Sir William de Erth of Airth - Bannockburn (Pt10)

4 more mounted  kniggit types, all of whom died during the two days of the battle.
Sets used;
Medieval Britian (Edmund)
Crusader Transport 1 (Both Williams and sir Pain)
Army of Joan d'Arc (Earl of Erths´s horse)
English Cavalry of Edward I (De vescay´s horse)
Army of Henry V (Mauley and Tiptoft´s (1st)horses)

Sir William de Erth of Airth, in Charge of the scottish army´s  baggage Train. William was  killed during the night of the 23rd by David II Strathbogie, the Earl of Atholl in an attack at on the baggage train at  Cambuskenneth Abbey. His arms were White and black..not as it appears in the pic, Grey and black.

Edmund de Mauely. Lord of Ascot. Killed on the second day at Bannockburn

William de  Vescy of Kildare, (English) Retainer  (dependent or follower of someone of rank) to Aymer de Valence, 2nd Earl of Pembroke (the guy in Charge of the archers and savior of Edward II at Bannockburn) . Here it looks like he´s watching Henry de Bohun´s  failed attempt to take on Robert de Bruce and thinking "what the......!!!"

Sir Pain de Tiptoft (de Tybotot/de Tibetot) (English)
Also killed on the second day. Sir Pain (also Payne) got a head swop using a head (Zvezda) from the spares box . I´m not at all pleased with the nag and now I´ve got hold of a full set of  English Cavalry of Edward I  , I´m going to give him something  more fitting to sit on.............

.................like this :-D

In fact, at some point,  I´m going to re-mount Edmund and both  the Williams  onto barded nags. Even though there´s not really enough barded nags in the Strelets range it´s worth the extra bit of effort. The unbarded nags will get used for untiteled types, sergeant-at-arms etc

Scottish Cavalry - Bannockburn (Pt 9)

The cavaly commanded by Robert II Kieth,  Marischal of Scotland.
Most of them come from the Military Order Sergeants set, which has conveniently divided up into two halves, one half wearing the Kettle type helmet, who will end up as part of the english cavalry, the rest a mixture of headgear who ended up as the scottish cavalry.
The second stand withthe  flag bearer carrying the Saltire.  Historically correct? To be honest I´ve no idea but it serves to make it immediately recognisable as a stand of scottish cavalry.
Sets used;
Military Order Sergeants
English Cavalry of Edward I (unamed kniggit and his nag)
Army of Henry V (Kieth´s Standard bearers nag)
Medieval Britain (Kieths Standard bearer)

The whole force charging off to scatter the english archers



This guy..he Looks a bit of a kniggit type so I´ll have to dig up a Name for him.

The Scottish Forces so far.

A lot of People don´t like Strelets "chunky" style, and although this is true of some of thier sets it isn´t always the case.

Perrier catapult

A type of sling catapult called a Perrier.
Basically a large static version of the Fustibalus (staff sling) it has no counterweight, but relies on the Crew  to pull both down and back to launch the Missile, which makes it a traction operated weapon.
Perriers range from a small, one-person devices to ones pulled by many soldiers or even a team of horses. At any size the traction-powered Perrier was a quite effective weapon because it could be  reloaded and fired relatively quickly.
The only Definition I can find for the word Perrier is this one;
Per´ri`er

n.

1.

(Mil.) A short mortar used formerly for throwing stone shot.

Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary, published 1913 by C. & G. Merriam Co

The Perrier is made from  balsawood, a cocktail stick and two pins,
The two Crewmen come from the Zvezda Medieval Heavy Bombard set.
Even though the device looks big, I reckon two would be enough if the arm was balanced correctly it would, even loaded, only need a small amount of force to get it moving.
I´ve left it looking a bit rough and ready, not cutting off the planks flush with the main Support Frame.

The sling is made from a bit of paper, the hook holding the release rope  made by softening the tip of the Cocktailstick in warm water, bending it adding a strip of paper and filling the gaps with PVA.

A couple of contemporary pics of Perrier´s

 Here´s a short Video of a  Perrier being demonstrated at the Tower of London.

 

They are powering it with 4 People, two..one at each side and the other two right under the arm!! This means they have to duck down to avoid being hit with the pulling end of the arm!!

Better to do it like this lot.

 

 

Bannockburn (pt8) English crossbows

They didn´t have a huge force of crossbowmen at Bannockburn so (according to any sources giving numbers of troop types) using the 50:1 Ratio  it works out to roughly 10 bods.
They are all from the Medieval crossbowmen set with head swops from other strelets sets or Accurate´s /Revell´s Hundred Years War English Men-At-Arms set.

