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Miniatures Adventure => Pikes, Muskets and Flouncy Shirts => Topic started by: Ockius on 29 November 2020, 01:02:58 PM
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I have been very much enjoying researching and putting together this army, and thought I'd post it as it seems hard to come by images of this particular force, especially in 15mm. I struggled to find many images when I was researching (though must credit the man behind the Stuart's Workbench blog for his excellent work converting this army in 28mm).
The painting is decent tabletop standard (I hope) rather that anything that will wow you ;)
The idea is this is an army for the 1510s-1520s, so the 1513 invasion of France led by Henry (also the 1513 Flodden campaign that happened when the Scots invaded while he was away), and then in the 1520s there was a small raid in 1522, big campaign in 1523 and a further invasion planned for 1525 that never happened, all against France.
I'll post things now and then as I am working on them, for anyone who is interested.
First lot:
Billmen in white coats, by Khurasan, who do the perfect range for this particular period of Henry's reign. These guys were basically levies from the Shires. Most parishes provided a man or two, as well as his arms and gear, but the Crown provided a white uniform coat, which I have done with green trim - the Tudor colour.
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....and the first few bowmen.
There will be lots more of these to come.
Also by Khurasan. In the uniform coats, and I've done them with red caps and quivers, as apparently the Earl of Northumberland, Henry Percy, who contributed a lot of men and resource to the invasion of France, kitted his men out with red and black accessories in his house colours.
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Very good to see these figures. In terms of size how do they compare to Essex 15mm?
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Beautiful job on those 15s!
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Very good to see these figures. In terms of size how do they compare to Essex 15mm?
These are all a good 2-3mm taller. I bought some longbowmen from Essex and they are I think too small to put in the same unit (almost a head shorter) and I've decided not to use the Essex (I only bought one pack). I could post a size comparison at some point if you like.
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Beautiful job on those 15s!
Thanks!
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These are all a good 2-3mm taller. I bought some longbowmen from Essex and they are I think too small to put in the same unit (almost a head shorter) and I've decided not to use the Essex (I only bought one pack). I could post a size comparison at some point if you like.
That's dead helpful Ockius, a comparison photo would be brilliant.
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That's dead helpful Ockius, a comparison photo would be brilliant.
Here we go. I suppose it depends how fussy one is about size difference.
Left to right:
Museum - Khurasan - Essex - Museum - Essex - Khurasan
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Much appreciated Ockius thank you. They are much bigger than the khurasan figures I have, From what you have posted they would be a good fit with the QRF Tudor Bill men. I have the Museum figure you used and that makes it easy to compare. Those Khurasan archers are too good to miss.
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Wow they are huge! Surely they are more like 18mm? Lovely looking minis tho.
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Wow they are huge! Surely they are more like 18mm? Lovely looking minis tho.
I am fairly new to 15mm, but from what I’ve seen it seems the newer ones are 15mm to eyes, rather than top of head, so maybe 17mm ish if we’re being exact. Having said that, they fit well with the Altuos range sold by Alternative Armies, and the Donnington New Era range. Will post some of those eventually.
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Now some of the mercenaries.
Landsknechts, mostly by Museum. These are tall, chunky, cartoony sculpts. Nice to paint, clear detail.
There are also a number of Old Glory chaps too (you can tell them by the thinner pikes that had to have hands drilled out for them). These fit quite well, but are quite different and harder work to prepare and paint. They add good variety though as Museum only do a few pike variants.
I’ve done them with a banner of the town of Buren (not sure if the Germany or Netherlands one) where Henry got a contingent of landsknechts from in both 1523 and 1544, I believe under two successive counts of Buren.
These guys were seen as an important source of pikemen for the English, who had few homegrown pike wielders, but they were apparently quite troublesome allies on campaign.
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there was a small raid in 1522
Superb, and quite an unusual subject.
You mean the raid at Morlaix I suppose. :) Technically, Brittany was not yet united with France, although already under the same crown. :D
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Superb, and quite an unusual subject.
You mean the raid at Morlaix I suppose. :) Technically, Brittany was not yet united with France, although already under the same crown. :D
I must admit, I don’t know much about it! I was just checking the dates of campaigns and it was mentioned. I have read more about the 1513, 1523 and 1544 campaigns.
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I must admit, I don’t know much about it! I was just checking the dates of campaigns and it was mentioned. I have read more about the 1513, 1523 and 1544 campaigns.
lol I just mentioned it for pleasure, actually the Bretons were already fighting on the French side since a few years, as before at the famous (um, probably famous only locally) naval battle of St-Matthieu in 1512.
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lol I just mentioned it for pleasure, actually the Bretons were already fighting on the French side since a few years, as before at the famous (um, probably famous only locally) naval battle of St-Matthieu in 1512.
Thanks, you’ve given me some more things to research!
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More mercenaries - some arquebusiers.
These are by Museum, like the majority of the pikemen. They are lovely to paint; the detail is so clear and they are made for contrast paints, which make light work of all the slashes and folds.
Henry also had some English arquebusiers, who I might try to represent later, if I can find the right models.
