The English Cavalry 1513

 

Let us begin with the King’s Spears. I have two versions of these. First, from Essex Miniatures Henry and his senior nobles. Two bases only. 

Very few of the English nobility thought it worth their while to maintain the large horses fit to carry barding and a heavily armoured man. Only the wealthiest did so and that because of their intimacy with the King.

Next, Roundway Miniatures  version. Seemingly we will not see their likes again. A shame.

 

The English made up their deficiency in “Gendarmes” by hiring Burgundians.  We have seen them before but can have another quick look.

Demi Lancers were an English speciality. 

Men in ¾ or less armour on smaller horses. Tactically these were charging cavalry. 

They liked to fight close to. The English had lots of them. Above, Minifigs, Essex and Alternative Armies.  Below, Minifigs and QRF.

Light Horse, again these were semi armoured men on smaller horses. Often Bishops were expected to raise a squadron and maintain it. I don’t have any. Khurasan make them and one day I might buy some. I envisage them as more disciplined than the Border Reivers but less formidable.

Border Horse. English King’s like to use Border Horse when they could. They also didn’t mind them taking casualties. Border Clans only notionally accepted external authority.  Go back far enough and there stands Bryneich and Rheged.

You might be interested to know that the southern boundary of the Reiver raiding range was the city of York. Beyond York you were safe from Blood Feud or random robbery with violence. From the Border Clans at any rate.

Next time for 1513 we will have a look at the English infantry.

England's Allies and Mercenaries in 1513

 

Here we are at last. The Valois French are complete. Likewise, the host of the King of Scots. Now we turn to the English. Or nearly so.

First let us see the  Allies/ Mercenaries. Those being the Burgundians and the Irish and various bits of the Emperor’s Army. The Emperor’s men were genuine allies. The Burgundians and Irish had to be contracted and paid. Top of the page and below Burgundians.

The Burgundian Gendarmes above.

A Burgundian Lance. We see the front rank of Gendarmes and the second supporting rank of mounted crossbow men. This was the favoured Burgundian formation. Note the smaller horses in the second rank.

Burgundian mounted Crossbows who could deploy separately.

 Imperial or Burgundian skirmishing shot.

The splendid Burgundian flags are from Pete's Flags.

Cardinal Wolsey wanted to hire 1000 Irish cavalry for the 1513 Campaign. Wolsey looked after the important stuff for Henry. Diplomacy, Finance, Legislation that sort of thing. Doubtless he was a sharp lad. 

The horsemen he was looking for came from Ireland’s Warrior Clans. A 1000 of them wouldn’t leave many left in Ireland. Let me explain. An Irish Warrior Clan was an agnatic Mercenary Company. It owned no land and made its living by hiring out for wages and grazing in Ireland’s regular small wars.

Had Wolsey succeeded in hiring them he would have gained some excellent light cavalry and have removed a significant military group from Ireland. Smart work. 

In the event it seems he failed. Probably over money. In another negotiation Wolsey haggled about the number of servants each Kern expected  to take to France.

Some Kern did go to France so a deal was done. Here are some above and below.

Wolsey might have got some Irish Cavalry.  They are not, as far as I know, attested in the record. 

All the same, if you want to use some think Stradiots as far as capability goes. "The finest Scourrers on Christian ground." as the man said about them. I wouldn't go with more than one unit of Irish cavalry in 1513 France.

One though, adds to the fun.

Before we go, have a gander at the pic' above.  It is Henry King of England in 1513. Gold armour is hard to miss. I wonder if he wore it in the field? My version will.

Next time in 1513 we will see the English cavalry. Pete's Flags above with Essex Miniatures.

Gendarmes and Archers 1513

 

When I again turned my attention  to 1513 I thought not to linger over long. Utterly wrong as it turned out. Each Gendarme needs at least one non noble horseman in support. There was a lot of painting.

I have written before about the “Lance” concept. A Lance being variably 2-5 men. One hundred Lances means at least 200 men and up to 500 men. As you can see i have simplified the representation here. 

Even with creative interpretation (cheating) it is a fair few cavalry.  Let us get to it.

Supporting Archer cavalry.

 You can see a lot of Minifigs in the pic's. A lot to like with these figures I think.

Not all Archers were archers.

David at Not By Appointment made me some flags for known French Commanders.

Above we see Berault (Bernard) Stewart. He is the lad in the middle. Note his buckle impressa drawn from his banner. Below Louis de Tremouille once again we see an impressa. In this case Fortuna's Wheel depicted on the surcoat.

