Charles Gerard's Regiment of Foote... redux!

Well, well, well....  a doppelganger has arrived...

From this ..



..to this..

..looks like they shrunk in the wash...

My regular reader will have read of my writings over Christmas, where, like some 21st Century, flat white drinking, snowflake hipster, I was complaining of  "not feeling the love" for the figure ranges/scales I'd (myself!) chosen for the nascent, and still-born, English Civil War project...  and how, having stamped my feet in a petulant manner, had sent off for an order of Peter Pig figures...

Well I am delighted to report that the flat whites are again creamy and smooth in Steve the Wargamer's world, as the arrival of the (excellently packed, and quickly sent) package was everything I had hoped it would be...  in fact so much love was flowing, a regiment's worth was cleaned, and on the painting sticks for priming the same day they arrived..

Let me introduce you then, to the "new" first regiment in the English Civil War project...  Sir Charles Gerard's Regiment of Foote

Poised to receive horse..

Seriously - they are lovely - look at the character in those resting pikemen..

The paint flowed quickly on these ones..  couple of hours?? I used the same technique I demonstrated in the post before last, it may be worth using a grey rather than black primer next time, same white wet brush after, but when the figures are this small I think the grey will help lighten the overall colouring..  for the next order I will get resting musketeers for the second ranks..

According to my research the regiment were originally raised - probably in early 1642 - as part of the Earl of Derby’s forces in Lancashire, where they were present at the siege of Manchester in September, and then at Edgehill (which is the the basis for this project) in October. They numbered approximately 740* at the battle, and were brigaded with Sir Lewis Dyve's and Sir Ralph Dutton's regiments on the front right of the Royalist deployment (see following)...

Picture courtesy Google Books

By all accounts they did sterling service anchoring the Royalist line at a time of most need.

The Concise Encyclopedia of the Revolutions and Wars of England, Scotland ...
By Stephen C. Manganiello

In November the regiment were present at Turnham Green, before going into winter quarters as part of the Oxford garrison at the end of a fairly successful year (for them, if not the King).

Gerard was a bit of a 'hard charger' by all the accounts I've read... he learnt his trade in Holland and the Low countries before returning to serve the King..  as above he was wounded at the battle, but went on to survive the war and was seen as a trusted pair of hands by the Royalist command - he was particularly active in Wales, and liked by Rupert. At the end of the war he went into exile, was influential at the court of Charles II, married, four children, was restored to his estates following the restoration, but was implicit in the later "glorious revolution" and after a short banishment was back in favour with the succession of William - he died in 1694 at the, not bad, age of 76...  not a particularly happy or pleasant man it seems - he seems to have been fairly litigious, a conspirer, and while in Wales during the war there were sufficient complaints about his heavy handedness to the King, that he was 'promoted sideways'..

Decision made then.. this is going to be a 15mm project

On to Parliament next - one of Charles Essex's Brigade I think who as you can see in the map were deployed opposite.. 

* source "Edgehill: The Battle Reinterpreted" By Christopher L. Scott, Alan Turton, Eric Gruber von Arni  

More details here:

http://www.battleofedgehill.org/edgehill-battlefield-map/index.html
http://bcw-project.org/biography/charles-gerard
http://wiki.bcw-project.org/royalist/foot-regiments/col.-charles-gerard-oxford