Tudor Artillery

Despite very little painting happening over the summer I have managed to get a few bits completed. Here are two artillery pieces to add to my growing Tudor forces for Henry VIII's 1513 invasion of France campaign, although they would also be suitable for the 1520s. I have been wanting to add a couple of guns with the crew in distinctive Tudor "Base" coats for a while but there was another reason for completing these; I was keen to try out some of Stuart's Tudor dolls that he sculpted a few months back.

I picked up some of these from Stuart a while ago and they are still available, details are here: http://stuartsworkbench.blogspot.co.uk/2017/05/lord-thomas-stanley-2nd-earl-of-derby.html . Before plunging into a whole unit of them, that is my current project, I wanted to experiment with a few just to make sure I could do a decent job of adding the sleeves to the coats with greenstuff. the problem facing me was that they are in quite dynamic poses to be artillery crew and I must have spent at least two hours swapping various plastic arms and trying to work out how they could be used. My final inspiration came from Simon's superb "Je Lay Emprins blog", if you have a look at this link you will see I have pretty shamelessly copied his idea for the gun on the left: http://je-lay-emprins.blogspot.co.uk/2013/02/wheeling-gun.html.

I am pleased with the results, they make a really dynamic base and certainly look as though they are wheeling the gun as an officer points out the direction he wishes them to fire in. The chap lifting the trail of the gun carriage is simply a Perry Miniatures labourer figure with a head swap and shovel removed while the breech loading gun is from Front Rank. The other gun is a miniature by Redoubt, a strange thing it's kind of half organ gun, as it has only four barrels. I wasn't sure whether to keep the chariot style "scythes" on the wheels of the carriage but I am guessing it is based on the kind of things that were used by the Spanish at Ravenna in 1512 and is intended to be an obstacle as well as a gun. Any crew would have to make sure they were standing well clear of it when it recoiled as those wheel spikes could cause a very nasty accident as the gun rolled back! 

The crew for the Redoubt gun are two Assault Group figures with head swaps, the same figures that were used in the dozens for the Billmen I painted a while back, and an old Citadel Empire figure. He is in very Germanic attire but I figured this would suit one of Henry's gun crew as he hired foreign specialists for his guns. Being pleased with this initial test of Stuarts Tudor dollies I am currently working on a set of attacking archers using them, it will be a while before they are completed however.

A Tudor breech loading gun being turned

A Tudor Organ Gun and Breech Loader

The three figures in Tudor coats are from the dolls sculpted by Stuart

The Tudor Organ gun, this one only has 4 barrels so could also be used as a normal gun at a pinch

The gun crew hurriedly move the gun

Tudor artillery pieces, 1513

The guns from behind