Covenantors and Montrose troops

[FreddBloggs]

of the ECW.

would I be right in thinking that other than the bonnet, Covenant troops looked much like their English counterparts?

That Montrose's Irish and Scots other than a sprinkling of kilts for highlanders and plaid sashes (for want of a better word) across the chest the same is true (Mixed hats, caps and bonnets as well)?

I know several people here have done these forces themselves, so just looking at the general outline.

[ochoin]

I'm no expert but I think, broadly speaking, this is true: they would probably have been uniformed in the English fashion.
At this time, apart from some dubious sketches & a few sketchy primary source descriptions, we are mostly left with conjecture. For example, as some of the Irish & Scots had fought for the Spanish as mercenaries, did they adapt a more Continental style of dress?

Differences seem to have come down to hats & colour...but even here there's often no clear demarcations. I believe the "Scottish" bonnet was popular in the north of England for example.

With the Irish, possibly Monmouth caps may have been popular. A light green is possible for their uniforms since that colour is often associated with the Irish but it could also have been varying shades of brown and grey.

At any rate, as Montrose’s campaign wore on, the men’s uniforms wore out did they replace it with whatever they could get their hands on, which would inevitably be captured Covenanter blue bonnets and Hodden grey uniforms? Did they all look very much alike?

There's a reason for soldiers wearing field signs & certain coloured sashes.

donald

[FreddBloggs]

As this is for 6mm (maybe) that helps a lot Donald.

[grizzlymc]

Fredd, what is your friend (for whom you are obviously enquiring) planning to use?

[FreddBloggs]

Ahhhhh not for a friend, for myself. I have some baccus, but they do not float my boat, so I thought maybe I should do my own range. So the hat/garment question then becomes a, what sculpts are needed question.

Watches rust patches start to show through the fur of a bear.....

[grizzlymc]

I have a willy of iron! I wonder how they might do for Chilean colonial. Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. My willy is still free of rust.

[BaronVonWreckedoften]

would I be right in thinking that other than the bonnet, Covenant troops looked much like their English counterparts?

That Montrose's Irish and Scots other than a sprinkling of kilts for highlanders and plaid sashes (for want of a better word) across the chest the same is true (Mixed hats, caps and bonnets as well)?

In the case of the Covenanters, yes in terms of cut, but of course they generally had a complete suit of clothes (ie coat and breeches) in one colour - the infamous, and elusive "hodden grey". I believe, from reading the controversial Stuart Reid, that there is now thought to have been a lot more latitude in what this colour actually meant - from slate grey through to beige via the pinkish grey currently worn by a London-based TA unit connected to the former London Scottish Regiment. Earlier on in the war, there were occasional units wearing complete suits of other colours - at least one regiment raised in Ulster wore red coats, at least, and there was famously a regiment kitted out with clothing supplied to one of the minor Scottish sects of Protestantism - ie all black (and hence known as "the ministers' regiment").

Your take on Montrose's army sounds pretty much what I have read - bands of "highland warriors" looking not unlike their Jacobite descendants; Scottish p&s regiments, possibly looking like Covenanter foot, or possibly in kilts/plaids, according to where they were recruited; and the Irish, who started off as a fairly "normal" looking p&s units - although recent threads on the LAF suggest no pikes, only shot, from the start - with clothing deteriorating over the course of a campaign.

On the subject of nothern English troops wearing Covenanter-style bonnets, I would be careful with this, as the style/shape of the bonnet is not really specified and might either be the floppy Scottish version, or might also be the old Tudor-style bonnet (think Baldrick from the Liz I series of Blackadder).

[FreddBloggs]

Thank you for that.

This simplifies things greatly, and as for northern troops in bonnets, I have an account of Fairfaxes being mistaken for cavaliers at one point due to them being in the broad brimmed floppy hat. But as a commander both h8m and his father worried less about looks and more about ability to fight.

On a personal note, I am aiming for most units to be a mix and match, with just odd ones fully uniform in the modern sense.

[levied troop]

I’ve been cleaning up some 28mm Covenanter figures and doing a bit of a read around. The blue bonnet seems universal and the jacket/trousers seem very common and slightly different from ‘English’ dress, a more home- spun effect but on a standard pattern. The cloth might have started ‘grey’ but, exposed to weather it’s been described as butternut. With slight variations it’s almost a uniform. Officers seem to be dressed in more variety and often indistinguishable from English officers.

If anyone has suitable recipes for ‘Hodden gray’ I’m all ears.

[grizzlymc]

Cheap black dyes still weather brown today. Grey would tend to s sort of tan / beige / butternut. And it happens quite quickly.