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Back to the homegrown soldiery with some heavy infantry Yeomen of the Guard.
Models by Khurasan.
I really like these models. They are wearing 'Almain rivet' armour, probably imported from Germany, and carrying continental style halberds, and wearing more modern, 'fashionable' clothes than the general line infantry. As far as I can tell, they were a sort of professional or at least semi-professional core to the mostly levy army.
Carrying the Earl of Northumberland's standard (or is it a banner? I remember reading that there was a difference, but cannot remember what it was)
Just three bases of them finished but more to come.
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Nice work - not only were there English arquebusiers, but a majority of the Yeomen of the Guard appear to have been so armed. I learned that from Stuart Mulligan who has the Army Royal blog site and has posted on here about his own Henrician army in 28mm.
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Nice work - not only were there English arquebusiers, but a majority of the Yeomen of the Guard appear to have been so armed. I learned that from Stuart Mulligan who has the Army Royal blog site and has posted on here about his own Henrician army in 28mm.
Thanks Baron,
Yes I think I originally learnt about them on one of your posts on the Slitherine site! It is in many ways quite a niche army, so there are only so many people talking about it online, so I think I've read most of the conversation about it by now lol
I get quite a bit of my info from the Osprey book on Henry VIII's army, but have also read around the topic elsewhere. There's a good resource for free at the moment here if you have the inclination to read Tudor English - lots of Henry's state papers summarised or transcribed, so you get a real insight into the fine detail of what went on https://www.british-history.ac.uk/letters-papers-hen8/vol1
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The first of the artillery.
I don’t know much about artillery of that time, so not sure what type of gun this is - an older fashioned sort I think from the hoops around the barrel.
All models from Old Glory. They are dressed in quite German style, which fits as Henry brought over gunners from Germany and the Low Countries. I’ll also get hold of some more English looking ones too eventually.
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Ockius - apologies if it sounded like I was trying to teach granny to suck eggs! As you say, there isn't a lot about this army on t'interweb, so it stands to reason anyone keen to learn more will have absorbed pretty much everything on-line. Thanks for the link, which I was not aware of - I'll be spending much of today having a look at that.
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Ockius - apologies if it sounded like I was trying to teach granny to suck eggs! As you say, there isn't a lot about this army on t'interweb, so it stands to reason anyone keen to learn more will have absorbed pretty much everything on-line. Thanks for the link, which I was not aware of - I'll be spending much of today having a look at that.
Not at all, the info is very much appreciated. As I said, I have learnt some of my stuff from reading your own posts!
Didn’t mean to sound arrogant or miffed or anything myself. Limitations of typed communication and all that!
If you know anything that runs counter to anything in my portrayal of the army then I like to hear it, as it’s partly a research experience
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Impressed with the effort and also the range of suitable figures which isn’t quite the case in 28mm.
It’s a tiny thing but the YOTG weren’t under the Earl of Northumberland and being a royal guard carried one of the standards associated with the monarch such as the royal arms, st George, the trinity and Edward the confessor.
Hope that helps and keep it up !
Stuart
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Here’s the breakdown of the army of the french campaign in 1513
https://www.british-history.ac.uk/letters-papers-hen8/vol1/pp918-940
All 600 YOTG with the king ‘bearing his standard’ presumably the royal arms or the livery banner but equally possible that it could be the others I mentioned. They included gunners which might be fun to replicate.
Northumberland’s retinue is 500 for which he orders a similar number of sets of almain rivet which is interesting as most were archers. He had a 50 man guard included within this and armed in that manner with halberd. Though note they weren’t YOTG. That said their appearance would have been as you’ve represented them.
You could do a base of YOTG with different banners do you could do both.
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Impressed with the effort and also the range of suitable figures which isn’t quite the case in 28mm.
It’s a tiny thing but the YOTG weren’t under the Earl of Northumberland and being a royal guard carried one of the standards associated with the monarch such as the royal arms, st George, the trinity and Edward the confessor.
Hope that helps and keep it up !
Stuart
Thanks for that info. I did wonder about the issue of the banners - I had got a delivery with the Northumberland banner, got excited and stuck it straight on without thinking it through. I will however use your info in the other post and put this stand in a different unit to be his retinue, and use the King's standard (which I now have too, courtesy of the excellent Pete's Flags) for the Yeomen of the Guard.
The link to the army breakdown is really good - I hadn't actually read that page.
I wonder if you have any idea what the 'strangers horsemen' are? They're mentioned a few times in considerable numbers (800 at one point, and that may only be part of the total).
Also interesting was this: "pikes of the Lord Lisle, 900; pikes of the Duke of Buckingham, 100; pikes of the Lord Burgany, 100". I had been wondering whether there were English pikes this early, but here's my answer. I have a few figures in mind for them too, so that's another unit to eventually make!
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‘Strangers’ were basically mercenaries. In that campaign they were Burgundian heavy cavalry employed to fill that deficiency in England at that time - something that continues throughout Henry’s reign.
A great book in that subject is Tudor Mercenaries and Auxiliaries by Gilbert John Millar.
