noticeably. I think i'll no doubt have a more active unit of archers and gendarmes in addition to these.

Perhaps unsurprisingly there are very few appropriate figures out there, some manufacturers have made an effort to give a nod to the French Ordonnance Archer though perhaps because of the evolving nature of them I did not find what was available to be either relevant or at the standard for what I wanted to achieve so the next challenge was to muster my rather infant skills of sculpting and converting to see whether I could do it any justice.

So with the brief of sculpting something with no real certainty as per the research and images in mind I arrived at this conclusion;


Here we have men at arms alongside mounted archers and a coustillier (in blue) thrown in too. I've mixed them up a little basing wise to emphasise the variation. In saying that the men at arms are a bit more of a definite thing and It's no leap of faith to imagine these forming the second line of a charge behind the gendarmes.


As for the archers, from the many months I've been putting this together I have no doubt that they were facsimiles of their English counterparts - scouting, mopping up and in something of a dragoon role on the battlefield. The coustillier, combatant or not depends on interpretation but I felt I couldn't neglect to show one.



The other aspect that I have tried as far as sculpting goes is to emphasise the status and role of the figures in the group; the men at arms have skirts fitted to their armour, within which I have sculpted a simple skirt as well as short and long skirted coats, the standard bearer is perhaps the most wealthy with decorated and slashed coat. This as opposed to the more uniform issue base coats of the archers and the coustillier in his own reasonably well off clothes and a slashed leather jerkin.

This unit has taken a few months to come together, the men at arms were sculpted quite a while ago whereas I sculpted the archers fairly recently, it's probably my critical eye but I can see that there is a difference in my ability over that period. I have been sculpting this week and it certainly feels like I have increased that a few steps again. It's certainly something that gets better and easier with momentum, I suppose it's the same with painting but I do find that when I have a break for a while I have to re-learn a few tricks to achieve the results I want.


I went with just a single banner for these, I'll definitely add more as I'd like to carry on with more figures on this theme. The image on the banner is a mix of a number of contemporary sources; St. Michael from this painting on wood panel from the late 1490's, something also replicated fairly closely in images from 1507;


I then added star emblems which are fairly generic of French symbolism around this time. I opted for a simple red background to differentiate this unit from the Gendarmes which will have the parti-coloured banner with St. Michael and Louis XII's porcupine (also shown above). As with all of my banners this was hand painted.

How on earth you'd wargame with this 'unit' I really don't know ! ha, another reason that I don't really game that much, perhaps that gives me a little more freedom to really try hard at depicting a historical representation. Though I suppose you could vary their use as your whim or scenario required.


There we are, I could be entirely wrong but it's my best shot, I hope you've enjoyed the journey as much as I have !

Next up, some Gendarmes, four to be precise to complete the proportionate representation of the 1513 French lance.


Oh go on then, here's a sneak peek at the initial progress with the points of reference below;


 



Bye for now

Stuart



The Last Apostle AAR

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This weekend myself and Simon Chick were invited to put on a scenario at the British Lead Adventure gaming meeting, a social / gaming meeting of contributors to the Lead Adventure Forum.

If you're not aware of the forum have a look, I have used it for years now as a source of honest critique and as a forum to discuss wargaming, painting and history. They're a most welcoming bunch, very much an online gaming community. For a lone painter like myself this serves to give me the encouragement and discussion that I would otherwise get from a gaming club, it's a god send.

If you don't know Simon you may be familiar with his blogs on the Burgundian Wars & Hundred Years War, whether or not these are your period you will find inspiration in buckets.

We were tasked in putting on a relatively small game that could be played at least twice over a day. I had a particular small action in mind, one which has captivated my imagination since I began collecting my Tudor army, the events of 27-28 July 1513;

The (King's) middle ward once outside the English territory of the Pale were subject to repeated harassment on its way to join those already besieging Therouanne. On this day a force comprising troops from Bolougne and Montreuil under the command of Bayard and de Piennes engaged the English, apparently with a view to capture or kill Henry himself. 

The ward stood its ground and whilst Henry took safe haven among the ranks of his mercenary Landsknechts the ward engaged the attackers with artillery, with none of their own to reply the French left the field (not before a lone knight challenged Henry to single combat - he refused!). When the ward moved on again some of the guns began to fall behind, one of the heaviest pieces, cast with the image of St. John the Evangelist, came to grief and slipped from its limber into a stream. This was a brand new gun (more on this later) and had hitherto not fired a shot, she weighed 3 tons and it was clearly going to take some effort to recover her. 

George Buckemer, a master carpenter from Calais reckoned he could get the gun out, the ward pressed on and he and a hundred workmen and a skeleton guard set to work but a powerful French force had been waiting from a safe distance and fell upon the scene with lance, crossbow and arquebus. The party were mostly slaughtered or taken prisoner but the gun remained mired, the carpenter was later blamed for his over confidence as one 'who would work all of his own head without counsel'.

Henry was somewhat annoyed at the loss of his beloved Apostle, sending Henry Bourchier, the Earl of Essex and a noble commander of cavalry, Sir Reese(sic) ap Thomas back to see if they could rescue the stricken piece. Lord Berners, master gunner was able to secure the gun to a limber but before they could make off a large French force appeared attacking the rear of the party as it moved off. The English responded with great spirit and forced the French to retreat leaving St John to nobly return to Henry's arsenal.

In trying to find more about this I stumbled upon the exact scenario, practically gift wrapped, so to give credit where it is due thank you Jay of solo wargaming I hope you're pleased with our efforts.

On to the Game, the scenario is summarised in the solo wargaming link above, we used Lion Rampant rules with a couple of adaptions; 
  • Infantry units were represented by 2 of my 60x60mm bases, 12 figures in the case of Longbowmen and 6 in the case of French skirmishers.
  • Cavalry units were represented as 1 60x60mm base of 2 figures - we doubled this in the second game.
  • It was then a case of adapting renaissance troop types into the Lion Rampant roster sheets which was fairly easy.
Over to Richard aka Captain Blood for the report with a few additions from me in brackets - I was too busy attempting to umpire and play !


At our British Lead Adventure meeting last weekend, I played in a splendid game staged by two of our resident top medieval modellers and painters, Stuart and Painterman. 
It was a real treat to get to play with a small portion of their exquisitely modelled and painted figure collections.

A quick photo battle report follows.

Points to note:

1. All the figures are from Stuart and Simon's collections and the terrain is also Simon's.
2. The shine on some of the figures is purely down to the light in the room.

The rules used were Lion Rampant, which worked pretty well. There was a quite surprising amount of evading, falling back, running away, and rallying. Casualties were fairly brutal.

The scenario was as follows, based on a real historical event:

Henry VIII's invasion of France in 1513. 

Not far from Calais, one of his twelve large guns of great magnitude each named after an Apostle 'this particular beast being called 'St John The Evangelist' has become stuck crossing the shallows of a river...

Henry Lord Bourchier, the Earl of Essex, along with Sir Rhys ap Thomas have been despatched post-haste with a rescue mission (and a stout wagon) to retrieve the missing artillery piece before it falls into French hands. But the French are also en route with an eye on the prize...

It was largely a fast-moving cavalry action. The forces were well balanced - the English with units of demi-lances, scurrers or border horse, and of course two companies of longbowmen. 
The French with a whole variety of horsemen from heavily armoured gendarmes, through mounted ordonnance archers to mercenary Stradiot cavalry. Backed up by a company of arquebusiers.

[The game began with] the super-gun in question, stuck in the shallows on a bend in the river.


The English Relief force arrives;


At the same time the French make their presence known;


An advance party of mounted archers espie the English rescue wagon, trundling toward its objective;


The English Longbowmen take the field and prepare to see off the French in time-honoured fashion... Not terribly successfully to begin with, but they got better...


Whilst Essex heads straight to the river with the border horse, the demilancers led by Sir Rees ap Thomas, sweep nobly across the meadow to take the advancing French gendarmes head on...


But with the Stradiots almost upon the river, Essex himself plunges forward to confront the gendarmes and drive them back...


As the longbows begin to have a deleterious effect on the French, causing various withdrawals..


...a charge by the border horse forces the stradiots to evade, just as Essex breaks the gendarmes... Leaving the rather strange spectacle of one stand of gendarmes racing off the field as another surges forward into the fray!


Another view of this excitement. At this point, Essex, somewhat wounded, is behind the clump of trees, right. [here you can also see our use of Border Horse to screen the river bank, these chaps from the Percy estates really proved their form in several charge and evade actions]


As the English horse establish more of a secure defensive screen, the rescue wagon reaches the river...


But wait... The routing gendarmes have rallied, turned, and come roaring back in to have another go, leaving the gallant border horse no alternative but to throw themselves in harm's way..


The wagon spends three turns recovering St John The Evangelist, whilst the tide of battle washes around it... 

The Earl of Essex however, is mortally wounded (as can be seen by all those arrow casualty markers) and expires shortly afterwards, as the French arquebusiers finally catch up with their cavalry and start popping away...


In this engagement (we managed two during the day) St. John made it off the table however though with the loss of Essex, one of the objectives, the game was a draw.

I thoroughly enjoyed myself, Simon's cart, mired crew limbering in the water and fully limbered gun really made for a visual spectacle, as did his gendarmes charging about the place. This really gave me the impetus to paint up these missing elements from my collections as well as to properly represent at least one of the most interesting 'guns of great magnitude,' the twelve apostles to which Henry had a great attachment as this scenario proves.

