Historicon 2026 Part 1 - Wakefield 1460 with Test of Resolve

I ran the scenario for the Battle of Wakefield, 1460, from one of the Test of Resolve Scenario books. This is an unusual action that some modern historians think was maybe just a glorified skirmish... but if so, it had very outsized results! Briefly, Richard of York, the wealthiest noble in England, had gained control of the mentally incompetent Lancastrian King Henry VI. He lacked sufficient support to take the Crown outright, resulting in the Act of Acord, whereby Richard, himself descended from both the 2nd and 4th of  King Edward III's surviving sons, would inherit the crown upon Henry's death, bypassing the son of Henry VI and his Queen, Margaret of Anjou, the 7 year old Edward, Prince of Wales. Not surprisingly, Margaret and a number of  English nobles found the Act unacceptable, and mustered armies to contest the issue. Richard headed North to augment his forces. In the traditional version, while staying at his manor in Sandal Major, he is said to have seen a party of Yorkist foragers beset upon by some Lancastrians, ran out with his local forces to aid them, was ambushed, captured, and later executed. The ToR scenario by Tim Couper and David Knight envisions a version of those events. 

The scenario as set up in my basement a few days before Historicon.

In the center is Richard of York and his entourage... he has Lancastrian enemies to his front, right, left, and rear, with only a few allies (upper left) who may be able to aid him. 

To his right, Exeter's battle (black die frames and chips /Battle Morale Points)

To his front, Somerset's battle (Blue dice frames and chips)

Richard of York and companies. 

To his left,. Roos' battle *(red dice frames and chips)

To Ricard's left rear, a single unit of mounted Household under Richard's 2nd son, Edmund, Earl of Rutland. Arriving later will be a second Yorkist battle under Salisbury. 

The final Lancastrian force is Baron Clifford, who arrives along the road to Sandal Magna shortly after the action commences. 

Close up of our hero (?), Richard of York and his Battle (white die frames and chips). 

Version 1, Wednesday night at Historicon. My freind (and roommate for the Convention), Thomas (green shirt) graciously volunteered to play Richard, knowing that he woukld not likely end with his head still attached to his shoulders.! As it developed, we couldn't turn a Yorkist "MOVE AND MELEE"card for the longest time, whilst the Lancastrians turned many!  This lead Somerset to advance upon York, the "ambush forces of Exeter and Roos to emerge from the woods, and Clifford's battle to strike Yoprkm in the rear ere he had a chance to move even once. Yikes! By the terms of the scenario, the whole result largely turns on the fate of Richard. Richard is a "rash" commander, and MUST attack Somerset until he has engaged him, OR any of the Lancastrians emerge from the woods. Attacked from all sides, Richard ran for it, while his men, and those of Rutland and Salisbury tried to delay the pursuing Lancastrians. Richard nearly made it off the Sandal Magna table edge, which would be a draw, but then he rolled a "1" not once but twice in a row for movement. That was enough time for the Lancastrians to kill most of Richard's troops, exhausting all of his Battle Morale points. On the Battle Resolve Test, Richard's battle then broke. On the subsequent post game tests, it transpired that Richard was captured and executed the next day, more or less as we understand it happened. Huis head was displayed on a pike, adorned by crown of thorns. No wonder that brutality of "The Game of Thrones" was inspired by the Wars of the Roses!

Set up for Game 2, Friday afternoon. This time Greg K, a long time convention wargames freind, volunteered to be Richard, whilst his gaming buddies ganged up against him as Lancastrians. As hopeless as Richard's situation looks, I assured both Thomas and Greg that it WAS possible for Fichard to win outright (it happened during a playtest of the scenario during the Pandemic), but that Richard had to be very, very lucky to do so.

Aided by a Lancastrian "Flummoxed card, Richard gets three moves in a row and slams into Somerset's Battle opposite him. Greg/Richard had very hot dice and Somerset... did not. Richard eliminated all of Somerset's Battle for the cost of a single lost BMP - which he regained when Somersets' battle broke!@

With no enemy in sight (Exeter and Roos haven't been able to emerge from their respective woods yet!), except the newly arrived Clifford to his former rear,  Richard turns around and heads back towards Sandal Magna. Richard could likely escape the field at this point, so Greg asked what Richard would have done. I answered, "Why, try to ride down Clifford too, of course!" After pointing out that he could have escaped, Richard resolved to do just that!

Richard's men take on Exeter's Battle first.... 

Meanwhile, Clifford and Salisbury/Rutland entertain one another around Sandal Magna. 

Fierce combats between Richard's men and those of Exeter and Roos. 

Clifford emerges victorious over both Rutalnd and Salisbury (who falls in combat), buit has only 5 BMP's left after the scrum. 

York battles on against Exeter and Roos, slowly gaining the upper hand against both!@

The Lancastrian battles are both melting away, until...

and then there were none! 