Gendarme or Archer  units can fight separately if required.

Now, Burgundian Gendarmes with supporting mounted Crossbow men. A debate meanders on about shooting from the saddle. I think they did, by utilising a latch. We will see more of them in a subsequent post on England's Allies and Mercenaries.

They are shown with latches. Could they dismount to shoot? Of course. They  weren’t centaurs. The ones above are a mixture of Minifigs and Donnington.

There are lots of flags on show today. They are from Pete’s Flags, free ones from Lancashire Games and banners for Berault (Bernard) Stuart and Louis de Tremouille that David at Not By Appointment kindly made for me. 

Next to turn once more to the English.  We will begin with England's Allies and Mercenaries. 

 

The Scots at Flodden

Now the additional figures have come from QRF. I can finally get some units completed.  Above James King of Scots.  

Above, the Guilds and levies of Edinburgh.  Note the very nice flags from Ray at Don't Throw a 1.  The first flag shows St. Margaret who began life as a Northumbrian princess.  She married the King of Scots. 

Next, I need to do the Earl Marischall's retinue.  That will give me three units for the Scots centre. And the guns of course.

The Scots artillery, 3 guns in all.

More pike men.

The Men of the Borders under the Home and Maxwell banners.

With Highland flank guard under a Gordon flag. I need to add another Highland unit for the Borderers other flank.

On the other side of the central units there will be more Highlanders.  One unit is done and another is in preparation.  Below, you see Clan Campbell.

 

Both of these will be full Clan levies.  The well armed Nobles and gentry supported by less well armed clansmen.

 

There we are, three units to go, one of pike men and two of Highlanders. In time I'll add some Border Horse too.  I have the figures already.  Baring a few that I'll badge with the St. Andrews or St. George's crosses the rest will be interchangable. As they were in life.

Berbers for Billhooks

 

There are of course Berbers and Berbers.  I’m thinking of Berbers in Spain.  Of course, Berbers are and were Berber, with Berber military traditions.  A quick look at Moorish and Numidian forces in ancient days shows the roots of that tradition.  Broadly speaking I’m going to end up with a list of units rather than a specific army list.   

 

This is my thinking so far.

When the ground was right, restrictive to cavalry and close formation troops, massed Berber skirmishers could attack in waves hurling javelins at close range.  On one such occasion they lured veteran Arab cavalry into dismounting to pursue them into difficult ground.  The Berbers then attacked destroying the Arab force.

 

On open ground other tactics were required and found. These revolved around the veiled spear men you see above.

Some tribes enjoyed a better military reputation than others.  Unfair?  Maybe.  It does allow us to vary the rating of units.  For example, we might have:

 

Veteran Berber spear men or Levy Berber spear men.  The veterans might be Retinue in Billhooks terms.   

Berber spear men might also be in a block with a second rank of archers.  The archers might be levy or might not.  A third rank of cavalry stood behind the archers.  Importantly, the cavalry could advance directly through both lines of infantry when the time came for a counter attack.

Sub Saharan troops loom large in Berber Armies.   

They might be mercenaries and so retinue.  Or, military slaves and so possibly not.   

They could be spear men or archers or a highly rated Black Guard unit. I've just ordered a unit of the latter because...El Cid.

 

Berber skirmishers were very good.  Fortunately, Billhooks already provides for such fellows.  I’ll use the Kern stat’s. Often such Berber infantry formed a second line behind the spear men and threw javelins over their heads.  The spear men leveled their spears, butts firmly grounded and knelt behind their shields to facilitate that.  This means we should allow our Berber skirmishers to form up to carry out that function.

That leads us nicely to Berber tactics in set piece battle.  The light cavalry deployed on the wings or in front of the army.  The light infantry was on the flanks.  The centre was formed of spear men with supporting archers or javelin throwers.  Behind this more cavalry waited.

The idea was to absorb the enemy charge and counter charge when they were disordered.  On occasion this was combined with a flank attack.

If you are interested in the Crusades, you might now be thinking “Just like the Fatimid’s battle tactics.” A moment later you might add "and Frankish tactics in Outremer".

This raises the interesting question were all Berber cavalry light skirmishers?  I don’t know the answer.  I can say that Berber cavalry in Fatimid armies did not skirmish but fought hand to hand.

Here is another thing, Berber armies could manoeuvre in response to drum signals. I think that calls for a special card.  My take is simple, the card will allow the whole army to advance or retire a single move.  It can be played once in a game.

That’s it so far.  More soon.