None of them are known to have survived though it has generally been accepted that each of the 12 pieces were of the same size, the main source in their regard is the payment for their founding in bronze in Flanders, a whopping £1344, 10s per gun as well as a bespoke carriage at £12 per gun.

Martin du Bellay when describing how St. John fell into the water stated that it was a 'double grand culverin 'of which the army had 12 of the same calibre. Furthermore lists of the wards state the Apostles as being the heaviest pieces after the siege bombards, these go on to state that the Apostles required 30 Flanders mares to pull the ammunition and ancillary equipment. Each Apostle was assigned a chief gunner, paid at 16d per day as well as 8 carters and other crew.

To give you an idea of their size here is a demi-cannon from the Mary Rose which I believe is slightly bigger than a double grand culverin but not too far off.


So, who knows we may see this scenario again with the French fully represented with their respective commanders but a good day had by all. Thanks again for your contributions chaps, I had a blast - see what I did there.......

Bye for now

Stuart

French Missile Foot II

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Throughout this year I have been developing my skill at sculpting, this began with some humble additions to existing figures to more recently attempting to change the entire look of a miniature, the general impetus for which has been to bring the existing Perry figures into the early 1500's for my French and Tudor armies.

As a result I've created some rather unique figures. They take a while to do as essentially I will keep at something - an shoulder, arm or whatever - until I feel it's right, thus with each figure I further my abilities and learn some methods or tricks along the way, what works and what doesn't.

I'm in no rush either so they quietly develop at a slow pace in the background, I've found it's also a break from painting as well as in itself inspiring me to paint so it's win win.

This small offering of 3 figures has been worked upon over the last few months. These are additions to my existing missile foot which, if you compare you can see the development of the sculpting from start to now, you can see how I sculpted the previous missile foot figures here.

In this base I experimented with representing a Swiss and an Italian, or rather, those were my influences while sculpting. There's also a French chap there too. Here I began with the French chap, then Italian and then Swiss, just across those 3 you can see a modest progress in my ability.

It is all trial and error, anyone can do it, you've just got to start.

First up is a French inspired arquebusier;


I sculpted this one quite some time ago so he's fairly modest in comparison to the others. This sculpt involved cutting and filing the livery jacket off the plastic figure then re-sculpting the top of the hose and creating a cod piece. In addition I then added the points for fastening, shirt pulled through at the bottom and puffed up the shoulders. I'm fairly happy with it, I later mastered puffed shoulders with the Swiss figure below and perhaps a bare head with cloth cap may have worked better but he'll pass muster.

Next we have an Italian inspired sculpt;


In creating this figure I felt I crossed a threshold in my ability, as essentially I had to sculpt all of the clothing using a Perry Ansar as my starting point;


To begin I cut then filed away the loincloth, I then sculpted the shirt, using the existing necklace as the shirt collar, this worked quite well. Following that I added the base coat, shoes, arms (both also from the Ansar sprue) and finally the head. This was an Ansar head to which I added hair and a cloth cap. I cut an arquebus in half and glued to the arm. I'm not too sure about the position of the left arm but not bad overall, there's some good movement in this one and I was particularly pleased with the voluminous shirt sleeves.

Finally the Swiss inspired Crossbowman;



This is perhaps my favourite yet. As with the first I began by filing away then re-building the waist, I didn't quite file enough of the rear but not bad nonetheless. The torso began with the undershirt, then the doublet with eyelet fastening showing on the top right and finally the arms and beard.

One key advance here was a tremendous tip; use e45 for moisture rather than water. It helps to have some moisture as you go to keep the flow of the putty pushing and to help achieve the forms you are trying to create, whilst it is possible with water the use of e45 or petroleum jelly just makes it a whole lot easier, you need the tiniest amount, minuscule even but it will honestly revolutionise what you're doing and make it a lot easier.

So here's the complete base, a rag tag bunch just right for French adventuriers with mercenary tag alongs;


Here they are with the rest of their unit, the basing of each stand is on the notion of their engagement in fire and manoeuvre, I'm not sure if that is perhaps a modern tactical application but it looks good for skirmishers.


Apologies for the quality of these photographs, my digital SLR died last week, a very sad occasion, suggestions on a good mid range replacement are most welcome.

These chaps require a suitable command base for which I have made initial progress upon, here's a sneak preview;


I chose an at ease pose for this build, he will stand next to the standard bearer and either another crossbowman or possibly a halberd armed chap.

That's all for now, just 3 figures but progress nonetheless and some momentum with the green stuff, it gets easier with practice, Picasso says it better; 'Inspiration exists, but it has to find us working'.

All the best

Stuart

FOR SALE Louis XII Guard Archers

French Gendarmes, Part I

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I am currently working upon a unit of French Gendarmes, it is still very much a work in progress as there's a fair amount of fine detail work, you may have seen a glimpse of these over the last month or so over on the Lead Adventure Forum and my Pinterest pages, If you have thanks for your comments they've kept me going.

There's so much fine detail that I have taken to sculpting of late to give myself a break ! Anyway, I shall walk you through the progress of the unit thus far and try and offer some tips to the daunting task of their intricate painting.

As you may expect it is important to have an array of source material at hand, you really need to get a feel for the period and moreover how clothing and armour fitted, the materials used and the patterns on the cloth. If you're a fan of the period you will no doubt be fairly familiar with what a gendarme looks like but you'll be surprised at what you can find with a more detailed look and indeed where that inspiration can take you.

With that in mind and as an ease into this unit I based the first gendarme on a tapestry from a series commissioned by Henry VIII; 'La Tenture de David et Bethsabee', I have made reference to this in past postings, you can find a book of the same name available at around £25 from the Musee national de la Renaissance which lavishly portrays the series of works in detail. The inspiration within that series for the first chap is this;


He wears a fine armour over which is a skirted coat of cloth of silver lined with cloth of gold - In English society only people of a high standing and / or with royal permission could wear this, I'm not sure if that is the same for French but it was certainly a display of wealth and status.

This wealth is further displayed in the horse caparison armour, in this instance a geometric design, note also that the coat of the knight is not in the same pattern, I've seen some images which do illustrate this but it is an interesting point which adds variety. In addition the lance is for war - no barber stripes here and also the plumes are not multi-coloured, which I have seen but I do think that a single colour helps the figure to appear more historical.  Here's my interpretation, it is by no means a facsimile rather I have taken the image as a starting point;




I quite enjoyed painting the geometric design and from here I took the star element of the horse armour pattern as inspiration for another gendarme;



I opted to have the Gendarme's coat in a different contrasting colour, a rich green with yellow border. Also the plumes are red as are the bows and armour strappings to tie the whole piece together. On that note I added very fine strokes of orange to give a bit more body to the plumes.

The method I used for the geometric design is as follows; Begin by painting the area in the base coat, in this instance I have added a brown wash and re-painted the base coat to get a good fill of clear colour to work upon. 

I then painted in dots of brown, taking care to try and ensure even spacing - it's easier this way than painting the design to completion then finding out it is out of line. Then paint each star in the base coat of whatever colour you're working with, there's a star example below. Also keep the dots in line and don't follow the contour of the armour otherwise you wont have the clear lines you require.



These take time, to keep the momentum up I then did a couple of less detailed chaps;




For this figure as the horse is not armoured I have painted a coat of rich red and yellow damask to display the rider's wealth. I took elements of the design from a wall hanging in the aforementioned book but you can find examples of damask patterns in most renaissance images - In addition, have a look at wallpaper designs, provided they're not too modern you can use them as a starting point, as the pattern is not crowded by anything else you'll find it easier to copy, here's a couple of examples from Farrow and Ball, both of which are based upon historic styles;

  

The next Gendarme has rejected any skirt or coat to show off his latest suit of gilt edged Maximilian armour upon which for recognition is painted a white cross of St. Denis.


The last member of the group is a converted piece; I sculpted a slashed coat on the rider and frontal armour on the horse - the Pavia Tapestry shows quite a few of the French and Imperial cavalry with half-armoured horses.

I gave the rider a yellow and red bordered coat (again from the above book) and used a sun motif for the horse armour, suns feature fairly regularly in most depictions, I opted for a sun with a face, each panel has a different expression.




The rider was fairly straightforward; I used an existing figure with a skirt and added the top with GS front and back. As for the horse, that took a little more time. I used the frontal Italian horse armour from the Perry MAA set as a base upon which to add GS. The armour is in three pieces, each was cut and filed to size and glued which then gave a base upon which to sculpt the additions, the raised boss on each side and added shape to the bottom as well as larger reins and fittings, here's a couple of progress photographs;


The horse has been prepared and filed with a pin added for stability, each piece is then individually worked upon with drying in between. 


Ready to paint. In hindsight I think the front piece could have a slight angle on it rather than sitting flat on the chest but it's not too much to worry about.

So there we have it, a crash course in Gendarme painting. Flags and more to follow.

That's all for now, more in the New Year.

All the best to you and yours

Stuart








WIP French Artillery Crew

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Hello, Bonjour, I'm back !

After a rather serious bout of painter's block I'm pleased to say that things are looking up, family and work commitments, interior decorating and beer - mainly beer have all been an easy alternative to the painting desk, I do dislike it when these periods occur but occur they do.

Work on the Gendarmes is on hold for the moment, they're intricate and have required a lot of time and attention so this project has been something of an ongoing distraction piece to dip in and out of.

