Conversions

    So it's been a while... I have still been busy, but I'm working my way through a monster unit of 30 Burgundian Pikemen, I'm getting there with them and hopefully it will only be a couple more weeks until they are completely finished and based up. In the mean time I thought I would show some conversions that I have been working on. They are all Billmen/Men at arms from a unit that will end up as some of the Earl of Warwick's Billmen, They have been quite enjoyable to make and involve a fair bit of bending, cutting, drilling, pinning and filling!

This first unfortunate fellow has taken a handgun bullet to the head and is falling backwards from the impact, he required a lot of patience with pinning and then filling! 

The second figure is running full pelt, I've tried to give all of the figures an energetic posing which mostly involves bending limbs.

This rather better armoured chap is carrying an axe I made from a small piece of florists wire with the axe head from the Perry's Agincourt to Orleans English Army set.

Now i'm not sure of the historical accuracy of this man, but i went for him all the same for a bit of variety, and I quite like him carrying a spear, perhaps he is a poorer retainer?

Lastly we have this fellow, he is posed like this because I will be putting him behind the guy with the bullet wound to the head. Pushing him on thinking maybe he has just lost his footing or something of the sort! 

Finally we have a base of 5 painted Warwick men at arms/billmen. I did these when I was getting a little bored of painting the white a blue livery of Burgundy and fancied a change, the will be part of the same unit as the 5 Conversions above and these themselves show a mish mash of parts from various perry sets! I hope you like them.

Warwick's men at arms

 To finish, I have just finished painting 10 archers to compliment these melee troops, they are also from the Earl of Warwick's troops and after i've finished basing them, I will get some pictures of them done and do a new blog post! Thanks for dropping by and hopefully I will not be too long away! Let me know your thoughts in the comments, I'd love to hear your opinions and suggestions!

Sir Walter Blount and his mounted companions

So here we are with my next unit, the project is coming along quite nicely, I've finished two units, the first was the mounted archers, which I've now decided to keep as a unit of 6 and the new unit which is what I shall be sharing today. These are 9 heavier cavalry, in the retinue of Sir Walter Blount, there are two knights in full plate armour, the main man Sir Walter, who I have depicted with slightly fancier armour, and also his ageing father, Sir Thomas Blount whom I have chosen to have plainer armour, perhaps representing older armour used in an earlier war and brought out again. I've given the retainers a mix of weaponry and armour as well as different coloured coats and clothes, just to keep things fresh, hopefully at some point in the near future I will be ordering a set of Banners to go on a couple of the lances/spears! I will next be working on a unit of Burgundian mercenaries which I have already started, a pike block to start with but eventually more, probably some burgundian cavalry at some point, both light and heavy. I have also turned my hand to a bit of conversion work, which I will probably feature in my next post. I have realised as writing this post that I missed some moulded on grass tufts, I will sort this later on so that i do not delay this post any further! 

The Full 9 assembled

The Beginning

  So Here starts a Project. The point of this blog is quite plainly to follow my progress as I build and paint a Yorkist army for the Wars of the Roses. I shall start with mainly focusing on the Battle of Towton, this was a Major Yorkist Victory and is a fairly well documented battle with regards to the participants. I have already begun by making and painting a few mounted archers with the Livery of Richard Neville Earl of Warwick.

Earl of Warwick's Mounted Archers

  I plan to do a couple more mounted archers to join these and either use them as a unit of 8 or two units of 4.  The miniatures are all Perry miniatures from the Light Cavalry set, some are slightly converted with parts from the wars of the roses infantry and also one of the horses has been reposed using wire and humbrol model filler so that it is reading up, the archer on the far right of the unit.    One of the reasons I've chosen to a project in this era is because I love the vast array of colours for different liveries, it helps me not to lose focus because when I get bored with painting one colour, I can just work on a different Lord's retinue. This has already happened, and I have actually already started on two more units, one a unit for Sir Walter Blount, and another of Burgundian Mercenaries, I don't there is any historical evidence of Burgundians at Towton, but as this is not a fixed army for that battle, I thought I'd do some because I liked the look of Perry European Mercenaries. Again with conversions to keep things interesting, although they will be shown in a different Post.    I will leave you with some more photos of individuals from the unit above! See you next time.