Mary Queen of Scots

[Cadman]

Mary Queen of Scots is, (arguably), one of the most fascinating individuals in British history.

She lived in an era that had a potential powder keg at every turn, and given the events at Kirk'o'Field, it was literally a powder keg.

Some examples of Murder and Mayhem, just off the top of my head....

 

Wed and widowed while still a teenager

The Reformation, with all that implies for a largely protestant country and an eighteen year old catholic Queen

Her maternal Guise family - extremely powerful in France during the mid-1500's

Volatile nobles on both sides of the Scottish/English Border, indeed certainly in the case of Lord Ruthven, completely unstable nobles

The influence, power and threat posed by France and Spain

Constantly shifting loyalties

An illegitimate but extremely able half-brother acting as her Regent

Catholic spies

Calvinism and John Knox

Numerous battles - one of them practically bloodless, and another bloodless one that was wryly called "The Chaseabout Raid"

A murdered second husband

Desperate cross-country horseback rides though the night

Alleged assault by a third husband (which I don't believe happened)

Forced abdication in favor of an infant son

Miscarriage of twins while imprisoned

A failed escape attempt from that prison - followed by a successful escape from that same prison....a prison....in a castle....on an island....in the middle of a loch

Another escape -- by abseiling down the back of a castle wall while her rebellious "Lords of the Congregation" were hammering at the front gates 

Imprisonment for 19 Years, while subject to, and complicit in, countless schemes and plots against her cousin Elizabeth I

And then a sad end at the age of 44

 

What an incredible story -- Hollywood really ought to do a movie about it. Oh, they already did -- it was released back in December 1971.

I don't count the John Ford/Kate Hepburn 1936 effort; it's a comedy - and I've never been able to stay awake long enough when trying to watch the 2014 movie, but Clemence Poesy does a good job as Queen Mary in the BBC's two-part "Gunpowder, Treason and Plot" from 2004. Apart from these, and despite all the inaccuracies in the screenplay, Vanessa's performance in the 1971 movie remains the Gold Standard, and I actually enjoy watching her and Glenda Jackson happily munching their way through the scenery.

I really don't care about the two fictional meetings between the two Queens in the movie either -- and who's to say they really never met anyway? If they did, then both Elizabeth's chief minister Cecil and her somewhat sinister spymaster Walsingham could have very easily scrubbed it from the record in any case.

What I especially love about this movie is Glenda's rather splendid over-the-top depiction of Elizabeth I. You'd think she was auditioning for the part of "The Pirate Queen" in some Christmas Pantomime production. You almost expect her to slap her thighs and break into "Yo-Ho-Ho and a Bottle of Rum" and start evilly twirling her moustaches every time she appears on screen.

Absolutely brilliant..!! And I must have a hunt and see if I can find her amazing 6-part TV series "Elizabeth R" from the early 1970's.

 

Err, the less said about yon TV series "Reign" the better....😲

 

Oh well anyway....I digress as usual....

I've wanted to do a diorama featuring the doomed Mary Stuart for ages and have been collecting suitable white metal castings and kit figures with a view to doing just that.

To the best of my knowledge, no company does a range of 54mm 16th century Scots, but A Call to Arms does plastic ECW sets which might be adapted, and there are a couple who offer Spanish Tercio's at the Battle of Rocroi that are suitable for using as Scottish Lowland troops, or even better, use them as Scottish Borderers. (George MacDonald Fraser's book "The Steel Bonnets" springs to mind).

The two white metal kit figures on the right of this photo below are perfect, but the guy on the left is far too ECW to work for a diorama set in 1568 -- however, with an added moustache and the suggestion of a tuft of hair on his chin he'll make for an excellent James Graham, 1st Marquis of Montrose in a future project depicting one of his Battles in Scotland during 1645.

 

Of course, the biggest drawback of all is the complete lack of any suitable 54mm figure I could use as Mary Stuart herself. So it was time to get creative.

I had a spare horse available. It was part of a Napoleonic set I bought in Budapest way back in 2002, and geez, it was cast in the hardest metal I've ever tried to work with.

However, after a bit of sweat and a lot of foul language, the left side was finally cut back and filed smooth in preparation for adding a figure riding side-saddle similar to the movie still of Ms Redgrave in the first photo above.