Clifford comes for Richard; both have 3 units and 5 BMP's left, but Richard's men are of better quality. They are, however,, "damned tired", having defeat not one, not two, but three enemy Battles already. 

Clifford and York go head to head to determine who will emerge the Victor!

York doesn't lose a single round of melee; Clifford is eliminated, and Richard and his companies are the Last Men Standing. It transpires that Somerset, Roos, Clifford, and Exeter are all either killed on the battlefield, or captured and then executed. Rutland survives unharmed, and Salisbury is wounded but later recovers. All hail Richard of York, the Once and Future King of all England!

What a blast this game was (and a tour de force of card sequence and die rolling by Greg/York). Not a game that any involved will soon forget. Thanks to all the players!

Hessian Grenadier Regiment Von Rall, American Revolutionary War

 Unlike the other Grenadiers in the Hessian army of this time, the Von Rall regiment was composed solely of Grenadiers.

Its origins date back to 1703. The jacket had ponceau (bright red) cuffs and collar, but no lapels.

The buttons and metal on the miters were brass. 

The cloith backing of the miter was dark blue with white stripes; the rea band on the miter was red piped white, rather than metal colored as in most other Grenadier miters.

These are Brigade Games figures with a flag from Flags of War; as a regiment, it had its own flags and design

The Regiment fought at the battles of Long Island, White Plains, Fort Washington, and Trenton. Subsequent actions were Brandywine, Monmouth, Savannah, Stone Ferry, and the Siege of Savannah. 

Kings Royal Regiment of New York, American Revolutionary War

From the Journal of the American Revolution: April 8, 2025by Stuart Lyall Manson:

In 1776, the Declaration of Independence charted a new autonomous path for thirteen of Britain’s North American colonies. One of the document’s many allegations was that British authorities had “excited domestic insurrections amongst us.”[1] While its context largely pointed towards Native Americans, another inspiration for this grievance may have been the embodying of Loyalist regiments in 1775 and 1776. Eventually thousands of colonists joined these military units to preserve the North American portion of the British Empire. Two weeks before the enactment of the Declaration of Independence, one of these Loyalist regiments was formed under extraordinary circumstances: The King’s Royal Regiment of New York commanded by Sir John Johnson.

Ironically, the unit was founded not in the colony of New York, but rather in Québec, also commonly referred to as Canada. In the early summer of 1776, Québec Gov. Guy Carleton was completing the colony’s liberation from a Rebel army. The year before, a force under generals Richard Montgomery and Benedict Arnold had invaded Quebec, conquering the settled areas up to the walls of the City of Québec. In the spring of 1776 a British relief force arrived, which ousted the occupiers in an ensuing campaign.At the tail end of this operation, Carleton unexpectedly encountered New York resident Sir John Jonston and 200 of his refugee neighbors near Montréal.

Johnson was a large landowner in the Mohawk River area in the colony of New York, and more importantly, a notorious Loyalist. He and his weary group had just escaped a grim situation in central New York, whose Loyalist and Rebel factions were hurtling towards civil war. Soon after meeting Johnson near Montréal, Carleton wrote to Secretary of State for the Colonies, George Germain, relaying intelligence conveyed by the refugee Loyalist leader: “He represents to me that there are considerable numbers of people, in the part of the country he comes from, who remain steadily attached to His Majesty’s Government and who would take up arms in its defence had they sufficient protection . . . in the meantime they suffer all the miseries that the persecuting spirit of the rebels is able to inflict upon them.”

The specific date of the genesis of the King’s Royal Regiment of New York—the date of Carleton’s commission to Johnson—is commonly cited on the regimental muster rolls as June 19, 1776. Several months later, Johnson referred to the regiment as “a force sufficient for me to stand upon my legs and look my enemies in the face.” This was a natural reaction to the political volatility that Johnson and his Loyalist friends had experienced with their numerically-superior rebellious neighbors back in the Mohawk River area of New York. There is much more fascinating information about the formation of the Regiment in the linked article, which can be downloaded as a free PDF. 

From Wikipedia article on the Regiment:  The regiment served with distinction throughout the war, launching raids and relief missions into the Province of New York. In the summer of 1777, the regiment was present at the siege of Fort Stanwix during the expedition of Brigadier General Barry St. Leger, and saw action at the Battle of Oriskany. Along with their Iroquois (Haudenosaunee)allies and other provincial regiments such as Butler's Rangers, the regiment took part in a series of raids, mostly in the  large-scale raid on the Schoharie and Mohawk valleys that culminated in the Battle of Klock's Field.

The regiment eventually comprised two battalions. The first battalion was disbanded in 1783 and the second in 1784. Members of the regiment were granted land and settled along the St. Laurence River and the north shore of  Lake Ontario.

