Cropredy 375

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Rather than cluttering up my ECW Travelogue guide to Cropredy Bridge, I decided to post a second entry which is purely devoted to my snaps from the Sealed Knot's Cropredy 375 event.

The Living History camp...




 
The battle...
 



































 

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Battle of Cheriton, 29th March 1644

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The William Waller campaigns continue...a saga of manoeuvre and counter manoeuvre.

Background
After the Battle of Alton (and the taking of Arundel by Waller), the two armies went into winter quarters. Hopton overwintered in Winchester where he was joined by a contingent of the King's Oxford Army under the command of the Earl of Forth. Forth had superiority but Hopton retained operational command (on account of Forth having bad gout).



Waller's Southern Association was bolstered by a cavalry brigade from the Earl of Essex's Army, under the command of Sir William Balfour.

In March, Parliamentarian forces began to muster near Petersfield, with a view to march on Hopton. Hopton had news of the movements of the London Brigade and marched to intercept them. the London Brigade got wind of the Royalist advance and withdrew to join Waller.


View of the battlefield from the memorial, Cheriton Wood on the left.

Waller marched to Alresford in order to cut off Hopton's route back to Wi…
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Battle of Cropredy Bridge, 29th June 1644

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The latest instalment of  'the travels of William Waller's Southern Association' visits Cropredy (pronounced cropper-dee): home to folk festivals (of the singing with one finger in their ear variety), a haunt of hippies in the '70s looking to hang out with Fairport Convention (some are still there, so don't be at all surprised to see Gandalf look alikes roaming the area), and 375 years ago a little dust up in the First Civil War.


You'll be pleased to hear that there is still a bridge, but not the titular 'bridge', it having been rebuilt and then widened in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries

The Royalists had suffered several defeats in early 1644, Nantwich, Cheriton, and were now besieged in York (the Scots having arrived on the scene to bolster the Parliamentarian forces). A beleaguered Charles was holed up in Oxford.


The Sealed Knot march across Cropredy Bridge
On Saturday, 29 June, Charles headed north along the eastern bank of the Cherwell. Wall…
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Basing House

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The next, gripping* installment of the Sir William Waller Southern Association adventures...

Basing House was strategically important, on the road from the King's capital in Oxford, to the important stronghold of Winchester.


Replica saker positioned on one of the rampiers

Views across the remaining earthworks

 Basing House was a Norman Castle, a Tudor palace and the home of the Earl of Winchester. The House came under it's first siege in 1643 by Sir William Waller. Waller had 7000 men but couldn't breach the considerable earthwork defences over the nine days of the siege, the defenders lost just two men.



 The Great Barn, which saw fierce fighting, and is one of the few buildings to still stand
 The second siege started in Spring 1644, this time Parliament's men decided to starve the defenders out. The siege was relieved in September of the same year when Gage marched from Oxford with a relief column. Gage withdrew to Oxford after relieving the siege; once his force had left…
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The Battle of Alton, 13th December 1643

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KeepYourPowderDry packed it's passport and ventured South in search of Sir William Waller's Southern Association campaign trail. First stop - the Battle of Alton.

I must confess to being rather fascinated with this battle since being a small person, we had a copy of the 'AA Book of British Towns' at home, and when there was nothing on the tellybox (which was nearly all the time, it was the early 1980s after all) I often used to leaf through it. One thing lodged in my memory, Alton Church having musket ball marks in it's door.

So, as I was in the area, I thought I should go and see this famous door.


St Lawrence's Church
September 1643, Sir William Waller was ordered to muster forces for the protection of Hampshire, and the western approach to London. By November his command was expanded to take in forces from Kent, Surrey, Sussex, supplemented by some of the London Trained Bands regiments and the remains of his own regiments (who had been seriously duffed up at R…
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Newbury

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Newbury has a lot in common with Newark, and I don't just mean the letters 'N-E-W'. Both saw significant action during the Civil Wars, both have 'showgrounds' and both are host towns for wargames shows.


