Matthew Gough

A slight update for the project here – unfortunately over the last few weeks I’ve been quite busy with uni interviews etc. And haven’t found too much time to paint. However I have managed to paint up a model to represent Matthew Gough, one of the other English (well.. Welsh) commanders at Formigny.

By 1450 Gough was a weathered veteran of the French wars, having taken part in the battles of Cravant and Verneuil and having been commander of various castles and towns that were captured in the English expansion. He was taken prisoner in 1432 at St. Denis leading to a massive outcry from the bards of Wales, for whom he was a much celebrated figure in their songs, the well known bard Guto'r Glyn writing:

‘Bu ar glêr bryder a braw/ Ban ddaliwyd, beunydd wylaw’

'anxious and alarmed, the bards wept daily when he was captured'  

Luckily for them, and him, funds were raised soon after and he was ransomed. At Formigny Gough led a small force from Bayeux which reinforced Kyriell’s army and, after the defeat, he succeeded in fleeing back to the city. However soon after that Gough returned to England and was killed during Jack Cade’s rebellion where he fell defending London Bridge against the advancing rebels.

I used another one of the metal command figures to represent him. I found a fair few interpretations of his heraldry, so I just went with the one I liked the look of the most – I’m fairly pleased with how his surcoat came out. I will try and get onto his retinue next – sadly one of them has met an ignominious end already, having been munched by our 5 month old golden retriever puppy, who somehow got hold of him – so I will have to seek a replacement. What’s left of him may make a nice casualty model though..

I’ve also done a bit of painting on some other character models from the Lancastrian set, which you can see below.

I’ve given up on getting accurate livery colours for retainers, so instead I’m going to take an educated guess – I don’t think anyone will be able to prove me wrong as it seems the evidence has simply not survived the passage of time!