The earlier uniform of the regiment is uncertain (and, of course, ALL of the options may have been worn by various individuals!). For sure they wore green coats; the British plan was for most loyalists units to have green coats, mostly with white facings, and brown leather gaiters. The source I used indicated buff belts, so that's how they appear here.

Wikipedia says green faced red, with buff vests and pants (and they are so illustrated in the PDF from the JAR as well); their-enactment unit below has them in green faced dark blue. Circa 1779, like most Loyalist units they transitioned to Red coats, in this case faced with dark blue. The figures are by Perry with a recycled King's color from a British regiment by Adolfo Ramos. 

Properly, the unit should be wearing caps as do these Canadian re-enactors. There is much more information about "The King's Royal Yorkers" on their website.

1st Virginia Regiment in Hunting Shirts - American Revolutionaey War

The flag certainly marks this outfit as the 1st Virginia regiment.

The 1st Regiment was authorized on August 21, 1775 in the Virginia State Troops as the First Virginia Regiment. It was organized on October 21, 1775 at Williamsburg as a provincial defense unit composed of six musket and two rifle companies under the command of Patrick Henry. Each company was to consist of 68 enlisted men, with officers to include a captain, lieutenant and ensign (second lieutenant). Six of the companies were armed with muskets, and two with rifles.

For my own reasons, I have chosen to depict them in hunting shirts; there isn't any evidence for this although not impossible in the early war years. 

There was definitely a Maryland regiment recorded as wearing hunting shirts died black, though. These are Brigade Games figures; the flag was made from images on the internet. 

The regiment was adopted on November 1, 1775 into the Continental Army. Eventually, its regulation uniform would be dark blue coats faced red, as  Virginia Continental regiment. 

It was assigned on February 27, 1776 to the Southern Department, but then reassigned to the Main Continental Army on July 29, 1776. It formed part of  Lord Stirling's Brigade from October 1776 until May 1777, when it became part of the first Virginia Brigade. 

In May 1779i t was consolidated with the 9th Virginia regiment to form a new 1st Virginia Regiment of 9 companies. In December, 1779, the regiment was transferred to the Southern Department. 

The regiment was captured by the British in the 2nd siege of Charleston on May 12, 1780. 

Kings Orange Rangers, American Revolutionary War

The King’s Orange Rangers regiment was formed in late 1776 by William Bayard of New York and commanded by his son, Lieutenant Colonel John Bayard. 

The regiment was plagued by problems throughout its existence including an outbreak of smallpox, lack of morale and discipline, infighting between officers, and even a shipwreck. The regiment was moved from the British encampment in the Manhattan area in the fall of 1778 to Halifax, Nova Scotia; this was likely a strategic move to combat internal conflicts and desertions within the regiment. 

Raid on Liverpool (Nova Scotia, 1780)

The most dramatic privateer raid occurred on September 13, 1780. Two American privateers, the Surprize under Cpt. Benjamin Cole, and the Delight, under Cpt. Lane, unloaded nearly 70 men at Ballast Cove shortly after midnight. By 4am they had captured the fort and taken Howard, two other officers, and all but six of the KOR garrison as prisoners. Perkins called out the militia, engineered the capture of Cole, and negotiated with Lane for the recovery of the fort and the release of the prisoners. Within a few hours "every thing [was] restored to its former Situation without any Blood Shed." Liverpool was not bothered by privateers for the remainder of the war. Most of Howard's company was ordered back to Halifax in mid-1781, but owing to appeals by the town's leaders, a detachment of 20 men under Lt. McLeod remained for the duration. 

[this, the preceding, and the following from Wikipedia article on the unit]

Port Williams (1781)

At Port Williams, Nova Scotia, the threat of American privateer attacks had subsided. In the spring of 1781, Major Samuel Bayard was ordered to take a detachment of Rangers overland from Halifax to Port Hughes in Nova Scotia to overawe local Planters who were planning to erect a Liberty Pole and thereby break with the King. There they fixed bayonets and "with bright weapons glittering, colours flying and drums beating, they marched up Church Street and back to Town Plot, where the barracks stood." This show of force brought the locals back in line. 

The King's Orange Rangers were to be stationed in Nova Scotia for the remainder of the war, at which time the members dispersed and were resettled. Only a few individuals chose to go to the land that had been assigned to the regiment in New Brunswick at the end of the war.

Obviously, I chose this unit for its interesting uniform (which was only issued in 1780)!

The flag is speculative and modified from that of another unit. 

The figures are by Perry. The history of the unit is a reminder that, by it's conclusion, the American Revolutionary War had become a worldwide conflict, involving North America, the Caribbean, India, and more, with the British fighting not only the Americans, but the French, Spanish, and Dutch, plus of course drawing a large number of contracted soldiers from various minor German states. 

This unit has at least one Canadian re-enactment group - lots of photos on their FB page.

Some more Canadian re-enactors, probably from a different group, at the citadel in Halifax, Nova Scotia.