Warburg 1760

This weekend sees the 250th anniversary of this Seven Years War battle. It's being reenacted in Germany. See newspaper item here. Official website with program of events here

Battle of the Boyne - League of Augsburg 25mm

I don't think we've had this before - looks good. Anyone got any of the Front Rank late 17th century figures yet?

Rory Mcgrath 'Bloody Britain; Monmouth Rebellion'

Time: 21:30 to 22:00 (30 minutes long).
When: Friday 20th August on Discovery (Digital Terrestrial)
'Rory McGrath investigates the rebellion of 1685 and learns how to fire a musket and take on a horse in a running race'. He's a comic so I don't have high expectations but I am curious.

The Queen on Flickr

So the Queen has a flickr page. Her Majesty here is inspecting the Honourable Artillery Company - the oldest unit in the British army.

Handel's Water Music

Today in 1717 this piece of music was 'launched' - here's a recent attempt to recreate it.

Execution of the Duke of Monmouth

Took place today in 1685. A sad end but not as sad as the end that most of his supporters were to suffer. Judge Jeffries and the Bloody Assizes

Viskovatov

Looking for images from this 19th century Russian military artist and came across this collection of pics depicting the army of Peter the Great. More here

ECW in 1/32 scale

This blog has an excellent set-up for recreating the ECW in a grand scale.

New German Living History Magazine

English text further down

Werte Freunde,

nach langer und streckenweise ermüdener Vorbereitungsphase ist
es nun endlich soweit: Mein Magazin ist seit heute "auf dem Markt".

Unter www.afaktor findet Ihr alle Informationen und eine PDF-Datei
zum freien, kostenlosen Herunterladen.

AFAKTOR, das moderne Magazin für lebendige Geschichtsdarstellung,
Kultur und Reenactment ist ein deutschsprachiges Magazin, das sich
an historische Darsteller von der Steinzeit bis 1918 richtet.

Die erste gedruckte Ausgabe kommt im Dezember in den Bahnhofsbuchhandel
und den Vertrieb via Abonnement, danach erscheint das Magazin vierteljährlich.

Lob, Tadel, Kritik und Vorschläge bitte an:

chefredakteur@afaktor.de

Viel Spaß beim Lesen,

Udo Brühe
AFAKTOR
www.afaktor.de
http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/AFAKTOR/109765879073851?ref=ts

.....................................

Dear friends,

after a long time of preparation my magazine is now available.

At www.afaktor.de you'll find more informations and a PDF-file
for downloading.

AFAKTOR is a germanspeaking magazine dedicated to Re-enacters
from the Stoneage to 1918.

The first issue is for free and from December 2010 on our magazine
will be available quarterly in Trainstations and per Abonnement.

You and your groups are very welcome if you wish to introduce
yourself, feel welcome!

Please send your feedbacks to:

chefredakteur@afaktor.de


Kind regards,

Udo Brühe
AFAKTOR
www.afaktor.de
http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/AFAKTOR/109765879073851?ref=ts

Onega Lake

As you know I run an unofficial fan club for the Great Northern War scene - they always seem to be doing something interesting and doing it with enthusiasm - it always makes me wish I was there and I faithfully report if in case any of you lot are in the Baltic region and want to get involved. These images are of a weekend on Onega Lake (second largest lake in Europe) and though it wasn't a serious attempt at 100 per cent historical stuff it is certainly interesting to check out the gallery of photos to see what they were up to.
Video and so on here
Also as part of the trip they went to Kuressaare, on the island Saaremaa, Estonia. It has a very well preserved fortress and castle that was taken by the Russians in 1710. So they appeared there to mark the date. http://lgpp1709.livejournal.com/18666.html#cutid1

Battle of Klushino, 1610

Picked this up from TMP, a great reenactment over July 4th weekend of the Battle of Klushino during the Russian "Time of Troubles" period in 1610. Absolutely great painting and modeling references! I've already got the site bookmarked for when I finally start painting my own Poles. Some wonderful shots of arms, armour, drill, uniforms and standards and included participants from nine countries. Would have loved to have been there for this one! Check out all of the pic's here.

By the way, I'm remiss for not doing so sooner, but the excellent picture above, as well as all of those reached via the link, are the work of TMP'er Joe Dever. My thanks to him for it's inclusion and for the great write-up of the event.

As Friend Raia has pointed out, my earlier identification of this Battle as being during the "Deluge" was incorrect. It was actually during the preceding Russian "Time of Troubles", which took place from 1598 to 1613 and revolved around the troubles of succession from the end of the Rurick dynasty until the beginning of the Romanov dynasty. I have already edited the "Deluge" reference in the opening paragraph and apologize to readers for the error in terminology.

