Building LEGO armies can become a bit of an obsessive pastime and it is not unknown for avid collectors to amass forces that number in the thousands. Indeed, here at Brick to the Past we have substantial numbers of Macedonian, Spartan, Persian, Roman, Viking, Anglo-Saxon, Norman and generic medieval troops. Jacobites however are new to us and it has been an interesting process designing and redesigning our burgeoning force. In this blog we explain how we did it and how you too can do it too.

 The first stage of any army building project is always research and this essentially takes two interrelated paths. Firstly, you need to get a good idea of what an army looked like, what clothes they wore, what equipment they used, what standards they flew. Secondly, you need to find out if LEGO actually make pieces that represent these characteristics and if not, how can you creatively fill in the gaps. This latter part may require you to consider any comprises you need to make and how far you are willing to pursue these. Cost may also play a significant part in this process because while the perfect part may exist, it might also be rare and therefore prohibitively expensive if your intention is to build a substantial force. Make sure you spend time exploring the options on sites such as Bricklink before committing.

Fortunately for the avid army builder, there is a wealth of easily accessible literature to help them along the way. Books published by companies such as Osprey are ideal for this purpose, because not only do they contain detailed drawings of soldiers and their equipment, they also provide descriptions of tactics and formations employed at the time. There are numerous titles available on the Jacobite Risings, both in and out of print, and so it was natural for us to turn to these as a major source of information. For this project, another good source came in the form of battlefield re-enactors and we were lucky enough to talk to members of Major General Glenbucket's Regiment, Alan Breck's Prestonpans Volunteer Regiment and Régiment Irlandois de Dillon at the Highland Folk Museum in 2016.

The most noticeable thing about Jacobite armies is the variety of clothing worn and equipment used. Indeed, the appearance of an army could change over the course of a campaign, as goods were requisitioned and equipment captured. Our army is stylistically based on that of the one during the ‘Forty-Five’ Rising and we have tried to incorporate a few key features into the mix. Before describing some of these however, a few words needs to be said on the subject of tartan.
 
If you walk down Edinburgh’s Royal Mile, or indeed any Scottish street that relies on an influx of tourists, you will be bombarded with advertisements for tartan goods, and more particularly, ‘authentic’ clan themed tartan goods. These trade on the idea that each Highland clan has its own unique tartan, and these days, this is largely true. However, this notion is a relatively new one, only dating from the first half of the 19th century and finding its roots, like many such traditions, in the Romantic movement of the time. Traditionally, tartans were not clan specific, with colours based on whatever natural dies were available locally, while patterns would have been made according to the tastes of the local weavers. As a result, what might be regarded as regional styles may have emerged, but these were not formalised along clan lines. During the ‘Forty-Five’ members of different clans would in fact have been identified by their ‘clan badges’, which usually took the form of a sprig of a specific plant and were usually worn on a person’s bonnet. For example, the various branches of Clan MacDonald wore a sprig of common heather as their badge. So while our armies are kilted in various types of tartan, these tartans are not supposed to specifically represent any of the clans who joined the Jacobite cause.

The tartan kilts we’ve adorned our troops with are a mixture of third party custom pieces and our own creations, made from cuts of ordinary craft-shop ribbon. While we prefer to stick with official LEGO parts as much as possible, the only official LEGO kilt made to date is the one that came with the Bagpiper from Collectible Minifigure Series 7, way back in 2012. These are no longer in production and currently go for in excess of £2 on the seconds market and only in very small numbers; they are therefore wildly impractical for the purposes of army building and as such the compromise had to be made.
 
Another major compromise was with regard to the Jacobite blue bonnet. The bonnets, which were worn not only by the army of the “Forty-Five” but also by those of previous risings, and indeed by earlier Scottish armies, are an iconic item of clothing and so this was important to address. The trouble is LEGO, having naturally never produced Jacobite playsets, have never produced a piece of headgear that closely resembles the bonnets; we were therefore immediately forced to look for an alternative. Fortunately, while it may be a different colour, LEGO do produce a piece which has alternatively been presented as a ‘beret’ or ‘flat cap’, in black. As far as minifigures go the difference between beret and bonnet is pretty much non-existent and so these pieces were identified as a suitable substitute. We did find a third-party company who made blue berets for LEGO minifigures, such as those worn by UN peacekeepers, but decided that this would result in too many non-LEGO pieces in the model.