 

The whole of the english army so far...still quite a few to get finished!

 



Wooden huts (Pegasus)

Two nice small buildings for a nice small price. Easy and quick to build, removable roofs, easy and quick  to paint, what more could I ask for?

With the bigger of the two houses I´ve added a fireplace and some printed wooden flooring.

The bigger house fits nicely alongside the houses made by Thorsten Burgdorf (which are available HERE )

The good thing about them is that they are usefull for a load of different scenarios and periods..like the new house that the DeWitt´s are moving into over at Bodstonia.

Austrian cuirassiers Regt. Nr 8 - Joined forces

At the FIGZ Meeting I picked up the Cuirassiers painted by Peter (Peter´s Cave) and now the Forces are joined (Setting them up helps mix the bods) There´s some really good close ups of the buglers/Standard bearers painted by Peter HERE

394 ....366 troopers, 15 officers, 10 buglers and 3 Standard bearers.

Are they ready to go and join thier comrades on the Croeburn dio? I think so :-D

Arial view

Bannockburn (Pt7) Maurice, Abbot of Inchaffray

Finally the next sheltron is completed.
Sets used;
Strelets Medieval crossbowmen
Strelets medieval Levy (1)
Strelets Medieval levy (2)
Medieval Britian
Crusader Transport (1)
Roman Port
As always with history, a problem has arisen. What coat of arms did Edward de Bruce wear on the day? Was it the one I´ve used, (in a lot of the Pictures protraying him at Bannockburn) or the Arms of the Earl of Carrick (Argent, Chevron Gules) ?

Éirinn go Brách!!

Cavalry view of the sheltron

Edward de Bruce



It bugged me so much that eventually I changed the Arms. I think, and it seems Logical, that only Robert de Bruce, being the C.i.C,  would have royal arms at the battle.........although I could be wrong.

Another of the Kneeling bods from the strelets Medieval crossbowmen set converted to a pikeman.

 

Maurice, Abbot of Inchaffray. He not only blessed the scottish troops at Bannockburn but apparently he had previously helped in the escape of  Robert de Bruce after the Battle of Methven in 1306.
The top half of Maurice Comes from the Crusader Transport (1) set and the bottom half from the Roman Port set.

Maurice Blessing the troops

And for a bit of fun. The Douglas/Stewart sheltron and De Bruces Sheltron accuse one another of drinking all the whisky...a fight ensues.
I´ve tried making the  basing so that the front rank is slightly back from the leading edge of the base and the tip of the spears a centimeter or two further from the leading edge so that it´s possible to have two base edges meet. Seems to work...so far.



Bannockburn (Pt6) Gilbert de Clare and Robert II Kieth

A start on the mounted elements for Bannockburn. The Knight bods have had head swops using helmets from the Zvezda English Knights of the 100 years war set.
The flags are handpainted (the designs are simple so it wasn´t worth photoshop etc to create some)
Sets used
Army of Joan d'Arc   (Horses with Caparisons and Gilbert de Clare)
Medieval Britian       (Standard bearers and Robert II Kieth)
Norman Knights       (English Standard bearer´s horse)
Army of Henry V      (Scottish Standard bearers horse)

Gilbert de Clare, 8th Earl of Gloucester, killed at Bannockburn. As it would be an insane task to include Standard bearers for all the english Knights, the english cavalry stands will get the George cross.

 

Robert II Kieth, Marischal of Scotland, who commanded the cavalry at Bannockburn, who numbered about 500. As he´ll be based with a Group of cavalry and he commanded them,  I´ve added a standard bearer carrying his colours.



Bannockburn (pt5) Sheltron 3rd battle - Edward de Bruce.

The start of another Sheltron, this one will be under command of Edward de Bruce.
Finding bods to fill the ranks from my collection without buying the Strelets Scottish Schiltron (PSR use the other spelling, Schiltron, which is accurate and  better than what´s written on the box artwork where it´s spelt sciltron) so conversions are necessary.
So far it´s mainly head swops or replacing of weapons.
Sets used;
Strelets Medieval crossbowmen
Strelets medieval Levy (1)
Strelets Medieval levy (2)
Medieval Britian

Two bods from  strelets medieval Crossbowmen set.

This bod is now a trumpeter. His new arm Comes from Hat´s El Cid Spanish command set.

Edward de Bruce. His top and bottom halves come from the Strelets Medieval britian set and the mace from the new weapons range from Valdemar.  His head was turned during conversion to look in the direction he´s pointing.

Standard bearer.

Only a couple more to do and they can be based :-D