Kirke's Lambs

Here are Kirke's Lambs, more formally known as the Queen Dowager's Regiment of Foote, hard-bitten veterans of the Tangiers garrison. There was nothing lamb-like about their behaviour after the battle of Sedgemoor, when they ruthlessly hunted down fugitive rebels and executed .

The historian Lord Macaulay describes the eponymous Colonel Percy Kirke as "a military adventurer whose vices had been developed by the worst of all schools, Tangier.... Within the ramparts of his fortress he was a despotic prince. The only check on his tyranny was the fear of being called to account by a distant and a careless government. He might therefore safely proceed to the most audacious excesses of rapacity, licentiousness, and cruelty. He lived with boundless dissoluteness, and procured by extortion the means of indulgence." He was personally responsible for ordering the hanging of at least 100 rebels. He famously promised to spare an innkeepers life if his daughter slept with him. She did, but in the morning awoke to find her father's corpse hanging from the window.

I bought around two dozen of the painted Front Rank minis on eBay, and some more (including the super Colonel Kirke) from a chap called Malcolm (sorry don't know the surname). The splendid flags are from Iain at Flags of War.

Here are the shotte. I messed up by using only flintlock-armed minis; at Sedgemoor, most of the Lambs would have carried matchlocks. Still, though, not too shabby!

Finally, I really like this shot, from the rear. I mixed madder, a brownish red, into the paint for some of the minis' tunics, as it was likely a major component in the dyes of the time. The bases are of my own design, so that I can swap out the command stand and even the pike, for more shotte.

Italian Crossbowmen

In the current sweltering heat, it seems appropriate to be working on Italians. Here's a unit you may have seen before (as a smaller unit), which I've recently expanded from two FK&P6 bases, to three, so that I can field them both on a 20cm grid as well as on a 15cm. The photos aren't the best (too much light), but you can see where I am coming from. The minis are Perry plastic mercenaries. The new minis (top right element, bottom left element) were painted by Shaun McTague, you can see them better, below. Nicely done!

I might, later, replace the flag which is a little anachronistic, with a Pete's Flags condottiere flag. 

I'm just finishing up some more light cavalry, along with some super arquebusiers. Soon, I'll be opening a new Burgundian front. There are a lot of minis going on bases, around here!

Fun with de-basing

I believe that only three things are certain, in life: Death, taxes and the need to re-base miniatures.

I base well over 1000 minis a year, mostly onto the very large bases I designed and use with "To the Strongest!" and "For King and Parliament." Perhaps half of these need to be stripped off old bases, first, usually the 2mm MDF bases that we have learned to love over the last decade.* Following a discussion on TMP, I thought it might be useful to describe how I do this, because I have had a lot of practice!

The steps are:

1. Find a tray with a flat bottom, a jug of water and, ideally, a stack of pennies.
2. Place the bases in the tray on a couple of pennies each (this allows water to get under the bases, and speeds the process). See pic above.
3. Carefully pour water into the tray, to bring the level of the water level with the top of the bases. If a little water goes onto the top of the bases, that's all for the good. However, should the minis be in water up to their knees (or hooves), you risk damaging their paint. See below; the water is just wetting the top of the base, but not enough to frighten the horses.

4. Leave the bases in the water for 24 hours or rather longer, especially if the bases are 3mm thick. The longer, the better results. The bases will gradually absorb water and get  thicker and thicker. Top the water level up, if necessary. A nice by-product of the process is that, after the first hour or so,  the thrifty baser can often salvage any tufts. Just remove them with a pair of tweezers (below), leave them to dry and re-use, later, with a little PVA. 

5. Give some of the minis a gentle tug, and see if they will pull off the base. If they were originally glued with wood glue, they will, most likely, come away very easily.

If, on the other hand, they were glued with superglue or UHU, you'll need to "crumble" the MDF base away (see below), and carefully trim away the remaining MDF and glue from under the individual bases with a sharp craft knife.

And there you have it; it's easier (and safer) than hacking away at dry MDF with a scalpel.

*... although theologists talk of an especially hot corner of hell, that is reserved for those who superglue minis to pennies, or, worse still, plywood.

Gallic Horse

Here are some photos of my extended and re-based Gallic horse. These are, strictly, part of my Gallic army as seen  at Salute in April, but they weren't needed for the Mancetter battle. Shaun McTague very kindly painted a dozen more for me, which I mixed in with the 36 I already had, to give me a generous total of 48. Each unit now consists of a whopping 16 miniatures. This gives me a broadly similar representational scale between my infantry and cavalry units. I'm gradually adding extra cavalry to bring my other armies up to the same standard.

Almost all of the minis are Wargames Foundry. I took the opportunity to "tart up" the existing figures and re-based onto my 20cm grid-half bases, which fit together to make a unit 19cm wide by 13cm deep for the 20cm grid. The photos don't do them justice.  :-(

These are half the heavy cavalry that I require for my 2020 To the Strongest! Salute game. The other half will be "Romanised" Gallic horse- semi-uniformed types, proto auxiliaries, in fact.

I've been basing a lot of other great stuff- I hope to post some more photos, next week!

Royal Dragoons WIP

I've been very busy painting and basing, recently, too busy to post very much, although I will catch up. But here is a WIP shot of the Royal Dragoons, for a future Sedgemoor project. They are North Star 1672 minis, very nicely painted, mostly by chum Steve Spence, although I couldn't resist painting a couple, myself. They are nice Copplestone-sculpted minis, with a fair few variants, and (very conveniently) North Star have recently begun to extend the range with some new dragoon command groups and rumours of Spaniards.*

I've decided to go with the dragoons as a 24-man unit which (at least for Sedgemoor) will operate in two halves, on the wings of the Royal army. I also plan to do the unit dismounted, with all 24 horses and horse holders. Raising a regiment of dragoons is a serious commitment, and not for the fainthearted!

*Some grenadiers in furry hats, with firelocks, would be a splendid addition, Nick  :-)

Tournaisis

Here is the first finished battalion for my Late c.17th project, in fact the very minis that attracted me to the period. David Imrie very kindly sold me these miniatures some five years back. They represent a battalion of around 1690 from the French Regiment Tournaisis, which served in Ireland and elsewhere. The picture is clickable. David's painting is superb- I can't get anywhere near this standard.

All of the miniatures are from the superb Front Rank Late c.17th range, and the flags are Flags of War. Having bought the 40-odd minis from David, I find that I have bought some four hundred and fifty more painted minis from various sources. Eventually there will be a set of rules and a display game, but don't hold your breath. :-)

It took me years to decide how to base them, and I settled on two wings of 12 shotte, 8 pike and a command stand of 5. My friend Ian Notter and I designed a series of wobbly-edged bases to carry them. There are four bases which means I can swap out the command stand for one with different flags, from a different nation, perhaps, or swap out the pike for an extra stand of shotte so that I can use the minis for the early c18th. The new bases can be found in the BigRedBatShop, here.

Finally, here's a closeup of the command stand. What I love most about this period is the cut of the uniforms, but I'm also mad for the floppy hats with ribbons around the edges.