To achieve the army’s variable appearance, we drew upon  a wide range of minifigures from a wide range of sets. Perhaps the most useful of these was the Highlander minifigure, released in 2012 as part of Collectable Minifigure Series 6. While the obviously stylised appearance of the minifigure is more Braveheart than Outlander, it does come with some extremely useful pieces, namely the torso itself, which is ideal for representing the plaid of the period and a round shield, known in the Highlands as a ‘targe’. The other benefit of the Series 6 Highlander is that it’s parts are still relatively cheap and so ideal for buying in large numbers. Obviously, we did not want the entire army to be dressed in the same way and so other torso designs were sought. Proving ideal were those from LEGO’s Pirates sets, Pirates of the Caribbean sets, Lord of the Rings and Hobbit sets and various Collectible Minifigure lines, including Series 14’s Zombie Pirate Captain. 

Weaponry and equipment were also an important consideration and it is worth noting that they changed considerably in the 57 years between the start of the first and end of the last Risings. The equipment of the army even changed across the course of the Risings; for example, in 1745 the Jacobites had little in the way of artillery and relatively few muskets, while at Culloden they fielded eleven 3-pounders and one 4-pounder and ran into battle armed with muskets and pistols captured during earlier engagement. Our aim was to strike a balance between these two points and so while the majority of our army is armed with sword and targe, there are a reasonable number of men carrying muskets and other fire arms. Swords, targes and firearms were of course relatively expensive items and in the early days at least, many Jacobite soldiers would not have had access to them. Many marched into battle carrying other much cheaper weapons, including the Lochaber Axe. The axe was a heavy polearm type weapon of about five or six feet in length and typically used as a defence against cavalry or a pike against infantry. At the Battle of Prestonpans in 1745 it was used to great effect against General Hope’s horse and is thought to have been a crucial element in the Jacobite victory. Naturally therefore, there are a number of axe wielding soldiers present in our army .

It’s easy to forget that the Jacobite army of the ”Forty-Five” was more than just its foot and that it in fact had a number of small cavalry units, including hussars and dragoons. We have not tried to recreate each of these units as it would result in a slightly unbalanced force. Instead, we have chosen two, namely the Scotch Hussars and the Prince’s Life Guard. Both represent distinctive elements of the Jacobite army and, fortunately, are easy to recreate in LEGO form using a mixture of Hobbit and Pirate pieces.

Another easily forgotten fact is that the Jacobite army of the ‘Forty-five’ wasn’t just made of kilted Highlanders. Lowlanders were also present in the army, albeit in much smaller numbers, and these men would not have worn the kilts and plaids of their Highland counterparts. Following the invasion of England around 300 Englishmen joined the Jacobite army to form the Manchester Regiment. The involvement of many of these men was however short-lived, as following a failed attempt to hold Carlisle Castle, they would be captured and  brutally punished. While these recruits would have joined the army in the clothes they were accustomed to wearing, there is evidence to suggest that the Jacobites tried to harmonise the appearance of their army by ordering replacement clothing in the Highland fashion.

Finally, the international contingent of the Jacobite army needs to be recognised. While French support for the ‘Forty-five’ never met the hopes and expectations of the Scottish Jacobites, it nevertheless existed. Much of this was provided in the form of detachments from the Irish Brigade, which had originally been formed when five Jacobite regiments were sent from Ireland to France during the Williamite War in Ireland in exchange for a larger force of French infantry. The ‘Irish Picquets’, as they were known, saw action at the Battle of Falkirk and Culloden, and were valued for their training and discipline. Interestingly, the uniform of this unit were red, much like those of the government force, but designed and cut in the French style. Other troops provided by the French were the Royal Scots (Royal Ecossais), who were originally formed as bodyguards for Valois Charles VII of France in 1418. The Royal Scots did not arrive in Scotland until late in the Campaign, landing in Montrose on 7th December 1745. French soldiers were also present in smaller numbers as engineers and gunners who would operate the Jacobite’s small collection of artillery.