This group will form the nucleus of crew for 2 light artillery pieces. I'd had both of these packs for quite some time and wondered how I could use them, then with some confidence with sculpting I revisited the idea to re-assess their potential. I must say they certainly proved to be fairly easy conversions; head swaps and cap or arm embellishments have brought these nicely into the 1500's, here's some further exploration of their development;


Left to right;

Gunner 1; here I used green stuff to build up the existing arms to heavy puffed and slashed sleeves, these were done arm by arm in two stages. The top of the arm was sculpted down to about the elbow, dried overnight then carried on to the wrist - I found out the hard way that it was difficult to sculpt in one piece without obscuring the detail in my handling, doing it in two stages also enabled me to get a greater natural hang of the cloth, hopefully this is apparent on the painted example below. The back was filed around the neck then a thin GS seam was added at the top to give that typical early renaissance low square neck on the jacket - you can see this particularly on the rear photograph below.

Gunner 2; the head was swapped with that from a Wargames Foundry pikeman (also a Perry sculpt) and as above the jacket was remodelled at the neck. Following this I then sculpted voluminous sleeves in turn, these were done in one go per sleeve, they were a bit tricky to get the drop right but a few attempts gave this end result. Here I found that if the putty is drying out a bit and it's still not satisfactory it's easier to let it dry and peel it off rather than trying to do it whilst it's still tacky.

Gunner 3; another head swap with the addition of a 'Bishop's Mantle' chain mail neck and shoulder protection. Of the three whilst I'm happy with the work on this figure I'm not sure if the earlier jacket confuses the end result. I considered trying to make it longer but concluded it would be rather difficult to do owing to the pose. I'm going to paint it in a drab colour to give the impression of the gunner using an old coat, hopefully he'll turn out OK.


Here are the first painted examples and another figure to join the group, the Master Gunner.


Again, a head swap was the first amendment, this required sculpting a shirt neck as the fit was quite tight, incidentally for all head swaps they were pinned and glued for strength. Following this I then sculpted some slashed breeches just showing above the knee as well as the addition of some quite hefty sideburns.


I'm quite pleased with the results so far, particularly on the loader, the arms and re-sculpted jacket have worked really well.

I hope you like them.

Thanks for looking

Stuart



Dismounted Knights 1500-1530 Kickstarter, Get involved !

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It's not often that I get behind Kickstarter projects but this one is rather special, a chance to be a part of something and with a bit of luck you could get your hands on some really bespoke pieces, so have a look at the fabulous pieces on offer at Oliver's Kickstarter;


There's some dedicated work here, I don't consider these as merely figures but works of a real master craftsman. These are display pieces really, figures that can really enhance your units or merely to have as mini works of art to inspire you.

That's the very reason I'm getting behind this, that feeling of imagining an entirely new unit, army even, on the basis of a figure. The figure on the right from the pair above is just that in appealing to my early Tudor interest. It is very much reminiscent of the 1527 'Genouilhac' armour, the earliest surviving garniture from Henry VIII's Greenwich workshop established 1511.


Its first outing was a joust held on 5 March 1527 when Henry was seen to appear in a 'newe harness all gilte of a strange fashion that had not bene sene' what would later become known as the Greenwich style encapsulating the various Western European influences of the international armourers in Henry's employ. This harness was manufactured by the Almain (German) armourers with the addition of a ventral plate - a feature unique to this workshop; at that time a closely guarded revolutionary W shaped plate worn beneath the cuirass to evenly distribute weight. 

That's just one figure that my obsessive niche interest picked out immediately. 

Moreover, these are all awe inspiring figures, one could create an impressive Scots or English command for Flodden, there's also a figure with a unique late transition sallet which would be suitable as a knight or a very mean doppelsoldner for your Landsknecht ranks. There's also scope here for an interesting Foot Combat typical of the tournaments of the period.

At this stage there are six miniatures on offer covering - what I consider - the 1500-1530 period with an onus on the early 1500's. Oliver has clearly got very much into the Maximilian style favoured during this period which I imagine is not an easy armour to tackle with green stuff. Perhaps a contributing factor in there being almost nothing on offer to cover dismounted knights of the early Renaissance.

In addition there are further representations of armour in contemporary Western European styles which, within a relatively modest collection perfectly represent this experimental and fluid period of late armour development.

It gets better, at the time of writing half the target has been reached - if successful there's more in progress which I believe will include figures in more static standing poses - just add a pike and your Scots Flodden command is looking rather nice indeed.

Have a look at the Kickstarter link to see more photographs and accompanying design notes.

All the best

Stuart

French Light Couleuvrine & Crew

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It's been a while in development but well worth the wait I hope, here we have the light culverin [sic] & crew painted and ready for war.

The figures began life as a Perry Wars of the Roses field gun with crew to which I used head swaps and green stuff to bring the crew into the early Renaissance, you can see more about their development in this earlier post.





As you may be able to see from the unpainted figures above I'm in the process of converting a second crew which should hopefully see some colour soon.

These guns are typical of the 1480's but served for quite some time, I suspect as long as they had a meaningful role and were safe to use. The hoop and iron bar construction fast became inferior to cast bronze and iron though as short to medium range anti-personnel they were still perfectly able.

I have painted the metal parts as dull iron with highlights of metal, over which I then applied a thin wash of dark orange/brown to reflect that these were not the newest pieces in Louis' arsenal.



For reference, guns of this construction were numerous on the Mary Rose, perhaps down to cost but favoured, I suspect for their ease of loading and faster rate of fire within the confines of a closed gun deck.

Incidentally, these pieces are also typical of those used by the English at Flodden though they are described as Serpentines, there are numerous terms for guns of varying sizes, Serpentine and Couleuvrine being descriptive of a breech or muzzle loading gun of 3.5-7ft long.


Bye for now

Stuart



Royal Armouries Gaming Event 2016

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Leeds Royal Armouries are hosting a Hundred Years War weekend historical and gaming event on the weekend of 23 & 24 April. This theme celebrates the recent re-location of the Agincourt diorama from the 600 year anniversary exhibition in the Tower of London to its permanent home in Leeds.

Over this weekend there will be a number of participation wargames on display and you can also get the opportunity to see the Perry Brothers and diorama modeller David Marshall in a talk about the creation of the diorama. In addition there's also the fantastic collection of arms and armour available at the armouries. You can find more information about the event here;

https://www.royalarmouries.org/events/calendar/2016-04-23/hundred-years-war-gaming-event

One of the games on display will be Simon Chick's Salute 2015 triple award winning Agincourt game. Simon is an avid collector of HYW figures and over the years has put on a number of games displaying key battles of the conflict, you can lose several hours admiring his exploits on his HYW blog here;

http://harness-and-array.blogspot.co.uk/

I will be assisting Simon with this game so if you're thinking of coming along do have a look and say hello - I might even be able to sneak in some Renaissance chat if no-one's listening.

For my part I have made a meagre contribution to the game. Simon has increased the size of the forces for the game since last year during which time the Perry French Infantry and Knights plastic boxed sets have been very much well received and will feature. In discussing this with Simon and admiring his dedication and commitment to his collection I commented that at that time my painting had taken a back seat so he kindly gave me a French Knight sprue to use as a distraction piece to get me back into it. Not long after that I was back painting gendarmes and artillery so it certainly worked. The fruits of this labour are these 6 knights which will join the reinforcements for the game. Fun to put together and fantastically detailed they were a joy to paint. Here are some closer photographs for your enjoyment;

Guillaume Martel, Sire de Bacqueville




Jacques de Crequy




Jean le Veneur, Sire de Homme



Jean V, Sire de Poix




Charles d'Albret, Constable of France




I hope you enjoyed that painting interlude, normal service will resume soon - presently working on some Landsknechts in French service.

All the best 

Stuart

Early Renaissance French Lance

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Here we have a completed unit of French Gendarmes, based and ready for action.



The flags are hand drawn and painted, I have gone for France Royal and a cross of St.Denis with the livery colours of Louis XII. This design is replicated in a number of commercially available flags and a couple of old wargames articles as a flag of 'Louis XII Gendarmes' though I must admit I have not seen the design in a contemporary image but it certainly seems probable and I liked the design so I chose it.

You can enjoy a closer figure by figure review in an earlier WIP post here.

In addition to the figures covered in that post I also worked on a final figure to bring the complement to 6 figures. I opted for a full caparison and skirted coat of blue/grey with inlaid dark blue damask and thread of gold trim.



 

This may look daunting to do but as with some of the designs discussed in the earlier post I find it's just a matter of putting the process into stages and dealing with each in turn. 

Using the horse as an example I painted the armour and areas of exposed flesh first in the normal manner. I then painted the caparison in the blue grey shade colour which was washed with a 1:1:1:1 mix of the shade colour, deep blue, black and water. Once dry I repainted the base colour leaving folds and creases in the dark wash colour which then gives an initial highlight.

I then mixed the wash colour without water and painted the damask design. I have found in comparison to geometric designs with clear lines that free flowing designs such as this can be a bit more forgiving with mistakes easier to correct. If you need to correct something just paint over with the shade base coat.

Then it's a case of building up the highlight colours on the inlaid areas with a final highlight around the design.

Hope that makes sense, you can get a better impression of this process in the close up above.



In addition to painting these figures I have been keen for quite a while, since December 2014 in fact (I'm a slow worker) to try and represent what a French Ordonnance lance would have looked like in the early renaissance period.

