Command Base - Covenanter Cavalry

Eureka Miniatures Cavalry - sold as Gordon Horse but like most figures in this period they work well with most of the armies.  I like these guys as the horses are pretty placid compared to the Perry ones.

Standard is conjectural but is taken to represent the one from Campbell of Lawers Troop.  Motto and heraldic boar both feature in various sigils and crests from this branch of the Campbells.  Worth noting that these guys weren't the usual Argylle Campbells, rather they were raised in Auchterarder, at the head of Loch Tay under the shadow of Ben Lawers.

The one draw back with the Eureka figures is getting the figures to sit well on the horses - was a real struggle getting them on and even then they seem to be sitting like the have a bad dose of the Duke's (again you'll need someone from Scotland to translate that :-)).

Command Base - Warlords Montrose

Sometimes it's easy to become a bit of a figure nazi.  Most of the stuff you see on this blog is either Perry or Eureka Miniatures - a lot of that is to do with size, what we've been looking for in poses or we just like the sculpts.  That being said there are many other great figures out there.

Warlord Miniatures fit well size-wise and if we hadn't bought all the lead before they released their ranges (yes we've been going that long) we would likely have used a lot more of their figures.  That being said, here's Warlords Montrose figure.

But who's to say it's the great man himself?  He could just be some other long haired fop and as such makes a nice addition to any command base.  I added him to some odd figures I had left around, making a nice wee "advancing" vignette.  So looks like some government troops are on the hunt for a dram.

The Earl of Lothian's Regiment

Raised by the Earl of Lothian in March 1642 for service in Ireland, the regiment seems to mainly have recruited in and around Jedburgh. Here it was commanded by its lieutenant Colonel, Walter Scott as the selected their minister (John Scott).  Shipped to Ireland in late summer, it participated in Leven’s two September campaigns.  It continued to serve in Ulster until withdrawn in February 1644.  On return, it was quartered in the central west (Paisley, Govan, Refrew and Pollock) where low morale led to some of its Captain’s plotting to join Montrose.  However, with the outbreak of hostilities in Huntly’s  lands led the regiment north, where they sacked Kincardine Castle and Gordon of Drums lands.  By summer they had marched south to Roxburghshire leaving a legacy depredations behind.  Although due to assemble with the army in Perth, they were late to arrive and thus missed the battle at Tibbermuir.

Sent north again in the autumn of 1644, it again operated with Lawer’s regiment and was based out of Aberdeen and Inverness.  By spring 1645, with Montrose ascendant after his winter campaign, Lothian’s  (7^thMarch) vacated Aberdeen to the Royalists, thus having extorted lodging and supplies but offered little in protection!

By late March, the regiment was in Brechin with Lieutenant General Ballie, but with Montrose’s sack of Dundee it was placed under Hurry, returning north to Aberdeen.  Here the regiment mutinied over pay and clothing, before marching out for Auldearn.

Along with Louden’s Foote, Lothians regiment formed the right flank of the front line and initially where successful in driving in the royalist line.  However, as the fighting bogged down, confusion with the cavalry guarding the flanks ensued, as Royalist reinforcements arrived.  The cavalry wheeled in the wrong direction, and got entangled with the infantry, disrupting the formations.  As with Lawer’s, Lothian’s were singled out for special treatment by the Irish on account of their Ulster experience and lost over 50%.  Two of its captains, Sir John and Sir Gideon Murray fell.

 

The remnants of the regiment retreated first to Inverness, before returning to Aberdeen and then Dundee. Over the next two years, the regiment continually was a candidate for amalgamation with other units.  Although eventually built up, it was finally disbanded in 1647.

This was the last big regiment to be painted but I wanted a wee change from the usual hidden grey.  Some of the regiments the Scottish Government sent to ireland were clothed by the English Parliament, using red cloth.  However, this would have been replaced as it got worn out and would have been a bit washed out.

To get this effect I made sure that about a third of the regiment was in grey's, but the balance would be painted with red jackets.  One of the big things I've tried to avoid is making the units too "bright" - you see a lot of ECW armies painted up like early 90's GW models - to uniform and way to clean.  So just like the hidden grey and the scot's bonnets, a mix of tones were selected to give the unit a weather-worn feeling

Pike Blocke

The Pike shows the range in tones pretty well, with the madder red providing the dull tone and a scarlet giving some of the reds a bit of zing.  Some armored pike provide a different feel and help break up the uniformity of the poses from the standard Scot's.

 

 

 

 

 

Command Base

As with most of the standards I had to be creative - the Earl of Lothian was a Kerr, so I took the blazon sun emblem from their crest and used that on the colonels colour.

When I started out, I kept on feeling it looked like the sun at the start of the TellyTubbies but it came out okay in the end.

 

 

Shotte Sleeves

As with the last few units, I've made the bases into mini vignettes with officers, halberd armed sergeants, dead and musicians.

The later must have picked up the flute when he was in Ulster, probably as an apprentice...

 

 

 

 

 

Scots Casualty Markers for Pike & Shotte

"Thair wes reknit to be slayne heir at this bloodie battell aboue 2000 men..."

Spalding on the slaughter at Auldearn in May 1645

While working on the Strathbogie regiment I also painted up a bunch of casualty markers for Warlord's Pike and Shotte rules. Casualties are not removed using the Pike and Shotte rules so casualties must be recorded by use of tokens, dice or modelled casualty markers like these.

These models are a mixture of Perry English Civil War "Dead and Wounded" set and Warlord models "Shotte Down in Flames" Pike and Shotte Casualties set. The models in both sets have English head gear so some minor conversion work was required to remove the English hats and replace with green stuff scots bonnets. The casualties are based on 40mm diameter, 3mm wooden bases from Litko. Below are close ups of each model from a couple of different angles.