Talking of artillery, we have also created a number of guns to place on our battlefield. LEGO of course have their classic moulded cannons that have appeared in their Pirates sets since the early 1980’s, but these aesthetically don’t accurately reflect the field artillery of the day and so we decided to build our own. Building artillery is great fun and our guns went through a number of iterations before settling on a final design. The main aim was to build something compact that would represent a gun somewhere in the 3-6 pound range and would look good at a minifigure scale of about 1:40.

With the army assembled, all that remains now is to place them in the field; stay tuned to the blog to find out how. If you want to find out early, our LEGO Jacobites will be unveiled as part of The Jacobite Risings: The Fight for Britain’s Throne at Manchester’s Bricktastic show this July; why not be the first to see it?

We'll be doing a guide to building the government army of the "Forty-five" later in the summer, follow us on Facebook or Twitter to see it first!

Finally, a big recommendation needs to be given to Maggie Craig's excellent book 'Bare-Arsed Banditti: The Men of the '45' which has provided us with a great deal of information and inspiration for our model. We also love the name of the book and found it a perfect into for this blog on our own bare arsed banditti. If you want to find out more about the rising of the "Forty-five" then get Maggie's book, it provides the perfect introduction.

We’re pleased to announce that we'll be at this year’s BRICK LIVE Glasgow show, held on the 20th to the 23rd of July at the Scottish Event Campus.

BRICK LIVE is a massive show with tons of things to see and do and is a must for anyone with a love of LEGO bricks. We’ll be joining some of the World’s best LEGO builders in the ‘Fan Zone’ where we will have on display our Viking themed LEGOfarne model. We hope to see you there!

Find out more and buy tickets at:

www.bricklive.co.uk/bricklive-glasgow-2

Erskine didn't get the epithet 'Bobbing John' for nothing and in 1715 decided to rescind his support for the government and take up the Jacobite cause. Towards the end of August of that year he marched from his ancestral castle of Kildrummy and using Corgarff Castle as rendezvous with further troops, continued on to Braemar. On 6th September, possibly at the ruinous castle, possibly somewhere else, he rose the standard of King James VIII and III. The rising would not be a long one and after an indecisive battle at Sheriffmuir and defeat at Preston enthusiasm among the Jacobites was on the wane. When James landed at Stonehaven in December the rising was effectively over. In February 1716 James, Erskine and the rising’s other leaders fled to France and shortly after Corgarff would be the scene of the Jacobite army’s dissolution. The castle was brunt once again, this time by government forces.

By the “Forty-five” Corgaff Castle had been repaired and would again play its part, for a short period acting as strategic munitions dump for Jacobite forces and the intended rendezvous of Jacobite forces. However, the rendezvous never happened as the castle was promptly raided by a party of the Government troops. The Jacobites were forced to quickly flee, leaving the greater part of their stores behind. We are fortunate to have a vivid account of the raid, written in a letter from Aberdeen on 6th March 1746, by Alexander Stuart of Dunearn, Captain in Lord Mark Kerr's regiment of Dragoons, to his brother, James Stuart of Drumsheuch:
 
"I returned on Wednesday from an expedition into the Highlands of Aberdeenshire, fifty miles from hence, to destroy a Magazine of the Rebels at Corgarff, which lies near the head of the Don. Three hundred foot commanded by Major Morris, and one hundred Dragoons commanded by me—the whole under the command of Lord Ancrum, were ordered for that duty. We marched from this on Friday, 28th February, in a snowy day to Monimuss, Sir Archibald Grant's house. Next day over mountains and Moors almost impassable at any time of the year, but much more so when covered with snow, to a place called Tarland. As soon as they saw us directing our March thither, they suspected our design on the Magazine there, and some rebels who lived there sent away an Express immediately to acquaint the Garrison, and to Glenbucket, who was with some men at Glenlivet above Strathdon, about Ten miles above the Castle.