I began by compiling something of an essay post of historic sources, current opinion and the thoughts of fellow gamers, you can view it here. The conclusion being 1 gendarme/man at arms to 2 archers with some speculation about exactly what the archers were. I settled for a mid ground of 1 as a lightly armed mounted archer with bow (an early dragoon) and 1 as a lance armed medium cavalryman or what the English would refer to as a demi-lancer. 




I also threw in a coustillier (chap in blue with the mounted archers) to complete the look. 

I based the gendarmes 3 figures to a base to represent jostling for position in the en haye line of battle, these then followed by the archer cavalry on 2 figures to a base, here's the result.


For comparison, here's the image that sparked my imagination to do this mini project.


This is now my blueprint for future units of French cavalry, whether it's right I don't suppose we'll really know but It certainly feels and looks about right. In creating this unit I have thoroughly tested my painting and sculpting abilities but hopefully it was worth it - I'm sure they'll be disastrously wiped out in their first venture on the table.

All the best

Stuart



The Walls of Therouanne Part III

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This weekend I joined Simon Chick and Steve Hall at Leeds Royal Armouries to put on a repeat of Simon's award winning Agincourt game. Both have very nicely summarised the day on their respective blogs linked above. 

Whilst I was there I met David Marshall of TM Terrain to collect the latest stage of a rolling 1513 siege of Therouanne scenery and terrain project to complement my armies.

This phase is the second instalment of the west side of Therouanne's city walls. If you're interested to learn about the start of the project, background information and initial works have a look at these earlier posts covering the first commission and a follow up covering a small party of bespoke defenders.

In brief I am essentially working my way from the centre to the right of the 1537 painting below (part of a larger image of Charles V's siege of the town.) The octagonal tower, house and round tower were completed in the first phase and this phase completed an additional house and trailing edge of the wall, immediately prior to a gatehouse. 

There are a few good quality contemporary images of the town which all repeat particular features of the walls, most of which I have used as specifics for the commission.




The main point of interest in these walls are the integral buildings within the wall structure, a sign of less turbulent times perhaps. The images available depict buildings of apparent whitewash and/or brick construction with crowstep ends, other than these pointers the rest would be down to further research and artistic license. 

I wanted the buildings to have a distinctly Northern French / Flemish look typical for the region so I set about finding some reference images. The easiest platform for this was Pinterest and quite soon I had developed a sizeable french medieval buildings gallery to help David get a good feel for the design brief.

David kept me updated as he worked, here are the works in progress;






By far the greatest element of this phase was the house. I had stipulated brick sides and crow step facades. The brick had to be in Flemish bond, parts of which were to be in a pattern on each side, there were to be high clay chimney pots and a low arch over the doors on either side. The front and rear of the house were to be half timbered in a distinctly French style and dorma windows needed to be in the roof;





David's interpretation of the brief by far exceeded all expectations, as can be gathered by this candid shot;


Here are a few mock ups with some of the valiant French and mercenary garrison;


This is part of the new section of wall, I asked for some considerable damage to represent persistent bombardment from Henry's artillery. I particularly like the way in which the modelling shows the different layers of construction / destruction. It also provides some alternative cover for the defenders to fire their bolts, arrows and shot.


The city walls were described in eyewitness accounts as being 'well provided with artillery and expert cannoneers who took a regular toll on the besiegers.'


Here's the whole wall in situ, measuring just under 6ft.




The next stage of the project will be some bespoke terrain boards for the wall to sit on. Accounts of the siege describe the walls having ditches in front, 'so deep that men feared to fall in if they went too close to the edge,  [the ditch banks] covered in turn with impenetrable hedges.

Meanwhile I think I shall do some more defenders for the walls, an excuse to get the green stuff out and get back into sculpting.

Bye for now

Stuart


Works in progress

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I've presently got a couple of projects running concurrently and as it's been two months since my last post I thought I'd say a quick hello and give an update and a look at what's on the workbench.

First up we have an unexpected return of attention to my early Tudor army - thought I'd give a clue above.

This was not quite intentional, over the last couple of years I have made attempts at sculpting various renaissance bits on to the  Perry WOTR plastic bodies, effectively using them as sculpting dollies, the progress of which can be seen in past posts. I've had mixed results but generally tend to have something on the go to keep my hand in - there's a lot that doesn't make it !

The base coat, very much a key characteristic of the early Tudor army and to a lesser extent that of their French counterparts had frustratingly eluded me, I'd had reasonable results but I just wasn't happy with them, until;

 

I can't quite summarise how it happened, just practice and many failed attempts which in turn drove me to keep trying. This was about 3 weeks ago and now I've finally found a technique which yields a good result I've had a steady flow of bodies in various stages of completion on the workbench, the very latest of which (as of today) is this chap;


I shall continue to putty push basecoats for the foreseeable. I shelved a notion to re-base my Tudor collection some time ago but have returned to the idea as a vehicle to integrate some figures of this appearance with the others to help lift the units into the early 16th century, there may even be a few that end up weeded out and make their way to eBay. I also had a few more nobles that I was keen to represent before I called a halt to begin my French army so it's win win. More on this soon.

If you can't wait for that long, I tend to post figure by figure updates for critique on this Lead Adventure Forum thread which incidentally also shows my various sculpting projects over the last 2 years;


All is not lost for Louis however as green stuff takes time to dry and the brushwork needs to be equally exercised so I've also been steadily building a unit of Landsknechts in French service, here's a preview;



In addition, I also have a side project of some early WW2 British which are in various stages of completion though I must admit that with the latest sculpting breakthrough I have very much been focused on the Renaissance, this blog is back in business !

Bye for now

Stuart




The Battle of the Spurs, sculpting & terrain bumper bonanza !

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In the last week or so I've had three events worthy of posting about, rather than doing them individually I thought it best to simply do a bumper summer blog posting.

Last year I commissioned David Marshall of TM Terrain to add to my existing terrain representation of the South West side of the walls of Therouanne. The nucleus of this commission was that this side faces the villages of Bomy and Guinegatte (Enguinegatte), the ground between which saw the Battle of the Spurs on the 16 August 1513, one of the key notable points of Henry's French campaign of that year, you can see a summary of the historical battle in an earlier blog post here.

Following the addition of the real estate the natural progression was some bespoke terrain to hold the walls; a road runs alongside with open terrain to the left and deep trenches skirt the walls, an eyewitness account of a Welsh soldier testified that these trenches were so deep that men were afraid to walk near the edge in case they fell in and their banks were set with impenetrable hedges, David's interpretation of this next chapter in the commission partnership can be seen in these photographs taken in his workshop;




*  *  *  *  *

With a reasonable section of walls and accompanying terrain the Army Royal venture had reached a notable chapter in its 8 year history, a refight of the Battle of The Spurs seemed a fitting way to mark the occasion.

To help realise this notion Michael Perry and Simon Chick offered their assistance; Michael had the space, additional figures and considerably more terrain to fully represent the action whilst Simon stepped in to offer troops from his Burgundian armies to bolster my meagre French forces. The stage was set for a day of gaming and socialising.

Michael had done his homework in researching the action and set up the field of battle in advance, with his permission I have saved myself some writing and shall handover to his account and expert photography of the day's action;

The Battle of the Spurs (or Guinegatte) 1513




The Battle of the Spurs, otherwise known as Guinegatte was the subject of the game this weekend. Simon Chick with his large and impressive Burgundian Army and Stuart Mulligan with his equally stunning Henrician force were up for the game fest. We thought that the Burgundians would suffice for the French army with a few additional figures from Stuart and Michael. David Marshall of TM Terrain also joined us to see the walls of Therouanne, that he'd built for Stuart, in situ on the table. This is a beautiful piece of work as you can see by the photos. Dave Andrews, who's responsible for a large part of the terrain squares, was also here along with Aly Morrison and Rick Priestly, who remembered most of the rules. Michael took the photos unless otherwise stated.



Simon and Stuart have been working on their respective armies for years, converting many of the figures you see with 'Green stuff'. In fact this was the culmination of eight years work for Stuart, always aiming to recreate Henry VIII's siege of Therouanne and the associated Battle of the Spurs. Although, he now needs to produce the whole French army !

In 1513 Henry VIII and Maximilian I besieged the town of Therouanne in Artois. The French were determined to break the siege and a second attempt (the first being successful) of resupplying the town with bacon and gunpowder carried by Stradiots on their saddles was made on 16th August. Accompanying the Albanian cavalry were French cavalry with the intention of distracting the besiegers while the supplies were rushed around the flanks. Infantry were not deemed to be needed and were left 12 miles to the south. However, the French were surprised when cresting the ridge at the village of Bomy to find the English arrayed to meet them. English and allied cavalry and mounted archers went out to greet them. Henry, apparently, wanted to join in but was advised to stay back with the infantry and so kind of missing his one and only battle. The French cavalry waited a little too long and were caught changing formation and falling back. This ended in a rout for the French.

Michael included French infantry in the game set up so as to make a potentially more interesting punch up. Also he added a small French garrison that could attempt to sally out of Therouanne and attack the guns. We used 'Hail Caesar' with the troop stats shown in the previous battle report. For the French, Simon commanded the large infantry ward and the small reserve of cavalry, Aly took the large division cavalry, Alan the small infantry ward and medium sized division of cavalry and Michael the medium ward on infantry. For the English it was more of a committee approach with Rick generally ordering the the two divisions of cavalry and Stuart, David and Dave commanding the three infantry wards, one of which were Landsknechts and two of English troops. English and allied troops were placed first in behind the line indicated on the photo (below) and the French second.