 

 

TO BE CONTINUED 

Edited July 1, 2018 by Cadman
fixed a couple of grammatical errors

[Cadman]

CONTINUED FROM PREVIOUS POST

 

Not always, but certainly more often than not, I use wooden kitchen chopping boards as the base for my dioramas. Another option is to use miniature Chinese display tables as these were cheap enough to just go ahead and build the diorama straight onto them. Well, the wife went out on a mission yesterday and bought two more. The price of these things seems to have rocketed over the past several years, and what she paid would've kept me in beer for a week down at the "German Bar" in the local Kempinski hotel. She did a good job all the same, and although this one isn't suitable for a diorama it's really well suited for displaying some of my 75mm Pegaso kit figures. The 54mm Japanese Onna-Bugeisha figure was included in the shot to illustrate just what a huge difference there is between 54mm and 75mm figures.

 

 

Anyway, to cut my usual long story short, the other table she bought is significantly larger than the examples I've used in the past and is going to work great for this diorama.

So well done Missus C.

 

 

Okay, so where was I? Oh yeah, Mary Stuart.

The lower body is part of an old resin figure that has been kicking around in my spares box for a couple of years now, (nothing gets thrown away at our place....😎)

 

 

The head was cut off this torso, which I think came from some old Phoenix casting from the late 1980's.

 

 

The right arm, head and bonnet were from my spares box and the entire thing stuck together with large dollops of 2-part epoxy.

 

 

The riding skirt was done with green/grey milliput....

 

 

 

....and then the entire assembly got a light mist of white primer.

 

Meanwhile, these guys were also prepped and primed.

 

After allowing the primer coats to dry overnight, it was finally time to get some color onto these figures -- at last....😊

 

 

TO BE CONTINUED

[Silver Fox]

I'm always impressed by your work and this looks like another beauty.

 

If you fancied dropping down a scale there are some nice 40mm Border Reviers here: https://www.perry-miniatures.com/index.php?cPath=23_42_44

[Cadman]

14 minutes ago, Silver Fox said:

I'm always impressed by your work and this looks like another beauty.

 

If you fancied dropping down a scale there are some nice 40mm Border Reviers here: https://www.perry-miniatures.com/index.php?cPath=23_42_44

Thanks for the link. I knew Perry Miniatures did the smaller scales (28mm?) but didn't know they also do 40mm. They look like excellent figures but perhaps a tad too small for my eyes. Importing hobby stuff is always a bit of an adventure as well, although I must admit there's not been just too many problems with Customs when small-ish orders come in from the UK.

[Silver Fox]

They actually do a lot of Napoleonics as well, which are nice as a rest for me from painting 28mm. %$mm plus is just too much for my pocket.

[Cadman]

CONTINUED FROM PREVIOUS POST

 

This "cobbled together from various bits and pieces" figure was now coming along nicely, although it was obvious I'd have to get the Dremel out and carve a few better folds into the riding skirt.

Should've done that before the milliput hardened up....😕....Oh well....

The horse got a change of color while I was at it.

 

And by the time this stage was reached I was just about ready to call her "almost done".

 

Meanwhile, I'd done a couple of flags in excel, printed them out and attached them to their new owners.

 

But there was something niggling away about them and I couldn't quite put my finger on what was wrong.

And then the penny dropped..!!

The Lion Rampant is facing the wrong way....doh....😲....😭....😄

So off they came and new ones were put on. They look so shiny in this shot because of the multiple coats of gloss varnish that were slapped onto them so's they'd keep their shape.

 

And I reckoned the Pike & Shot group was now beginning to look quite good. Still had to give those flags a squirt of matte varnish to dull them down though.

 

In the meantime, it was back to Mary Stuart and some finishing touches.

She won't win any prizes, but then again, I only spent around six days on her plus she's a diorama figure anyway, so she's good enough -- and besides, I don't "do competitions" in any case.

 

 

 

Did I happen to mention that this little project is actually going to be two dioramas? Probably not.

The relatively large one will be built onto a wooden base and displayed on the larger of the new display tables. This will depict the Battle of Langside 13-May-1568, although this isn't going to be the final locations of the figures.

I'm thinking it'll look better with Mary off to the side giving some of the troops a pep-talk rather than just lining them all up.

 

 

Meanwhile, I'll be building a smaller vignette to depict the aftermath of defeat and the "escape" into England on 16-May-1568, and it'll be displayed on a smaller table which is the same design as the larger diorama.

At this moment in time I've no idea how I'll block off two of those edges so I don't end up with resin "water" all over the hobby room floor.

That's not quite true as I'm actually chewing a couple of ideas around, but they'll keep for now.

 

However, that kit figure looks far too old to stand in as Mary Queen of Scots who was only 25 or 26 at the time of the events I want to portray. She'll work fine as one of the Queen's "Four Mary's" though.

I'll have a hunt through my usual on-line sources for a suitable figure to use as Mary Stuart about to climb into that leaky rowing boat.

