Saturday, December 8, 2012

English Civil War: Royalist Infantry: pt 2

    The next group of my ECW army figures are two more Royalist Foote regiments. The first is that of Sir Charles Gerard. known to have been bluecoats. Gerard was a member of an old Lancashire family, and a stalwart supporter of the King and his cause. There is a reenactment regiment of Gerard's Foote in the Sealed Knot;  more can be read about Sir Charles and the regiment on their website.

I chose to do this regiment wearing rather old-fashioned Morions, which, for the pikemen, are adorned with red plumes proclaiming their Royalist sentiments.



The dress of this regiment is a bit less flamboyant than some of the others, but still note the decoration on the seams of the baggy pants of the Musketeers. 


The design of the flags, quartered per saltire or and azure, with gold wreaths as the badge, is known for this regiment. Still other regiments had the field divided into eighths diagonally, termed "gyronny". 


This very stylish regiment is the King's Lifeguard of Foote. Their red coats are set off by dark red pants, striped in white, and complimented by white plumes (all but the coat color highly speculative, and even there the exact shade is unknown, although of course subject to the usual dirt and fading!


An overview of the regiment, with the pikemen holding theirs at "Push of Pike". Many don't like this position for wargames pikemen due to the practical aspects of handling melee contact on the wargaming table, but I'm always happy to have an occasional unit in this very aggressive posture.



A rear view of the Lifeguards; the ornate designs on the standards are known (the scroll above the Lion reads "Dieu et mon Droit"). This regiment is also re-enacted by the Sealed Knot; their website is here.  There are illustrations of the flag designs as well as numerous pictures of reenactors on the site. 

7 comments:

  1. Nice units, I was a member of the Kings guard for five years and it was blast.

    Ian

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    1. I would think that would have been a fascinating experience, Ian! You should write about it some time, if he haven't already. I've consider re-enacting myself, but I only have so much time. Here in the US, it would have to be the Revolutionary War. I love the history of the (American) Civil War, but if I'm going to put that much time, money and work into it, I want a snappy looking uniform. :-)

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  2. I added this as an addendum to the post on my blog. I thoroughly concur about 'push of pike' minis - whatever small nuisance is entailed is well worth what they bring to the scene.

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    1. I think we're in the minority here, but I'm glad I'm not standing completely alone in the cold! :-)

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  3. Amazingly you base your troops the same as myself on thin wooden bases. Cheap but effective and add some weight if the figures are plastic 25mm as a lot of mine are. Excellent stuff.

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    1. This basing was done in the mid 1970's (!), and it is rather thick balsa wood. Now days I usually use 3mm MDF bases.

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  4. Hi, just wanted to tell you, I enjoyed this article.
    It was practical. Keep on posting!

    ReplyDelete