More Longbowmen

My latest addition to my force is another unit of archers. Think I pretty much covered everything on them in my last post really. The only thing of note is the standard bearer I put together with parts from various kits, including a couple of hand swaps. The banner itself is removable once again to potentially enable the unit to be used in a WOTR setting.

I also incorporated a few heads from the Agincourt box. I figure around 1450 that, much like the men at arms, not everyone would be wearing the newest styles of armour and there would be a few hand me downs knocking about. For example a bascinet is still recorded in the Bridport muster roll of 1457 (only one mind you).

Here's a shot of progress so far, not much to show for however many years this project's been running, though I did have a long break..

I'm working on a foot men at arms unit next but God knows when I'll finish it; we have a baby due at the end of the month so I'll probably be quite busy!

Some Longbowmen

After a bit of a hiatus I’d like to present my latest unit for the English army at Formigny: a unit of longbowmen. As I mentioned in my previous post since seeing the conversions others had done by adding the bows from the HYW English Army box to WOTR bodies I was convinced that this was the way to go. The HYW bows have a much more authentic and chunky feel to them, as well as being a bit longer, which I think makes them a much more accurate representation of the warbow. Converting them was a little fiddly at times but they went together quite easily generally and, in a lot of cases, I just used the arms straight from the sprue without doing hand swaps (the jacks and aketons from the HYW set also seem a lot more detailed than those from the WOTR one, you can certainly see the advance in sculpting and moulding between the kits).

Painting wise I made quite extensive use of GW’s contrast paints. Since these came out I’ve found them to be an absolute godsend when painting things like leather or cloth, as they provide really good shading with a single coat. A couple of years ago there’s no way you could have convinced me I’d ever paint a model without several layers of shading and highlighting but now, having a family and much decreased painting time, I’ll take any tool that enables me to speed things up while providing a good result. Having said this I’m not keen on the finish these paints provide on some areas, skin for example, so have used them as a base and then highlighted up after adding in additional details such as eyes. Any livery jackets have been painted with some variation of the St George’s cross worn by English troops in France 

In order to provide some degree of usability in a WOTR setting, I’ve managed to create a removable banner which could be swapped in the future. This was just done by gluing it with PVA and manipulating it into shape around another banner pole. Once dry it can be removed and replaced quite easily and I added a spear point to the top to stop it sliding too far.

Being a former warbow archer one thing I’ve been trying to get right for some time is making the bows look like they’re made of Yew. I’ve found this fairly difficult on miniatures as there really isn’t much space to create the differentiation between the dark heartwood of the bow’s belly and the yellow/cream of its back. In this case though I’m fairly happy with the end result. The models received a coat of Army Painter anti-shine matt varnish and I really like what this has done to bring all the colours together and dull down the shine that some of the contrast paints leave behind.

Next up I think I’ll do another unit of archers, as I really enjoyed putting these guys together.

Henry Norbury's Command

The final commander I needed to build was Henry Norbury. He was the commander of the garrison of the Norman town of Vire and led this force to support the English army at Formigny, where he was taken prisoner. 

Norbury himself was built with a standard torso and head from the foot knights set but with arms from the Agincourt mounted Knights box. I like this combination as it creates a fairly dynamic pose. I attempted to do the bull's head heraldry on his surcoat, though I think it possibly looks a bit more like a goat.. his armour also looks a little bit dark to me but I think this is largely because of the black surcoat.

I've also included two men at arms in slightly earlier/transitional armour. The first, at the front, is made up of a French Agincourt infantry body with a great bascinet visor, and arms from the foot knights box. 

The other, at the back, is an Agincourt man at arms modified with green stuff. I've turned his one part cuirass into a two part one and added some tassets.

Next up I'm planning on doing some archers but using the bows from the Agincourt frame. These look much larger and more accurate than the ones from the WOTR frame. Bit of a labour of love but after seeing Charlie's thread on the Lead Adventure forum where he's done the same thing I'm convinced it's worthwhile.

Resurrection! Robert Vere's command stand

My last post on this blog was April 2013 over seven years ago! In that time quite a lot has changed: I’ve bought a house, got married, had a child and have another one on the way early next year. One thing that hasn’t changed however is my great interest in history and the enjoyment I get out of painting and modelling. With the recent release of the ‘Never Mind the Billhooks’ rules I found myself motivated to do some sort of 15th C. project and then suddenly realised that I actually already had one I’d started and not finished. As a result I thought I’d resurrect the Formigny blog and carry on with it. 

