Elizabethan Troops in Ireland

[Rogerc]

I have decided to expand my Border Reivers into Ireland and add regular troops. Quick write up of the project and photos on the blog.

https://gapagnw.blogspot.co.uk/

IMG_20171027_125030 by Roger Castle, on Flickr
IMG_20171027_130657 by Roger Castle, on Flickr
IMG_20171027_130820 by Roger Castle, on Flickr

[Metternich]

This is wonderfully good !  Ireland is a natural expansion of the Elizabethan zone of conflict - and you have a wonderful collection.  Excellent repurposing of the Eureka Conquistador hound keeper.  What manufacturers' Galloglass are you intending to draft in for Irish ?  (and I suppose you will have Kerns and Irish horse?  Depending on the year, a few Spaniards could be found there supporting them, too).  I look forward to seeing how this project progresses.

[whiskey priest]

I'm glad to see someone else moving into this period. I'l be following your blog to see what you get up to!

[dijit]

Great stuff! I have a quite a large collection of Reivers too, and steadily getting them painted up. The Graven Images minis are lovely to paint.

The elizabethan era has a lot to offer. You can also expand into Holland or the spanish main, without too much effort.

[Kingscarbine]

Great collection you got there. I always liked the Vendel range. Thumbs up!

[Lowtardog]

Very nicely done, I did exactly the same thing a while ago, using the then vendel and Jim Bowen reviers, adding in foundry swashbucklers and some o the wars of religion Old Glory figures.

Fir Irish again the Jim Bowen and Vendel were the mainstay supporting by old glory from their WOTR (though they are very small 25mm in comparison) for gallowglass Late Saxon Huscarls can be pressed into service and  dark ages irish etc can meet the bill for lowly Kerns.

Crusader have a nice pack tucked away in the HYW range and worth looking at the claymore castings Scots, they have nice gallowglass and Kern types. You could with some judicious work drag in some of the Redoubt or other ECW highlanders if you aren`t too fussy as redshanks (try and get ones wearing Trews rather than kilts where possible.

[Rogerc]

Thanks for the advice and enthusiasm guys.

I intend to use most of the figures suggested. The Foundry Swashbucklers and Jim Bowen Garrison troops will form my regulars. Hoka Hey stock the Jom Bowen figures and are at Leeds tomorrow so will pick a few up.

For Irish again Jim Bowen but I ordered the Claymore Islemen who arrived this morning. Just one figure I ma not sure about using the rest are perfect. Couple of tweaks to figures to give me what I wanted, will share shortly as just taken some pictures. I have a couple of dark age Irish to use as Kern alonside the above, oddly though these have trews and no tunic rather than the tunic and no trews!! A couple of these with darts should fit in OK.

Redoubt do Irish too, they can be hit and miss so have ordered 4 light horse and 2 each of Gallowglass and Kern. Will decide when they get here if I like them. Horse are going to be the biggest issue. I may need to dig through some ancient ranges for light cavalry in mail without stirrups.

[Rogerc]

OK so I ordered some of the Claymore Islemen/Irish yesterday and they arrived prmptly today. Very impressed.

Beautiful figures with virtually no flash or mould lines. Despite being dsigned for the 1380's most of these are a great fit for Elizabethan Ireland just a couple of figures need amending slightly.
IMG_20171028_124328 by Roger Castle, on Flickr
IMG_20171028_124419 by Roger Castle, on Flickr

These three given axes will look ideal, although the chap with the bow has a helmet you could use with the Picts. The figure matches some descriptions of Irish Gallowglass in the low countries and Germany with the double handed axe or sword and a small bow.

Here is the amended figures.

IMG_20171028_155717 by Roger Castle, on Flickr
IMG_20171028_155728 by Roger Castle, on Flickr
IMG_20171028_155741 by Roger Castle, on Flickr

The odd thing was the different size axes. The thin oes were a but bendy but the thick ones to thick for their hands. I think they are designed so the thick ones can be trimmed and fitted to figures with hands close together. The thin ones go on the ones with hands further apart I assume as these are less at risk from bending and snapping.

IMG_20171028_155938 by Roger Castle, on Flickr

And drilling out the Kern with darts spare hand looks quite cool.

IMG_20171028_155809 by Roger Castle, on Flickr

Picking up some Graven Images figures tomorrow and might add a post to the blog with more pictures once they are all ready for painting.

[Black Burt]

Great collection, I have been thinking of digging out my border reivers recently as well.

[Rogerc]

picked up some more troops from Hocka Hey today at a very busy Leeds show. The old Jim Bowen figures are lovely if chunky. Not sure about the new figures. Picked up a pack of Gallowglass and although not really any bigger than Jim's old figures they look a different scale entirely to the Claymore figures which bizarely just look small against the older ones.

LOWTARDOG I also ordered the Crusader pack, thanks for the heads up.

[Irregular Wars Nic]

Great project, and a fantastic period.

[Metternich]

Good choices on your Irish.  Looking forward to seeing them ready for battle.

[dijit]

Great start there!

[Codsticker]

Those Gallowglass figures look great. The weapon swaps are well done.

[Rogerc]

Cheers Guys, just added an update to the blog, apologies some of the pictures not great as we are not getting natural light outside the weekends with the clocks going back!

https://gapagnw.blogspot.co.uk/

IMG_20171031_202422 by Roger Castle, on Flickr
IMG_20171031_202356 by Roger Castle, on Flickr