The French won the toss and moved first. Aly went off at full steam, sending his huge amount of cavalry down his left flank to confront the English horse. If only he had some support, Alan's cavalry and infantry as well as Michael's were very tardy although Simon's ward in the centre made a slightly better show.




In response Rick arranged his first cavalry division in neat lines but held fast wait for his second division to enter the field, but didn't.


The Landsknechts,in the centre made a move to their right to try and worry the on coming cavalry the other English ward had some trouble moving and only advanced slowly. The third ward failed to enter the table.


Aly then sent out a small unit of skirmishing mounted crossbow to goad the opposing horse, scoring a 6 and forcing a morale test that made one cavalry unit flinch and fall back. He then proceeded to do the same in the next three turns! His dice rolling was certainly an improvement on the previous game.




Simon was making good progress in the centre but his right flank was only moving like a snail. Alan managed to bring up his horse in support of Aly and then fell back a little as the Landsknechts looked as if they attack.


The English managed to get their reserve cavalry and infantry on to the field, the cavalry supporting their comrades and the infantry moving up through Guinegatte.





Gradually, the two lines closed along the front and fire was exchanged while Aly made his first cavalry charge against a unit of Border horse, wiping them out and going into the next unit of horse.


Charging and counter charging by Rick's horse carried on for the next few turns but with the English horse only winning one of the combats. The Landsknechts did charge in against Alan's horse but unluckily threw bad dice and recoiled.




Meanwhile, the garrison had sallied out and made very slow progress across no man's land to attack one of two guns that were capable on firing on them. They managed to reach the gun despite being heavily mauled but came off worse in the fight and fell back.


The game was up, no wards or divisions were actually broken but both English cavalry formations were so close with the French still having one in reserve and the infantry in the centre would then be out flanked and so it was judged a French victory! So, it was a complete reverse to the original battle, but the French did have infantry this time.

*  *  *  *  *

I was keen to create a unique unit for the game and considered the date to be a fitting opportunity to present my latest sculpting and painting with this unit of Tudor bill under the command of the Marquis of Dorset;



Individual studies



I shall draw to a close at this juncture as I'd like to write some biography on The Marquis of Dorset as well as outline how the unit came together and my plans for the future.

I hope you've enjoyed this extended post.

Bye for now

Stuart









Thomas Grey, 2nd Marquess of Dorset unit complete

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In the production of the latest unit for my armies of 1513 I have returned to the Tudors. This came about primarily from a long background project of attempting to sculpt a convincing base coat which finally came to fruition.

Armed with my new skill it seemed fitting to create a unit of Tudor infantry. The whole composition and nucleus from the army's conception had been to replicate the forces that Henry took with him to France and whilst I could do this fairly painstakingly with commanders, heraldry, flags and troop proportions the main signature element of the period had eluded me and this was a massive compromise.

I pushed on regardless and feel I still managed to get a feel of the period in other ways but this aspect  slowly burned away in the background, I knew I had to do it somehow and I guess that's what prompted me to have a go at sculpting, that and a lot of encouragement.

Once I was satisfied with the look I had created I began to slowly turn out Tudor billmen and accompanying command for a new unit;


This was the first figure that I was satisfied with, the eureka moment if you like. The aspect I had previously had the most difficulty with was the folds in the skirt and with this effort I was finally happy that I had achieved a convincing look. The sleeves were occasionally difficult too as I kept sculpting too many folds in them whereas they're actually fairly stiff things. 

In sculpting these I began with the idea of simply carrying on using the existing Tudor heads from Perry miniatures but I wanted some greater variety so I initially looked at head-swaps from the old Foundry Landsknecht range (also Perry sculpted) as they fitted quite well as in this example..

The obvious issue with this was that it would soon leave me with quite a lot of headless Landsknechts and as I generally have a unit of these on the go I wasn't too keen on that option. However, a chance discussion in the pub with Simon Chick got me on to Siligum;


Siligum is a two part solution, not unlike Green Stuff which when mixed together forms a workable rubbery like material that you can use to create a press mould. It works best with at least one flat surface in the subject but I've found that you can get reasonable moulds of heads so here was a sound time (and miniature) saving investment, green stuff heads soon began multiplying on my desk.

The solution is workable for a few minutes after which you then push green stuff into the mould you have created and leave to cure. By weight it's probably the same price as Green Stuff and you can get various size packs. I'm still using the first 300g pack.


The next figure to get the treatment was that of the commander. The head was made from a mould of a Foundry Gendarme and the body was sculpted on to that of one of the Perry WOTR foot knights. An aspect of this sculpt is that there are more folds, those with wealth in this period demonstrated this factor in many ways, one of which was to wear rich fabric and a lot of it which led to skirts / base coats with more folds than the poorer elements of society. I also sculpted a slashed breast as was the fashion.


Whilst the press moulded Landsknecht heads saved costly headswaps they didn't quite look right . To really complete the Tudor image I wanted sombre cloth caps, the bobbed type haircut typical of the period and some more expressive faces. The solution for this came from an unlikely source;

The heads in this set are very expressive and with a bit of work - generally removing existing hair or cap then adding hair and a new cap they work really well. I've also found most of the arms to be useful and more recently the bodies are quite useful for casualties (more on that soon).

I made Siligum moulds of the caps on the Tudor heads then sculpted hair underneath on each figure and this has remained to be another time saving method with effective results.


 Below is another billman in an attacking pose with the Ansar / cloth cap and hair sculpt treatment;



Staying with the Ansar heads there's one in the sprue with a turban and a particularly expressive face which I didn't want to do that much to.

The European courts all featured Moors from North Africa as servants and musicians to lesser and greater extents. Henry's court at this time had quite a few; the servants in Catherine of Aragon's entourage included Moors, a Moorish trumpeter John Blanke can be seen in the Westminster Tournament roll and James IV at this time is recorded as having a troop of Moorish drummers.

The Maarquess of Dorset campaigned in Spain so I made the leap that he too may have added to his entourage. That's my excuse anyway for a rather spectacular standard bearer;


To demonstrate a slightly more refined appearance I painted the turban in a rich gold, black and red pattern and sculpted slashed and puffed sleeves on the undergarment, these were then painted in Dorset's livery of Murrey and White.

The banner is the heraldry of Dorset though in hindsight I think it may include elements added after 1513 - I don't think there are many pedants out there who may notice. It's an intricate multi quartered design typical of the din of the ashes of the Wars of the Roses where families expressed their ever changing allegiances and standing in this manner.


I have a drawing of the Marquess' swallow tailed standard that I knew was correct for this campaign and for that matter an earlier expedition to Guyenne of 1512; ' The Lord Marquys Dorset, parted white and murrey with a like fringe, a unicorn of ermine rayonee alternately of silver and gold sprinkled with sprigs of pinks'

So why not have 2 banner bearers. For this figure I used a foot knight body and arms and added a sculpted base coat with one of the standard Tudor heads.

The banner was rather intricate to paint but no less rewarding. I had a discussion on LAF as to what colour Murrey was with the consensus being red wine which works for me. The colour on the Moor's liveried clothing is slightly darker but it all adds to variety.

I was then at the point of having a reasonable sized unit which I unveiled recently at a refight of the Battle of the Spurs game (see previous post), here are some more detailed photographs;


I wanted to make this unit stand out as a celebration of the hard work that had gone into it so I chose a large 120 x 60 mm base to give a platform for a mini diorama and the maximum potential to show each figure off.

Whilst the new look is spot on for the period I'm not overly keen on sculpting an entire replacement army for my existing Tudor forces so I opted to integrate and re-base with the figures I had with around 60-70% in base coats to those lesser equipped.


I currently have a mix of basing styles in my forces; 60x30 and 60x60mm bases, the smaller of which (above) I've found to be a bit too small with little opportunity for any sort of scene or cohesion. Also, some of the very oldest of figures in the army are on these bases so I used this as an opportunity to take these bases out of the army, retain the figures I wanted to keep and put aside those I didn't. So this unit has replaced 4 of these smaller bases, re-using a few figures in the process.

I've had a few thoughts about the way forward.

I think it's best to continue this approach of sculpting new additions whilst retaining some figures not similarly attired, this gives variety and I think also reflects the pockets of the commanders of each retinue. Some brought thousands to Henry's call whereas some only a handful.

I've opted to have a few large 120x60mm bases for more senior commanders and a majority 60x60mm bases for lesser commanders complemented by further 60x60mm bases without flags.

Here's the new and old



I'm considering keeping a handful of 60x60mm bases in present form to represent Northern levy's or militia, I'm not sure, perhaps I may just have a lesser proportion of base coated chaps among them - your thoughts are welcome.

Note some rather improved photography too - new camera and this time I've even read the manual.

Now for some biography, Thomas Grey, 2nd Marquess of Dorset, 1477-1530


In 1507 Dorset fell foul of Henry VII's suspicions and was interred in the Tower and then Calais for 'as longe as Kynge Henry VII lyved, and shulde have bene put to deathe, yf he had lyved longer' this was pardoned at Henry VIII's ascension following which he soon took the king's favour, due in no small part to his prowess at jousting.

In May 1512 perhaps eager to please Henry despatched an expedition of 5000 infantry for the reconquest of Guienne, in conjunction with his Father in Law Ferdinand of Castile. Dorset was chosen to command and received his commission as lieutenant-general. Ferdinand acted only for his own advantage, and despite the protests of Dorset kept making excuses for delay, while all the time he was securing for himself the kingdom of Navarre.