Yep, the pike reference is from what I can gather, the first effort at home grown pike in England. The nobles whose retinues include them were some of the richest who could afford to equip and arm them.
Henry also employed landsknecht pike and shot who get a mention in dispatches during this campaign but the English pike don’t so the conclusion is they saw no action. Most of it during that campaign was cavalry, artillery and bows.
On artillery get yourself some organ guns as they were in the arsenal en masse.
All the best
Stuart
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In that campaign they were Burgundian heavy cavalry
Interesting... That would mean from some part of the "Burgundian Circle" of the Holy Roman Empire (as the Duchy of Burgundy had diseappeared)...
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They were provided for hire by Maximilian, he did very well from the Tudor treasury in that alliance.
Though indeed from Maximilian’s HRE they’re distinctly referred to as Burgundians by the English throughout which would indicate an origin in the Low Countries.
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Thanks for the info l, Stuart. My Burgundian men at arms are yet to reach the painting desk, and I’m still working out which models to use for them as I’ve ended up with some rather mismatched horse sizes across the makes I’ve sampled so far.
Likewise with the Border Horse / Staves, who will probably be produced first.
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The first three bases of dismounted men at arms.
These are actually Wars of the Roses figures by Donnington, but as far as I can tell this sort of armour (or at least similar) was probably still worn by lots of the gentry in 1513, perhaps later. I’ve gone for purely pole-armed figures as I think that was the most common hand-to-hand weapon by this time.
These guys represent nobles and gentry with their household retainers.
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Very nice!
All the best to you in the New Year - looking forward to seeing this project develop.
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Very nice!
All the best to you in the New Year - looking forward to seeing this project develop.
Thanks mate, all the best for 2021 to you too.
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Latest addition - light horse, often known as staves or Border horse.
It took me quite a while to find the figures that I liked and that fitted with my existing army. Eventually I went with Donnington New Era figures from their medieval ranges (Burgundians, Hundred Years War and WOTR), so these are not actually designed as Tudor Border horse, but they seemed a good fit to me. I think the mix of gear, with aketons, brigandines, mail and a smattering of plate fits well with what were in some ways irregular cavalry as many were part of reiver gangs accustomed to raiding on the Scots Border.
I added some bucklers and crossbows hanging from saddles to make them look more appropriate (both by Donnington - amazing that they are making such tiny, fiddly parts, as the margins relative to time and effort input must be tiny, so I’m grateful to them!).
There’s also one guy by Alternative Armies Altuos range, which only has one variant, but is a good typical portrayal of a stave.
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Very nicely done. I think your selection of figures works well too.
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Thanks OB.
I have a second unit of 8 to do and quite looking forward to them.
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The army is getting pretty large now, and I’ve gradually painted, built and bought an array of scenery, so here they are positioned to defend a small village.
I still don’t have any roads or tracks yet, but that will be the next scenery.
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A couple more, with one of the whole lot.
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Very nice, it's good watching your collection grow.
I must have another look at those Donnington figures. They may be the solution I've been looking for to match my Steve Shaw Flodden era Scots.
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Very nice, it's good watching your collection grow.
I must have another look at those Donnington figures. They may be the solution I've been looking for to match my Steve Shaw Flodden era Scots.
I am a fan of them, I like the faces on them and enjoy painting them. If you want to see any pics then let me know; I have longbows, crossbows, as well as the foot knights and light horse posted here. I reckon lots of them are good for Flodden too.
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Thanks Ockius. A pic of the longbow would be good and of the Bill men. I'm pretty convinced the knights and light cavalry will work.
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Thanks Ockius. A pic of the longbow would be good and of the Bill men. I'm pretty convinced the knights and light cavalry will work.
Here we go, a I’ve since painted more and based these but they’re packed away now.
There are longbows in the HYW, WotR and Burgundian ranges that I picked from.
Reckon they are middling size, perhaps 16mm - bigger than Essex, smaller than my Khurasan and Museum.
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Thanks Ockius, much appreciated.
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I’m still adding bits to this army every now and then. Here are a few casualty markers, to avoid cluttering the table with counters during games of Pike and Shotte.
Some for English infantry, landsknechts, Irish/Scots Highlanders and mounted men at arms.
Figures by Ancient and Modern Army Supplies and Venexia
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Nice work. Not really a period of interest but nice work. I am, however, very interested in the source(s) of your buildings. Looks like one might be from Peter Pig but what of the others? And the church? Thanks!
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Nice work. Not really a period of interest but nice work. I am, however, very interested in the source(s) of your buildings. Looks like one might be from Peter Pig but what of the others? And the church? Thanks!
Thanks!
I’ve got a fair few buildings from
Magister Militum (not sure if they are currently available as they were going to be ceasing trading). They are quite nice but bigger and not such clean casts as the Peter Pig ones you identified.
I’ve also found good stuff from Total Battle Miniatures, and some others. The black weather-boarded barn is I think from Warbases with the weatherboards added by me from card (took ages! Looks good though).
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Thanks for the info on the buildings. Pretty much done buying miniatures but still willing to acquire architecture.