That leaky rowing boat which will take her over the Solway Firth and an important date in nineteen years time at a place called Fotheringhay, that by all accounts she actually welcomed -- as a chance to be a "Catholic Martyr". Umm, and I've just given away where my loyalties are, and they're certainly not with James Stewart, the Earl of Moray. I do have some sympathy for the impossible situation Elizabeth I found herself landed in though.

😎

Anyway, getting back to the hunt for a second Mary Stuart figure, this'll be something similar to Hollywood's massive search for the actress to play Scarlett O'Hara.

 

I'll be transferring this thread to the diorama section sometime next week, as despite the fact there's still a ton of work to do on the kit figures, that's where it'll belong once I make a start on the groundwork -- and that river section.

Cheers the Noo

H

Edited July 5, 2018 by Cadman

[Vince1159]

Lovely job Cadman,if you get the chance read 'My Heart is my Own' by John Guy....

[Cadman]

5 hours ago, Vince1159 said:

Lovely job Cadman,if you get the chance read 'My Heart is my Own' by John Guy....

I have JG's book. Also Antonia Fraser's which I read a long time ago, but intend revisiting.

Finished Mickey Mayhew's "Little Book of Mary Queen of Scots" earlier this evening. It's quite an entertaining read. 

I'm no book snob, but after being burned a couple of times by Ms Gregory -- and Margaret George is even worse -- I'm reluctant to look at any historical fiction on the subject of Mary Stuart,

Having said that, I do admit that I remember enjoying Jean Plaidy's "Royal Road to Fotheringay" and "The Captive Queen of Scots", but that must've been around thirty years ago. Might just buy them both for my Kindle and revisit them as well, but only if I get really bored.

😜

 

Edited July 2, 2018 by Cadman
added a comment

[Vince1159]

I've read Antonia Frasers and it's good but the only thing i didn't like was parts in Latin with no translation,it's been a long time though so i might buy one...

Edited July 1, 2018 by Vince1159

[Cadman]

5 hours ago, Vince1159 said:

I've read Antonia Frasers and it's good but the only thing i didn't like was parts in Latin with no translation,it's been a long time though so i might buy one...

Yeah I know. There's a bunch of untranslated French quotes in Fraser's book as well.

There's always Google Translate of course, but the results can be unpredictable and often inadvertently funny.

[Sgt.Squarehead]

Is that a can of Irn-Bru in her hand? 

[Cadman]

9 hours ago, Sgt.Squarehead said:

Is that a can of Irn-Bru in her hand? 

Close, but no cigar.

It's a can of Carlsberg Special -- I was trying to be subtle and dropping a huge hint on where Bothwell was skulking by this time.

😵

Got a bit more done on the figures....

 

....and began weathering the getaway vehicle....

 

Edited July 3, 2018 by Cadman

[Cadman]

Knew I had the DVD set of Glenda Jackson in the BBC's "Elizabeth R" kicking around somewhere. Found it yesterday in this 7-disk Dutch import yesterday. It's in English and the Dutch sub-titles can be switched off via the menu options.

Sure it's a bit dated now, after all the series was filmed almost fifty years ago, still features some stunning performances though.

The episode I'm most interested in re-watching is the fourth one, "Horrible Conspiracies".

Following description is from IMDb....

S1, Ep4

5 Mar. 1972

Horrible Conspiracies

8.3 (34)

It is 1586 and Mary Queen of Scots has been imprisoned in England for nearly 20 years, Walsingham is determined to strike Mary and the catholic faction down. Elizabeth tries to protect her doomed fellow Queen,but is slowly drawn into Mary's tragedy.

 

 

 

 

Edited July 3, 2018 by Cadman
added a couple of photos

[Cadman]

I made a lot of progress on the figures earlier this week, and the rowing boat driver is just about finished.

 

I was wrong about the Civilian Mary (Mk2) figure. I thought she looked way older than Martial Mary (Mk1) but once I got her face done she looks okay. (Need to add a touch of yellow to her hair though).

Guess she was pretty relieved to dump the cuirass she was wearing and revert back to civvie clothes. She'll do fine as the Queen of Scots getting ready to hightail it out of Scotland.

If you squint your eyes a lot, dim the lights down low and use some imagination, the guy with her could be a dead ringer for Nigel Davenport in the 1971 movie.

Shame the real James Hepburn (Bothwell) was incarcerated in Denmark by the time Mary Stuart made her daft decision to explore England's 16th century penal system.

 

That really just leaves these two Gents to finish off -- and then get on with the two dioramas for this wee project.

 

[Gimme Shelter]

fantastic work - look out Walsingham, the spy master