The English troops were kept idle until a severe pestilence in the camp utterly demoralised them, and taking matters into their own hands they insisted on returning home.

An account describes that 'The Englishmen did eat of the garlick with all meats and drank hot wines in the hot weather and did eat all of the hot fruits that they could get which caused their blood so to boil in their bellies that they fell sick three thousand of the flux and thereof died eighteen hundred men.'

When this news reached Henry he wrote in anger to Ferdinand to stop them by force if necessary; but his orders were too late, and the English army returned home without having effected anything, landing at Plymouth in November.

Ferdinand wrote to his ambassadors in England to tell the king that Dorset was doubtless a very distinguished nobleman, but was entirely to blame for the failure of the expedition. Although Ferdinand himself had shown bad faith, his censure was in the main just, for Dorset seems to have displayed none of the qualities of a general; it is, however, fair to remember that he suffered much from sickness. At first it was contemplated bringing him and his associates, who put the blame on their chief, to trial, but it was impossible to discriminate, and eventually, at the request of the council, the matter was hushed up.

Dorset answered the call for the French campaign of 1513 with a retinue of just over 300 men, joining the King in the middleward. The number is above the 200 odd average so not altogether un-modest. Unfortunately nothing survives of his achievements in the campaign.

In the years to follow Dorset's achievements in the tourney are noted as is the King's favour. In 1523 he took part raids on the Scottish border to keep order whilst Suffolk was campaigning in France.

Overall he was a brave soldier, the 1512 campaign is often referred as a fiasco and indicative of a failing Tudor army but I think this is only the case as it's an early expedition after a relative period of military inactivity. I would agree however that Dorset seems to have owed his position chiefly to the favour of the king though a contemporary source recounts that he was esteemed, the first general of those times for embattling an army. The same authority continues that his speech was soldierlike, plain, short, smart, and material.

I've been interested in Dorset since beginning the collection and I'm glad to have him join the ranks and to represent a new chapter in my Tudor army.

I think that's enough rambling for the moment !

Bye for now

Stuart

French light artillery & crew

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This project has been a slow burner as I began work on the crew some time ago, I abandoned the unit for a while as I wasn't sure how best to convert the master gunner but inspiration has since provided the result.

Here are the conversions bar one member who I neglected to photograph prior to basing;


Left to right, the chap with the breech was perhaps the simplest conversion; I added green stuff to his arms to give more voluminous sleeves typical of the early 1500's and did a head swap from a Wargames Foundry Landsknecht (also Perry sculpted), he wears the red & yellow livery of Louis XII.

The master gunner wears a woollen base coat in national colours, the base coat was added after the figure was prepared; I filed away about 1-2mm off the torso and created a GS fill between the legs, allowed it to dry and then sculpted the coat on top. The filing / cutting in the gap between the arms and body was quite fiddly but I think it's turned out OK.

After this photograph was taken I added a few more things to the painting. Master gunners were much in demand and were spread throughout the French armies of the period, serving wherever they were sent, I thought I'd add a red and yellow Bishop's mitre livery badge of the city of Therouanne to demonstrate his allegiance to his current role.

To further mark him as a master gunner with the experience of a long siege I painted small powder burns and marks on the front of his base coat, hand and sleeve, a little touch but it adds to the character.


Finally, the chap with the sponge was perhaps the most difficult sculpt, the puffed sleeves are quite hard to get right in terms of how much volume there is in the material and how much I can emphasise the fold in each pull of material. The head is a plastic Ansar head with added GS cloth hat, I've had so much use out of that box of plastics, they're a veritable hive for conversion and head swaps in particular, very expressive.

I also built up the breastplate a bit and altered it to look like a Maximilian style breast plate in the latest fashion.



In contrast to the other light culverin I painted the wood and iron work of the gun in red. There are various examples of gun frames whether natural or painted in different colours. German pieces for example tended to be black with red ironwork, the latter a protective layer to prevent rust as is shown here.

This now concludes my work on the conversion of both of the Perry light guns, here they are in defensive position on the outskirts of a ruined village - the fencing and gabions are from Renedra with a few bits added and the ruined building is from 4ground - they do a nice version of this with red daub which I must get some day.



Here they are alongside a larger gun on a section of Therouanne's walls;


I think I'll eventually get the bombard and convert the crew in this manner to add to my Tudors, pieces of that nature though dated were still being put to use well into the 1520's. This work has also served to remind me that my Tudors are bereft of artillery at present so I shall get to that too.

Bye for now

Stuart

Casualty Markers

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Following last month's wargame I left with quite a few projects in mind; viewing friend's collections and discussing the hobby brought aspects to my attention that I had either not thought of at all or shelved for whatever reason so this is the first of those projects.

To begin I ordered some circular dial markers from Warbases and then set about kit bashing, sculpting and painting the following grim vignettes.


The first casualty to get the treatment was a Tudor Billman with a crossbow bolt lodged in his stomach.


The body, head and one arm are all from the Perry Ansar plastics box, the heads are particularly expressive and lend themselves quite well to the addition of a cap and hair. Some of the torsos feature wooden type necklaces which I've found when painted look rather convincingly like the neck of a gathered shirt. Furthermore, the bare feet are easy to add sculpted bear paw shoes typical of the early renaissance and the legs can easily be painted as hose / tights. All of the figures in the box also wear some sort of skirt which can be easily filed down and sculpted upon, it really takes a few stages off the base coat sculpting process that I have adopted.

This figure was in a running pose so I cut and re-positioned the legs then filed one side so it sat flat on the base. I then sculpted the base coat, added the arms and head then sculpted the hair and cap. The arm holding the bolt is from a WW2 plastic of which I've no idea where it came from or how I got it but needless to say it's an arm with a hand in the right position.



I'm really pleased with this one, everything came together well for a good composition and fun to paint, the face was just right for a pained expression.


This figure had a similar build to the first, the legs being cut and re-positioned before sculpting of the coat. The arms are from the Perry WOTR & Mercenaries boxed set. I cut a deep laceration across the face of the figure and wanted to try and express the dying moments; the base coat has been opened to get some air, he's writhing in pain pushing his shoe off and holding on to a final comfort of his rosary beads as he prepares for the end.


I painted the base coat in halved livery split by a white cross of St. Denis. Red and Yellow was the livery of Louis XII and, by coincidence two of the commanders of the Therouanne garrison as well as the city arms of Therouanne - future French infantry units are going to look rather uniform !


In the interest of balance I then set about creating another Tudor casualty, a Longbowman with a nasty open fracture on his foot, his sword broken he pleads with his assailant or perhaps a friend to come to his aid;


I used the same build process as earlier described, the body, arms and head with an expressive face are from the Ansar set, the pouch is from a Games Workshop set of Empire bowmen, quite useful things. I achieved the fracture by bending the foot to partial breaking point.

I spent quite a bit of time getting the painting right on this figure, the exposed bone took a while to get right and I thought I'd add a Tudor rose as some extra detail on the Cross of St. George on his chest. I decided against the arrows in the end as I felt they didn't really contribute much to the composition.


I then turned my attention back to the French, this time I used an Ansar figure which when viewed from the rear and sides did not require any work to make a base coat, the only sculpting therefore being the coat sleeves, hat and hair.


For this scene I positioned the arms and head to depict the dying moments of reaching for a lost objective / friend / weapon. The legs and arms are from the Foot Knights box, the legs not being from the same figure took a while to get right, the first two attempts were rather short looking chaps. The figure had a sash to which I added some GS. In comparison to the others, a fairly straightforward build. 




I was quite happy with the result though the combination of palette and large hat does add an air of a musketeer type appearance to this figure.

For the final vignette I wanted to try and create something a bit more intricate, inspiration came from a scene in the Pavia tapestry;


This was quite a difficult build, I had to make a few compromises but the overall feel is the same (I hope);


The Tudor assailant in base coat was constructed in the same manner as those previous, I tried numerous times to get the figure to kneel on the neck of his victim but just couldn't get it so I settled for kneeling on the side and holding the victim's head. One arm is from the Foot Knight set and the other from the command sprue in the Mercenaries set to which I only realised when painting does not have a gauntlet, so I painted a nice silver hand instead !

In using armoured arms I thought this gave the feel of a more senior yeoman with a bit of wealth so I thought I'd attempt a more contemporary bellows visor which turned out OK, I'll certainly give it further attempts for future units.



The victim's body was one of the figures in the WOTR set, the hands were quite hard to get right. Also given that the leaning figure obscures the victim I regretted picking a figure with a Brigandine as some fairly fiddly painting ensued.





Overall the completed scene is pretty good and useful to use as a casualty marker behind a French or Tudor unit.

So there we have it, inspiration projects part one, a nice set of casualty markers.

There certainly will be more of these, I really enjoyed thinking the scenes up and putting them together, I'll have to turn my attention to some cavalry at some point though I may have to ask Warbases if they can do some slightly larger markers.

The next inspiration project is already underway.

Bye for now

Stuart





Tudor Organ Guns

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Henry invested a lot in the ordonnance for the 1513 campaign, in part as a display of wealth and his interest in the very latest artillery but also out of necessity to found a burgeoning arsenal. In the period of relative peace that preceded 1513 there had been little call to allocate funds to expensive guns. Henry VII had not been particularly interested in artillery as he was committed to peace rather than war and economy over extravagance.

