Keep Your Powder Dry

I'm a bit of a fan of the National Civil War Centre and Newark in general; the centre and Newark having graced the pages of this blog a number of times. Well the Centre has had a revamp.

So much of a revamp that rather than trying to re-write the previous entry it made more sense to write a fresh entry.


On entering the museum the ground floor has stayed pretty much the same - a history of Newark gallery, and then the main gallery. The main gallery boasts an impressive display of arms and armour (mostly on loan from the Royal Armouries), interactive displays, Civil War era 'civilian' artefacts (including Newark siege tokens, and a deserters' hand branding iron). The multimedia theatre presents three short films, three in the morning and a different three in the afternoon. Not forgetting the dressing up for small and no-so-small people.

The World Turned Upside Down is the new exhibition which replaces the excellent arms and armour display, and the medical exhibition. Th…

Updated: added Church Of St Leonard, Middleton

Whilst writing the Prince Rupert travelogue I became aware of a number of houses which had some link to the Civil Wars, but were not tied to Rupert's advance north. Nor could they claim a close connection to a particular battle, such as Bolling House's role in Adwalton Moor.

In this series you'll find houses that didn't fit the Rupert narrative very well; were closed to the public at the time of writing Rupert; or, I hadn't known about a Civil Wars connection. I propose to write one entry per county*, and will update each entry as I expand my visits. I will change the date stamps of updated entries so subscribers (hello both of you) will be informed of updates. Initially I will look at the counties most local to Château KeepYourPowderDry - Derbyshire, Cheshire, Lancashire and Yorkshire.

And so we turn to Lancashire...

One such house is Hoghton (pronounced Horton) Tower an Elizabethan fortified manor house. Strong conne…

I was having a bit of a sort out/procrastinating about doing a gajillion headswaps of Peter Pig clubmen*, when I discovered some really useful figures in my 'spares box'. In the interests of 'balance' it must also be pointed out that there were some pretty useless figures in the spares box too (vampire with modern pistol, lots of deaded/wounded Scots highlanders etc).

Well, it would be a criminal waste not to use the useful figures wouldn't it?

The Scots Covenanters, now have a baggage train (of sorts).



A witches' coven, complete with bubbling cauldron. The impressive bit being the fact I hadn't lost all three (separate) legs for the cauldron. Please note my witches look like witches, so have green skin and black clothes.



Plus also in the pipeline are some more artillery pieces for the Parliamentarian and Royalist armies. Yet more baggage for those two armies too (well I did have rather a lot of spare horseholders), and another unit of commanded shot each. …

When we think of the British Civil Wars we think of everyone belonging to one of the warring camps - there was another group of people who wanted no part in the war, wanting instead to live a peaceful life. When the war visited them, or more precisely soldiers foraging or looting, they rose up and banded together to protect their homes and property.

"Peace and truth"
Clubmen risings took place in Shropshire, Worcester, and most notably in Dorsetshire. In Bradford citizens rose up and sided with Fairfax, at Adwalton Moor, in defence of their home. The most significant clubmen rising was in Dorsetshire: for a fuller history of the Dorsetshire clubmen might I suggest the following article at Fontmell Magna village, and of course the Clubmen 1645 website and blog.

My clubmen are, naturally, from Peter Pig. However to represent a large rabble of people with just three poses has meant quite a number of headswaps. Must say I am a little disappointed that Peter Pig (a Dorsetshire co…