Bill

Salute for Heroes Multiperiod Event

24-25 July Suffolk is the place and just about every period covered are going to be there in aid of the Help for Heroes charity. Details here. Features a Major muster for the ECWS among many other shows from Greek Hoplites to modern military displays. Details here

Battle of Sedgemoor 1685

So another excuse to raise a glass - this time to celebrate the last pitched battle fought on English soil on the 6th July and the last popular English rebellion. Wiki.
Anyone painted any Front Rank figures' late 17th century range yet? Send in some pics if you have. These are their grenadiers - perfect for James II's army.

American Revolution - the prequel

To celebrate 4th of July I thought I'd link to this interesting article from NY Times about colonial elements in the English Civil War. I must say there was elements of the ECW in the American Revolution.

100 and Counting – The State of the Blog

True to my word, at 1800 hours local time yesterday, midnight GMT, I unearthed a well-aged bottle of Di Serrano’s finest elixir, poured a generous snifter, lit a good cigar and raised my glass to all here. I especially toasted Ralphus, who created this little corner of the "ether" that several of us call “home”.

In my comments following Ralphus’ post on Follower number 99, I mentioned the stature and pursuits of some of our Followers, and I hope that was not misconstrued. Between Ralphus, Fraxinus, Corporal Trim and myself, I don’t know that any of us enjoy any special qualifications or stature, I know that I don’t. We are simply enthusiasts dedicated to a particular period or era, and we write for fellow enthusiasts. That some of our Followers happen to be noted historians and authors, or equally-dedicated enthusiasts specializing in specific nationalities or armies, is simply what we Americans would call “The Icing on the Cake”.

Many times one of us will author a post, or pose a question in a post, and one of You, our dedicated Followers and readers, will contribute to the discussion, offer new sources we were not previously aware of, or plant the “seed” of another post or research project. This is but one of the reasons that I personally value the inclusion of people like Curt Johnson (Dur Ecu), Daniel Schorr (the Northern Wars web site), Stéphane Thion (Timur), our good friends Motorway in the Netherlands (Anno Domini 1672 blog), Uwe in Bavaria (History in 1/72nd blog), and Guiseppe and Auguste in Italy (La Grande Guerra del Nord blog). It is exactly because of my own limitations. These individuals are “specialists” and have patiently answered questions that I’ve had, sent unsolicited material to Ralphus and myself, and keep us “honest” in what we offer to our readers. However, that does not slight any other Follower or reader, and I believe that many more of you are probably capable of contributing to these interactive discussions and would love to see even more feedback than we already receive, and we do receive quite a bit.

In one of my last comments I compared our little community to a Victorian-era salle. For those not familiar with this tradition, in late 19th Century England and on the Continent, it was extremely popular for groups of like-minded, genteel Ladies and Gentlemen to gather in the home of one of the group and engage in discussion, debate, public oration, reading of both poetry and literature, and comparison of fine wines, port and cheeses. Indeed, it was out of one of these salle’s that Mary Wolstonecraft Shelley’s “Frankenstein, the Modern Prometheus” first saw the light of day. That this blog attracts such a high-caliber of participants is to be celebrated and saluted. Please, invite your friends, share your thoughts with us, let us know where your interests lie. If one of the four principal authors cannot answer your questions, I am confident that one of our Followers can point us all in the proper direction.

saluté

Bill

Sir William the Aged

Number 100 Has Arrived!

Welcome to reader and follower "Donogh" , who joined us today, officially number 100. I hope you will all join me at midnight GMT in raising a pint in salute and we might consider making Donogh the Elector of some smallish Germanic Stadt or Bishopric. A fellow named Fred did quite well in that role a few years beyond our time frame.

Bill

Mars WSS Saxons Finally Reviewed

If you read my post on the "Plastic Olympics" back in February, you will remember that I extrapolated what I thought would be the contents of the Mars WSS Saxons set and used that as part of my "scoring" criteria.

Well, PSR has finally gotten a proper review done on this set here, and I may have actually been overly-generous in my scoring. As I suspected, there are 4 of each and every pose, so you are left to decide what to do with 4 standard bearers, 4 NCO's, 4 drummers, 4 fifers, 4 pioneers and 8 officers (2 poses). If I bought enough of these sets to actually do 3 or 4 decent-sized gaming battalions, they would be accompanied by a full battalion of grenadiers, a half-battalion of pioneers, a complete fife and drum corps, and a veritable panoply of flags.

The overall quality of the sculpting has improved compared to other Mars sets of the past, but still isn't up to the standards of the better makers, and there is a significant amount of flash for a new mold. Overall, better than nothing, but far short of what this set could have been. Sad really.

Bill

99 Followers

We're one short of 100 followers to this blog. What should we do to celebrate the 100th?

ECWS at St Ives

This is a very decent film of the English Civil War Society recently fighting at St Ives (not the Cornish one - the other Cromwellian one celebrating 900 years). Of course it's much more fun to experience in the flesh - smelling the eggy black powder smoke and so on but this comes a close second. This film is pretty impressive - sells the Society and the period well - hats off to the reeenactors and the camera person.