Henry VIII however thought differently and thanks to the economic shrewdness of his father he inherited a healthy treasury which enabled him to afford to amass the best and most modern pieces available and furthermore, where possible he wanted to manufacture them in England.

This realisation came relatively early in his reign and the government in 1513 appear to have operated on the assumption that new guns would have to be provided for the entire army. One can get the sense of the urgency to be in a state of readiness for the campaign in the testament of the Venetian Ambassador when commenting upon preparations at the newly established foundries, January 1513;

'by day and night and on all the festivals the cannon founders are at work'

From what I have gathered the following ordonnance was amassed;

  • 120 organ guns, 40 for each ward and each with its own cart
  • 180 other artillery pieces comprising;
  • 6 bombards 'Nuremberg Pieces' presumably bought or hired from the continent, two in each ward, each pulled by a team of 24 Flanders mares
  • the 12 'apostles' specifically commissioned by Henry for this campaign which were 6 bronze cast siege guns of 'unusual magnitude each cast in the image of an apostle' and 6 pieces of the field.
  • the remainder was made up of demi culverins, serpentines and falconets of unknown composition and allocation.
Quite a lot of preparation - to think these all had to then travel by sea I take my hat off to Tudor logistics & organisation.

To address the lack of artillery in my Tudor army I have started at the top of the list, the organ guns.


Organ gun and Hackbutts 1496 from Phillip Monch Kriegsbuch


Lighter field organ gun from Maximilian's 1502 book of armaments

An organ gun was a multi-barrelled anti personnel field piece which fired either diced shot for the larger calibre examples or standard shot in single or multiple rows. They could be wheeled to aid an assault (or indeed defence) of a breach in a wall or used to bolster the infantry in the field. It could be argued that the organs were of much greater use when approached by enemy troops than the larger field pieces. Henry's order of what appears to be an unusually large number may have been to compensate for the relative lack of shot in his army at that point or perhaps just sheer extravagance.

There's an interesting short film and demonstration of an organ gun of the later 16c here.


The guns I used are former Hinchcliffe miniatures, now available from Hinds figures, each gun comes with 3 possibilities for the calibre of gun and size and type of wheel for the carriage, they're very detailed and easy to assemble. For the crew I used plastic Perry Miniatures bodies and arms from their WOTR, Mahdist Ansar & Confederate Artillery ranges with sculpted additions, here's how I put each piece together;



This is my favourite option which I believe is based in part upon the Phillip Monch design above, there are three rows of 12 arquebus sized barrels on a rotating central stock. I painted the carriage in a dark natural wood with blackened iron fixings and added some additions from my bits box of which the green monogrammed and liveried wooden powder box is a particularly nice result.


For the master gunner I followed what is now for me a fairly standard base coat and cap sculpting process - you can view this in more detail in the previous Dorset's Retinue post.


As a challenge I wanted to try and have an open coat which I think has worked out fairly well, the belt has been loosened at the waist and the chest flap has been undone. Also I made an effort at a hair crop typical of the period gathered in slightly at the neck. I then tried sculpting a St.George cross on the back of the figure which though it is the right size and proportion still feels to be in too much relief so I may try a slightly flatter example later or simply return to painting them on.

To complete the look of the figure I painted a gold St.George cross livery badge on the cap and some weathering on the coat to represent the dirty work of loading and firing an artillery piece.


The gunner's assistant proved to be an unexpected challenge principally as the touch-hole for the gun is relatively high, the whole assembly, sculpting and painting process made for an awkward looking figure until it was met with the gun. Also, the hand is perhaps in an unnatural position of being twisted under rather than over at the wrist, I can't decide, it looks OK in the finished piece.



The second gun is of a slightly larger calibre barrel arranged in a single linear battery. I painted this in a lighter wood tone with blackened iron fixings and bronze barrels. The additional pieces were from various artillery bits with the addition of a sculpted coat and cap which the assistant gunner has taken off.

The sculpting process was as above for the Master Gunner and a little bit different for the assistant.



The Master Gunner was washed / painted in the slightly dirtier tone as described above


I wanted his assistant to look a bit different, in the first instance I wanted to have a figure holding a halberd on the notion that as these were fairly short ranged pieces the gun was at a greater risk of being rushed. In addition, I wanted to show a figure who had removed his base coat for the hot work of servicing the gun.

The main initial effort was filing away the right amount of plastic from the figure to begin. I used a Stanley knife blade for this as it enabled quite a bit to be taken off but in a controlled fashion, previous efforts with a scalpel and needle files took a long time. You essentially have to remove the plastic around the waist, to then re-build with green stuff, you need to take away down to the intended depth of GS that you'll use so that there is as little visible join as possible if that makes sense.

After that the midriff has to be re-built by sculpting the rear, codpiece, doublet and all of the points with fastenings. A particularly good source with illustrations for this is The King's Servants book by the Tudor Tailor which features line drawings and contemporary photographs of the clothing.

I was fairly pleased with the result but then I thought;

if he's taken his coat off it must be nearby, it's too expensive to lose _!

So I set about trying to represent a coat laid over the basket and barrel of equipment, unpainted it looked like a Dali painting of a melting coat but I think it's turned out OK.


Quite an enjoyable project and my Tudor Army now has some home grown fire-power to assist it in the field.



Right, it's about time I returned my attentions to the French......

Bye for now

Stuart



Landsknechts in French Service I

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Over the past month or so I have been working upon some Landsknechts or rather Lansquenets in French service, this is part 1 of 2, the finished unit will be a square of 28 figures on two bases.

The Landsknechts of the Therouanne garrison performed rather well by all accounts in various skirmishing actions throughout the siege -  a frequent tactic recorded by the English was that they would sally out and make attempts to entice their foe into the range of the arquebusiers and crossbowmen on the walls, the favoured approach being to try and take a standard .

At around 1300 in number they comprised just under a third of the garrison. They were led by a Swiss Captain Brandhec (who went on to command Landsknechts throughout the 1520's) and my guess is that they were recruited in Guelders as per the 6000 in the relief army.


Each time I work upon a unit of Landsknechts I learn something new or apply a different approach and this is no exception. Last time I got to grips with Pinterest which really helped for colour combinations both from contemporary sources and re-enactors which you can see on these two boards that I have put together;



In tackling this unit the challenge was to make the figures to be clearly in French service and in some way subtly different from their Imperial counterparts. I approached this with white cross and fleur de lys field signs and the banners of course, in addition I also had a loose theme of the French blue, red and yellow livery running through the unit to emphasise a sense of unit identity.

I paint all of the standing Landsknechts in my collection with field signs and appropriate banners and leave those in advancing poses and arquebusiers neutral so that they can be easily interchanged.



With Landsknechts colour is key but this is by no means a straightforward task if you want to achieve convincing results, I've written a detailed painting guide which should help anyone new or returning to the subject;


On to the figures, first up are the standard bearers or Fahnriche


This Landsknecht carries a simple banner of the cross of St Denis on a striped yellow and red background to reflect Louis XII's livery. He wears a Wappenrock (war coat) for which I was keen to apply some inspiration found in a series of coloured paintings that heavily feature the garment. Here's some examples and there are more on the Pinterest link above from which you can also view the original source;


This half plain / striped design is also apparent in the French / Italian cavalry in lower right of this depiction of the Battle of Marignano, I'll repeat this when I next work upon some cavalry.



The second banner bearer is a heavily armed infantryman in yellow clothing to match the banner and a cross of St. Denis painted on his breastplate. When painting I use a dull brown wash after the base colour to achieve a slightly earthy tone, I vary this for some colours in an attempt to really bring them out; for yellow I use a 50/50 dark leather / dull brown wash which I find works as a good base for ochre. For Red I add tan and dark red to the wash and for blue I wash with a mix of dark blue, black and dark brown. On the first standard bearer I waited for the blue wash to dry before doing the brown wash for the rest of the figure to avoid the washes bleeding.

I took inspiration from the Pavia Tapestry for the banners which itself is well worth a close study. The tapestry or rather series of tapestries were completed by Bernard van Orley in Brussels during 1528-31, from the series a number of French banners within the infantry can be easily identified and follow a theme of either a plain cross of St Denis on a yellow, blue or red background or upon a striped background as can be seen here;


This theme with some variation is typical of the first quarter of the sixteenth century as you can see between the Marignano (1515) & Pavia (1525) images above. In saying that I would like to create a bespoke banner for those Captained by Richard de la Pole when I get round to it.

The banners were created as black and white drawings using Photoshop and printed onto self adhesive paper. I painted them in the usual 3 stage method then cut out and carefully folded with highlights painted onto the creases thereafter.

The pennons were a great find from the Front Rank 18th Century equipment range, a Fleur de lys with tassels and cravat really help to emphasise unit identity and seemed suitably date neutral to use for this period;


The remainder of the command group are the lieutenant and two doppelsoldners with zweihander and halberd;

The lieutenant wears a parti-colour coat as described above with a fine red hat and shoes, I also painted a small cross brooch on the underside of his hat.

Aside him his guards are a well armoured halberdier and a rather impregnable looking chap in half armour wielding a formidable two handed sword. The latter figure features in Steel Fist Miniatures range of 16th century dismounted knights, they're very clean casts and the sculptor has been at considerable pains to ensure the accuracy of source material. They also blend rather well with this range of Foundry Miniatures.