Your little, and not so little, ones can dress as pikemen at the museum.
The First Battle of  Newbury, 20th September 1643
The war isn't going so well for Parliament, Charles has taken Banbury, Oxford, Reading and stormed Bristol. He has now set his sights on Gloucester, cue the Earl of Essex to the rescue. Essex had marched from London to beat off the Royalist threat, but now he had to return to London.


'Arty' camera angle to avoid sun's reflection
The King's army wanted to halt Essex's march to London, and the two sides crossed paths at Newbury. The King arrived first, taking up position slightly to the south and west of Newbury. Essex drew his army up to confront the Royalist army  to the west of the King's lines (parallel to the modern …
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A New Regiment - How Long Does It Take?

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A question that arose to myself the other day was: "I wonder how long it takes me to 'do' a regiment?"

So I've decided to time and document the process. I already had the figures, had researched which regiment it would represent (coats and flags), and emailed my request through to Maverick Models to have the flag produced. So I imagine I have excluded a fair chunk of time there. Nor have I included 'prevarication' time - all that time spent deciding what colour to chose, trying to find elusive pots of paint that aren't where they should be, deciding what music I should listen to whilst painting, cleaning brushes, filling water pots, drying time etc

This is one of my standard regiments of foot: 34 figures with separate pikes, and a casualty marker. I'm not the most accomplished painter, my painting style is more akin to waving a brush in the vaguely right direction. Nor am I the quickest. I am of the school that believes if the sculptor put the det…
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Siege Engineers

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Update: added pictures of a 'siege hat' from the West Berkshire Museum in Newbury.

Yet another task avoidance project has reared it's head. At this rate those Royalist horse will never get painted.

Keen eyed visitors to the National Civil War Centre (NCWC) and the Royal Armouries will have spotted the exhibited siege engineer armour, with elongated lobster pot helmets with shoulder supports (helmet apparently so heavy that there are brackets which transfer the weight directly to the wearer's shoulders). Well, once you've seen them you are going to need some in your army aren't you?



Apologies - the siege armour on display at Newark, beautifully presented but awful to try and capture with a camera due to the light streaming in

Siege armour at Royal Armouries, Leeds. Again nicely displayed but suffering from sun light reflection.

 Close ups of an engineer's helmet

 Whilst visiting Newbury for my ECW Travelogue series of posts I saw a 'siege hat' in the disp…
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Colonel John Pickering’s Regiment of Foot

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Colonel John Pickering’s Regiment of Foot was raised in 1644 and was part of the Eastern Association. Stormed Lincoln in 1644 before taking part at York, Marston Moor, Sheffield, Bolsover Castle and Second Newbury. In 1645 they were garrisoned at Abingdon before becoming part of the New Model Army.


The Regiment is re-enacted by Colonel John Pickering's Foot part of the Sealed Knot.



Pickering was a lawyer who acted as a diplomat for parliament  conveying messages and reporting back from the Scottish privy council. Pickering originally commanded a regiment of dragoons, before taking command of his regiment of foot.


Pickering's was my guinea pig unit answering my 'how long does it take?' question.


The regiment have a published history (Glenn Foard, Pryor Publications). Out of print but available from online auction houses and ABE Books.


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Duke of Hamilton's Regiment of Foot

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The Duke of Hamilton's Regiment of Foot, unlike all of my other Covenanter Regiments of Foot, did not take part at Marston Moor.

Hamilton's were raised in Lanarkshire in1648 for the Second Civil War. A short lived regiment they fought in the Preston campaign, Penrith, Appleby, Stainmore, Winwick Pass, before surrendering to the New Model Army at Winwick and Warrington.


The regiment carried black flags with a white saltaire, apart from the Colonel's company who had a white flag with an ermine field.


I must confess I struggled to get started painting these figures; I think my experiment in working out how long it took to paint a regiment hung heavy around my neck like the ancient mariner's albatross. Once I had got jackets, trousers, wood and flesh out of the way the process became less onerous.


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