On Saturday morning we marched from Tarland, a most terrible march, to the Castle, which stands on the side of the Don, where I daresay never Dragoons were before, nor ever will be again, nor foot neither, unless Highlanders! Though we marched early in the morning it was past four before we arrived there. We found it abandoned by the Garrison, but so lately, that the fire was burning, and no living creature in the house but a poor cat sitting by the fire. They had thrown the barrels of powder down the bank into the river in order I suppose to destroy it, but had not time—and had conveyed the arms up and down the hills near it in different directions, and hid the bayonets under a dung-hill. However, we found all out, and brought away 367 firelocks, 370 bayonets. There were some more arms destroyed, which we could not carry. Ten thousand musket balls we threw into the river and amongst the heather, etc., etc., and it being impossible to convey away the powder for want of country horses, all gone to the hills with the country folks who had run away, being told by the rebels that we were to burn and destroy the whole country. We staved 32 double barrels of exceeding fine Spanish powder equal to 69 of our barrels, and threw it all into the river—and afterwards, for want of horses, were obliged to burn and destroy so many of the firelocks, that we brought but 131 to Aberdeen. We returned on Wednesday from such a country that a hundred men might beat a thousand from the hills above them—and had it snowed another night when we went there, it had been impossible to have returned. We were obliged to be two nights in the open fields—and sit on horseback all night. However, we happily executed what we were sent upon— and, thank God, returned safe, with only the loss of one horse. I do assure you the Clergy, who have everywhere in Scotland much distinguished themselves for our religion and happy constitution, behaved very kindly to us, were our guides and intelligencers everywhere—and three of them went quite up to the Castle of Corgarff with us, from whence, I forgot to tell you, we were obliged to return eight miles for quarters—and 'twas two o'clock in the morning before we arrived. Guess what a journey in such a country, in a dark night, snowing the whole time! . . . I hear now the Rebels are in great want of provisions. This Magazine is a great loss to the Rebels—it supplying them with ammunition in their marches thro' the Highlands, where carriages cannot go."
 
In Dougal Graham's history of the rising, published in September 1746, the only account to ever be written in rhyming couplets, a short description is given of the capture of Corgarff Castle. Graham however chose to apply a little artistic license claiming Lord Ancrum blew up the castle with the captured gunpowder barrels rather than simply staving them:

We look forward to unveiling LEGO Corgaff as part of The Jacobite Risings: The Fight for Britain’s Throne – why not be the first to see it at Manchester’s Bricktastic this July?

We are pleased to announce the title and theme of this year’s big build - The Jacobite Risings: The Fight for Britain’s Throne.

So what where the risings and why have we chosen them?

The Jacobite Risings, also known as the Jacobite Rebellions depending on the writer’s perspective, were a series of uprisings, rebellions and wars that occurred predominantly in Scotland, but also spread into Ireland and England, between 1689 and 1746. Following the deposition of James II of England and VII of Scotland in the Glorious Revolution, the aims of the risings were to return the Stuart monarch, and later his descendants, to the thrones of England and Scotland (and after 1707, the Kingdom of Great Britain). They take their name from Jacobus, the Latin form of James.

While conflict broke out in 1689, 1715, and 1719, the most famous rising is probably the last, that of 1745. During the “Forty-five" Charles Edward Stuart, also known as the Young Pretender or Bonnie Prince Charlie, led an army from the Scottish Highlands as far south as Derby before retreating north to be decisively defeated at the Battle of Culloden in 1746. Culloden was the last pitched battle to be fought on British soil and marked the end of any serious attempt to restore the house of Stuart to the throne.

This year is the Scottish Government’s year of History, Heritage and Archaeology and so we wanted to take part in the celebrations. We were already building a Lego Broch for Caithness Broch Project and so wanted something that was from a distinctly different time period but also covered a more specific and pivotal moment in Scottish and indeed British history. The risings presented the ideal choice.

Given the extensive time period, the number of important events and the varied geography over which the risings took place, deciding on what to build was a real challenge. Did we choose to cover one rising or several? If one, which one? And did we choose a specific geographical area or try and create scenes from across Scotland, England and Ireland?

One of the things we felt was extremely important was to instill the model with a strong sense of identity and the best way to do this was through its landscape. When you’re building a model of around 17m2 good landscaping can mean the difference between its success and failure. Crucially, we therefore decided that the model should focus on a distinct geography rather than a particular rising. In terms of the latter, we did not want the model to become of smorgasbord of disparate historical events either, so it will be largely based on those of the “Forty-five". The advantage of the “Forty-five" is that it allows us to build features, such as one of the Hanoverian Barracks built following the 1719 rising, that did not exist in earlier periods. The flexibility around the date also allows us to show some events that occurred in the run-up to the rising, such as the flurry of road and bridge building typically ascribed to the British Government’s General Wade.