On to the men in the ranks;




Most of these were inspired by the aforementioned Pinterest galleries with a couple of my own combinations thrown in. I've explored the subject of painting Landsknechts in detail on the other blog linked above. In creating this unit, as it's one of two units I got to 18 figures then picked 14 to ensure a good selection and variety of palette. You can batch paint and mix if you're doing a lot but I've always done them as individuals and checked what colours I've used before embarking on a new figure.

In addition it's good to have a couple in fairly basic colours then a mid range and then a couple in a riot of colour, remember that some may be obscured by the flag so have a few trial runs at how you want to base the unit.


On that subject as I've based these on a single 120x60mm base it's quite tricky to apply the basing process, particularly the filler when you start. You can either apply the figures to the base in stages or just be patient with the filler, I use both a standard and very narrow palette knife to help with this. I also blend filler with acrylic paint mixed to the same colour as the basing paint, that way if the base gets chipped it doesn't stand out as much as plain white filler.

There's no such thing as too many Landsknechts !

Bye for now

Stuart

WIP; French infantry conversions

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I have been steadily working upon these over the last couple of months, it's only six figures so far but worthy of a post I thought, these and hopefully a few more will be the next in the painting queue.

Sources for French infantry and indeed French dress in general for the lower classes are, in my experience, rather scarce. Since becoming somewhat addicted to Pinterest I have built up a board dedicated to the French of this period for inspiration and catalogue, you can view this here;


To summarise it in brief the French fashion of the early 16c is derived of various Western European Influence but the particular elements that can be attributed are Italian and Swiss in my opinion, add to that coats and jackets not dissimilar to those of Tudor fashion and you have - I hope, a reasonable representation of a Valois French soldier, one in which would be marginally different from the Northern region in comparison to the Italian theatre.

The sources of inspiration for these conversions are the following images of mostly French origin;


Siege of Dijon tapestry (1513) detail

'La Chausse au Faucon' tapestry, date unknown

A tapestry on the meeting of Henry & Francis at the Field of Cloth of Gold c.1520

I can't remember where I found this, sorry!

Beraud Stuart 'Traite sur l'Art de la Guerre' (Treatise on the Art of War) approx. 1508

In my interpretation I have polarised these sources into two distinctions; figures in jackets / coats and those without in doublet and hose. Some slashing but relatively understated and puffed shoulders are fairly predominant. 

The figures took me a while to sculpt as I re-visited them a number of times in attempts to get particular aspects right or at least to my satisfaction. It's a learning curve really but I can definitely see my ability developing with this batch of sculpting conversions. Here are some more angles;



For the Arquebusiers I seem to have unintentionally put them all in jackets / coats ! - I'll have to balance that with the next few conversions.

These figures were the easier to convert as I've had a bit of experience in sculpting coats and there's a lot less preparatory filing to do on the plastics.

From left to right;

1. This soldier wears a knee length jacket fastening in the middle with puffed sleeves at the shoulder. Jackets were both outer and inner garments; wealthier individuals would wear them underneath a gown or not for warmer weather, they were made of a variety of materials, for military issue they could be in livery or of a base colour though predominantly the former for military issue. From what I can ascertain these were typical of both Tudor and Valois fashion. He also wears a cloth cap with feathers (a stipulation of a 1521 ordonnance). The head is from the Perry Ansar set.

2. This soldier wears a base coat, an outer garment. Again this would be issued in the livery of the issuing Captain / Town / Crown. Also knee length, I've done this for all to make a distinction from the slightly longer coats of the Tudor sculpts that I have done. He also wears a cloth cap with feathers (lifted from the Perry Swiss heads) and puffed and slashed doublet underneath. I've taken the additional distinction that arquebusiers and/or their employers may be a bit more well off than their crossbow wielding counterparts. On that note these would have been issued to the Franc Archers of the period. Another Ansar head also - it's a must have set for parts.

3. Finally for the arquebusiers this chap wears a sleeveless hoqueton (a stipulation of a 1522 levy for Franc Archers raised in Picardy) with the puffed and slashed sleeves of his doublet showing underneath, he has opted for a sallet in place of his cap, I toyed with the idea of adding a feather but I haven't seen it in great number other than on Louis' Archer guards. Really pleased with the slashed sleeves on this one.

On to the crossbowmen, All are unintentionally in doublet and hose so I shall add a jacket / hoqueton for balance in the next sculpts.

These were rather challenging as a lot had to be filed away from the plastics in preparation which meant that the groin and rear had to be re-sculpted - lots of odd looking rears in number of failed attempts leading up to these.



From left to right;

1. This soldier wears doublet and hose, the former with puffed sleeves the latter fairly simple with a cod-piece (slightly obscured by the crossbow). He wears a simple cloth cap. The head was from the Perry Ansar set.

2. As above only more elaborate sleeves, taken from the example in the 'Chausse au Faucon' tapestry example above, again his (painstakingly sculpted) cod-piece is obscured by the crossbow.

3. An un-obscured cod-piece ! this chap wears what I have taken to be shorts for want of the proper word (answers gratefully received), quite a few of the sources above depict this and it's prevalent in Landsknecht / Swiss dress also. His doublet is puffed and slashed at the shoulder and he wears a simple cloth cap over his converted Ansar head.

I'm really pleased with this batch and it's good to see progression from my efforts 3 years ago;


I'm confident from the research I have made and the few visual sources above that I have achieved a suitably French appearance for these and a formula going forward. As ever I am interested for your feedback and critique so let me know what you think.

All the best, Au Revoir !

Stuart

Work In Progress; Tudor Pike

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Whilst painting some French & Landsknechts I have been working upon the next batch of sculpting. I was keen to return my focus to the Tudors and decided to begin work upon a unit of English pikemen.

As far as I am aware this campaign saw the first mustering and armament of home recruited English Pike. The use of pike however was not unfamiliar to the early Tudors; Henry VII was served very well at Bosworth by mercenary pike 'well trained and drilled in the Swiss fashion' and indeed went on to face these adversaries at Stoke Field.

Henry VIII sent a contingent of Landsknecht pike as part of Dorset's 1512 Spanish expedition and in the preparation for the 1513 campaign he was at pains to present a fully equipped modern army. Within the preparations for war the total ratio of pikes to bills for the campaign was proposed at 50:40;

'4500 bills and marispikes English and Welsh and 5000 pykes of the Almaynes [Landsknechts]'

Whilst this included mercenary pike the composition was an unprecedented major effort at modernity of the army. Add the proposed 10'000 archers and the 50:50 missile to staff ratio reasonably mirrors that of the Wars of the Roses though the subtle differences are notable.

For the French campaign 1000 English pike were recorded as being part of the Kings ward within the contingents of the wealthy elite of the court;

'30 June 1513, the King's ward passing out of Calais [toward Therouanne] pikes of the Lord Lisle [Charles Brandon], 900; pikes of the Duke of Buckingham, 100; pikes of the Lord Burgany [Bergavenny], 100. "All along the baggage meddled (mixed) with the ordnance.'

1000 men is reasonable enough to depict and no small affair, it's also interesting to note that there were less Landsknecht Pike within the King's ward at that time (800). Also when it appeared that the ward may have been attacked by French cavalry on the approaches to Therouanne Henry dismounted and stood within the ranks of the Landsknechts for protection, nothing like hedging your bets !

I intend to have a 24 figure square of English Pike with an outer shell of armoured soldiers, later comment on this was that they should;

'have white corselets whiche must be always clene kepte for it is a bewtifull sight in the battaile and a gret terror to the enemyes' and also that these men 'so armed and placed be in more jeperdie than other men be.'

The armour was no doubt some of the latest munition 'almayn rivett' specifically ordered for this campaign as mentioned in a document noting payments for war, November 1512;

'For harness. To Lewez de Fava for 800 harness at 8s. each, August, 1st year. To Will. Gurre, "bregandymaker," for making clean and workmanship of certain harness. To Leonard Friscobald for 577 pairs of harness called Almayn ryvetts, at 11s. a pair.'


Each set or pair of Almayn rivet armour consisted of breastplate, possibly backplate, tassets (thigh defences) and movable arm splints to fit the wearer.

On to the figures.

I have started by putting together the armoured figures for the unit, I began by working on some fairly straightforward builds from the Perry plastics ranges but really wanted to depict the Almain Rivett armour. I wasn't quite ready to sculpt it, largely as the task was somewhat daunting for the number of figures that I want so I turned to seeing if I could make some press moulds of armour from existing figures which after several attempts yielded some good results.


This group represents what I hope to achieve with the unit, left to right;

1.) Figure with quilted jack, arm splints and press moulded breast plate and thigh defences (separate moulds). The mould came out quite well with these after quite a few attempts. I've yet to clean it up a bit as well as adding belts and probably a back plate.
2.) As with 1 though the mould isn't as good, I'll see if I can make it better with some sculpted additions I'm hoping it will look OK when painted. The head and visor are also (annoyingly difficult) press moulds with sculpted fittings.
3.) As with 1 and 2 though using a different breast plate.
4.) Straight assembly to represent older armour with sculpted cap and hair over an Ansar head.
5.) Unarmoured pikeman not quite finished but there for comparison, I'll have quite a few of these.

If I were ever to turn my attention to the Scots this would be how I'd represent the more well off professional soldiers among the front ranks no doubt with the following addition for Flodden;


I'm hoping to get this unit done in the New Year so lets hope they take well to painting.

Bye for now.

Stuart



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