I’ve thought a bit more about the direction I’d like to take it and ultimately want to try and produce an army that can be used for the late Hundred Years War and early Wars of the Roses. This shouldn’t be too difficult as there are only five years between Formigny in 1450 and the First Battle of St Albans in 1455 but I may try and tailor some stands in units with either slightly earlier armour styles or more Cross of St George jackets that can be added or removed depending on the context.

The next stand I've been working on is one of the other English commanders at Formigny, Robert Vere. He was one of the younger sons of the Earl of Oxford and around the time of the battle was the Captain of Caen. He brought troops to reinforce Thomas Kyriell's army at Formigny.

All the models are just made up of plastic parts from the various sets, mainly the foot knights box but I've attempted to also represent men at arms in slightly earlier armour styles, as not everyone in 1450 would have had top of the range and cutting edge harness. Part of my inspiration for this was this illustration from Tobias Capwell's 'Armour of the English Knight, 1400-1450'

In order to try and portray this I've used some parts and bodies from the Agincourt box and modified them slightly. For example I've tried to give them a two part cuirass and tassets along with a great bascinet. In a couple of cases I've combined the torsos from the Agincourt mounted knights set with legs from the foot knights box.

One of these features on this command base and I've used a pair of arms from the mercenaries command sprue.

Hopefully this at least gives the impression of a transitional set of armour. 

Next up will be my final command stand - that of Henry Norbury.

Gough's Command

Apologies for the lack of updates over the last month or so. I've been a rather busy boy as I've been applying to do a masters up in Liverpool. After a long interview process and weeks of anxiously waiting I'm pleased to say I've been accepted and will be starting in September! As a result I can finally focus on painting again instead of revision. After painting Gough himself up I decided to get on with the rest of his retinue. In a similar way to Kyriell's command I thought I'd use the two main colours of his heraldry as a base (blue and yellow in this case).

Before moving onto the full base itself I thought I'd focus upon one of the models in there I'm particularly pleased with; the 'swordsman'. I've always wanted to do a model armed with a sword and buckler ever since I saw this painting by Graham Turner of the battle of Ferrybridge with the chap near the fence in it.

I was originally planning on doing a musician model but as I started cutting bits here and there I started to form a different idea. He's been made by chopping and changing a few hands here and there and then adding a buckler on from the mercenaries box.

 I'm pretty pleased with the end result - he came out quite nicely, if I do say so myself! The rest of the retinue are composed of kitbashes from the plastic sets with a metal Richard duke of Gloucester thrown in for good measure.

Quite happy with this base overall, it looks as though Gough and his men are advancing into the French army. I'm fairly pleased with the banner as well, which I put together and painted myself:

So, what next? The answer is I'm not really sure.. Maybe some billmen or archers, we'll see. In any case watch this space!

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!

Some Conversions..

Over the last few days I’ve been having a bit of a mess around with the Perry plastics to see what sort of conversions I can come up with, and have been pretty pleased with the results. Using parts from the other plastic sets it’s possible to come up with some quite dynamic and interesting poses.

I want to incorporate a few casualty models into my ranks. Before the battle commenced the English forces are recorded as standing their ground while the French bombarded them with cannon fire, which the sources imply was quite effective as it caused a group of archers to sally forth, without orders, to capture them and stop the carnage they were creating. I didn’t really want to make guys being blown to bits by cannon balls so I instead thought it might be an idea to make some being hit by arrows/bolts, as there were quite a few crossbowmen and francs-archers present on the French side and it isn’t a great stretch to imagine them adding to the gunfire. I cut the models off their bases and then repositioned them, using various different arms and hand combinations to create a dynamic effect. I’m quite happy with the result.

These guys were made by drilling out hands and using metal halberds/bills to create different poses. This frees up the other hand so it can be used for something else, like signalling or carrying something.

 

These others were basically just put together by utilising a combination of parts from different sets (cavalry helmets, mercenary arms etc.) with a little bit of green stuff to alter poses slightly or fill gaps.

Next up I’m planning on working on Matthew Gough’s command base, one of the other principal commanders of the battle. I’m still searching for livery colours, but have had little luck. At this rate I think I will probably just have to make my mind up to decide on livery colours for each of the commanders using what I have available (for example using Kyriell’s red and yellow from his heraldry as the colours for his detachment). I think it’s likely the information simply hasn’t been recorded as none of the commanders at Formigny seem to have been particularly well known characters, even though they had quite substantial service records by the time of Formigny.