Sir Henry Willoughby

Onward with the last third of the Army, I am now concentrating my efforts upon completing the infantry.

Here we have Sir Henry Willoughby wearing a heraldic tabard accompanied by a picked man carrying his personal standard. I have attempted to nod at a couple of things in this base;

1.) By all accounts Henry was a wealthy and well appointed gentleman, his appearence at this time is unknown though his tomb (d.1528) appears to indicate a transitional armour in that it has slender aspects of late 15c design with tassets but sports more contemporary bear paw sabatons.

Heraldic tabards though outdated on the continent were still not uncommon in the English Army of the period, seperated from the continent, fashions very much developed at a slower rate (in a way the appearence of my whole army rests upon this supposition!), there are quite a few tombs which depict this. Whether this was the choice of the sculptor to represent the deceased in their prime or an indication of the fashion at death is unknown but it certainly is an indication that there was nothing improper in depicting this style.

2.) My first French piece of equipment; Henry and his men advance over a battered and hurriedly discarded pavise bearing the arms of Therouanne, the siege of which saw the only considerable amount of action - I'm quite pleased with this and may duplicate on a few more stands.

I had fun creating this stand, particularly the standard, we love flags !

For those interested, here is a brief biography of Henry and his military career;

Sir Henry Willoughby lived up to his family motto of sans changer (without change) and showed that he must have posessed some aptitude in loyally serving three kings; he was a servant of the royal household under Richard III and a knight of the body to Henry VII and Henry VIII. He was knighted at the battle of Stoke in 1487, and served in Flanders in 1489. Sir Henry maintained his own retinue on behalf of the King, and took them to fight in Brittany in 1491 and to defend a rebellion at Blackheath in 1497.

In 1512 he was appointed master of the ordnance and raised a retinue of 830 men for the Marquis of Dorset's unsuccesful Guienne expedition. In the 1513 expedition to France at the age of 62 Sir Henry commanded a retinue of 200 and served in the rearward (that of the King).

He attended Queen Katherine at the Field of Cloth of Gold in 1520 and died in 1528.

Stuart.