As for the geography, despite events of the “Forty-five" taking place over most of Scotland and indeed much of England, it was clear that we should set our model in the Scottish Highlands and more specifically, the highlands of the area now designated as the Cairngorms National Park. The area was witness to important events during most of the risings, including the Battle of Killiecrankie in 1689, the rising of James VIII and III’s banner in 1715 and the disbandment of the last Jacobite army in 1746, and is home to a number of buildings used during the conflicts, such as Ruthven Barracks, Corgaff Castle and Braemar Castle. The National Park also has an incredible landscape, with snowy mountains, ancient Caledonian forests, deep gorges, and idyllic straths and glens; it therefore provides us with an immensely rich palette to draw upon for what we hope will be a strong and distinctive model.

We’ll have more on The Jacobite Risings: The Fight for Britain’s Throne in the coming months, including the history of some of the model’s key features as well as write-ups of some of the field trips we undertook as part of our research. Stay tuned for more and if you haven’t done so already, keep up-to-date by following us on Facebook and Twitter.

Sunday was the Aberdeen Children's Hospital Lego Show at the eponymous city's Airyhall Community Centre. This is the first show we've attended in Scotland and sent along Dan Harris to represent us. He took with him part of England 793 as well as a couple of smaller builds, one of which we are yet to reveal to you.

Dan said "the show was really fun and it was a pleasure to meet some of Scotland's best and most enthusiastic builders. The show's visitors were also great and I'm looking forward to future events!".

The show was organised by the local LEGO Club, Granite City Bricks, and raised money to buy LEGO sets for Aberdeen Children's Hospital. We thank the organisers for a great event and wish them luck with future ventures!

Dan Harris has been island hopping in Scotland’s Western Isles, here’s what he found out.

What do you do for a holiday if your country has just heedlessly voted to devalue its own currency? Well one thing is to take a bit of gamble on the weather and look a bit closer to home and, to be fair, when you live in a country that disregards the forecasts of economists about a post-Brexit economy, then disregarding the forecasts of the Met Office is the next logical step, even if years accumulated climatic data and complex mathematical models suggest the odds are stacked against you. And so with unrealistic expectations of a brighter tomorrow, we hopped on the ferry at Ullapool and set sale for the Isle of Lewis.

For those unfamiliar with Scotland’s geography, the Isle of Lewis is the largest island in the Western Isles of the Outer Hebrides. More accurately, it is just over half of the largest island in the Western Isles of the Outer Hebrides, because confusingly, the southern half is called the Isle of Harris, despite being part of exactly the same landmass.

Situated on Europe’s Atlantic edge, Lewis and Harris are both astonishingly beautiful islands, with everything from vast, white sandy beaches to precipitous, rugged hills and mountains. You might be able to tell, it didn’t really take that much to convince me to visit them, even if the weather was more promising in the Mediterranean. But I’ll pause there, because this isn’t supposed to be some kind of ‘what I did on my summer holidays’ type essay, of the sort you had to write on your first day back at school. No, this is essay is supposed to have some relevance to the Blog and oh what relevance there is!

Not only beautiful, the Outer Hebrides are also home to some of Scotland’s finest archaeological sites and so this trip wasn’t just a holiday, it was also a field trip. There were three sites in particular that we wanted to visit and by happy coincidence, they are all within a few miles of each other, on the western coast of Lewis. Of greatest relevance to our current work was the Dun Carloway Broch. This remarkably complete structure, perhaps second only to Mousa on Shetland, is thought to date from the late first millennium BC and the late Iron Age. It’s south side stands almost intact to what is thought to be its original height of 9 metres. Remarkably, people alive in the 1830s remembered seeing the broch in a near-complete state, roofed over with a large flat stone. The broch has a well preserved entrance, guard cell, intra-mural staircase and cavities, scarcement ledges and ground level chambers. The ground floor of the broch is uneven and contains a large slab of bedrock, suggesting that a second timber floor would have been the main living space. The broch proved an excellent source of first-hand information to help inform the construction of our own Lego Broch for Caithness Broch Project…despite not actually being in Caithness.

Just south along the coast is another of Scotland’s best archaeological sites, the Callanish Complex of Standing Stones. These are somewhat older than the Broch, dating back to around 3,000 BC and the Neolithic period. The complex comprises of at least 19 visible monuments as well as many now hidden remains. The best known and best preserved is known as Callanish 1 or Cnoc An Tursa, located just to the west of the village of Calanais. While we don’t have any immediate plans to build any more stone circles, it’s always worth having a few examples stored up, just in case we do decide to. Building an accurate model of Callanish 1 would certainly prove an interesting challenge.

The final site visit took us to the island of Beàrnaraigh Mòr, perhaps better known as Great Bernera, which is connected to Lewis via a short bridge. On its northern coast lies the sandy bay of Traigh Bostadh where in 1993, following a severe storm, the remains of a Viking house and older Iron Age village were uncovered. Evidence suggests that the bay was occupied at least as far back as 1,500 years ago by people thought to be Pictish in origin. The Iron Age village proved the most interesting find, comprising of a complex of semi-subterranean, drystone dwellings of a ‘jelly-baby’ shape. The local history society has built a life-size reconstruction of one of these Iron Age dwellings, which can be visited for a small donation. While obviously less ambitious than Caithness Broch Project’s aim to build a life-size reconstruction of a broch, the house is an excellent example of what can be done and of the benefits of recreating historical buildings using traditional methods.

Since I don’t think you want to hear about my days spent on the beach or wandering the hill country of Harris, this marks the end of my report. As forecasted, the trip ended with driving rain and winds so strong they uprooted our tent, leaving us soaked, cold and in need of alternative accommodation – next year we’ll probably just holiday in Greece.

Field trip season well and truly kicked off this weekend as we ventured north to what is arguably the farthest corner of mainland Britain. On Sunday we were lucky enough to be given a tour of some of the finest Broch sites in Caithness and Sutherland by none other than local Broch experts Ken and Iain from Caithness Broch Project.

Field trips are a valuable part of what we do and despite some mildly grim weather and the occasional cloud of midges, this one was no exception. Brochs on our visit included Nybster, Dunbeath , Kintradwell / Cin Trolla and Carn Liath and they provided us with a wealth of features, some of which are delightfully grizzly, to include in our forthcoming model.

As if having two Broch experts accompany us wasn't enough, we were also lucky enough to bump into AOC Archaeology's John Barber, who has years of experience working in Scotland's  historic environment. John is currently undertaking research into the engineering, architecture and conservation of  brochs with the University of Edinburgh, so the opportunity to quiz him did not go unmissed.

This may well have been our most productive field trip ever and so now, with our heads full of new found information, it's time to get building... or maybe go on another field trip, because you can't have too much of a good thing.

Here at Brick to the Past we love a good field trip, so this weekend we've been vising the Highland Folk Museum to catch up with some of the locals. We loved the display put on by Major General Glenbucket's Regiment, Alan Breck's Prestonpans Volunteer Regiment and Régiment Irlandois de Dillon. Now, is this the biggest clue yet for what we have planned for 2017?

We are delighted to announce that Brick to the Past have been commissioned by the Caithness Broch Project to build a minifigure scale Lego Broch for permanent display at the Caithness Horizons Museum. The model will also be taken around schools in Caithness and used for discussing Brochs in more detail with local children, as well as other aspects of Iron Age life.

This project is just one of many outreach activities Caithness Broch Project have planned to coincide with the Scottish Government's 'Year of History Heritage and Archaeology' in 2017.

For those unfamiliar with Scottish Iron Age archaeology, a broch is an Iron Age drystone hollow-walled structure of a type found only in Scotland and mostly in northern Scotland. Caithness, Sutherland and the Northern Isles have the densest concentrations, but there are also a great many examples in the west of Scotland and the Hebrides.

Caithness Broch Project is a registered charity (SC046307). The aims of the Project can be divided into several achievable targets:

• Promote and Preserve existing archaeological sites in Caithness, through improved signage, access and information releases on these sites.
• Create an Archaeological Trail around Caithness, for locals and visitors alike to follow and discover the wonders of our past.
• The ultimate goal of the project, through authentic building techniques from the time, is to build a replica of an Iron Age Broch, which becomes the base for a Tourist Centre and Dry Stone Workshop.

Check out their website and support them on social media:

www.thebrochproject.co.uk
www.facebook.com/CaithnessBrochProject
www.twitter.com/thebrochproject
www.instagram.com/caithnessbrochproject