Wars of the Roses Artillery

The role of gunpowder weaponry on the medieval battlefield is often overlooked, with focus naturally on the rise and fall of heavy cavalry, the development (and then discarding) of armour, and the changing fortunes of infantry (from dominance to supporting act and back to dominance again).  But it's known that artillery of one sort or another featured at many sieges, and even in pitched battle.  By the time of the Wars of the Roses, states like Burgundy and France had extensive artillery trains - and round shot of various types and sizes has been found at the site of Bosworth, for example.  The recent large WoTR commission I've been working on (see numerous previous posts!) also included six artillery units.  These were all sourced from Perry Miniatures, in metal this time rather than my usual medium;

I themed each gun crew around one of the factions present at Bosworth, in this case the overall scheme of Sir William Stanley.  For flexibility, the crews aren't badged - so the same gun and crew could be used for anyone with a red livery (Richard Neville, for example - he could certainly afford artillery!).

Red and white livery, intended for Thomas Howard (Surrey) but again, no badges - so could be others (e.g. Exeter).  The guns themselves were all done the same way - a dark red carriage and wheels, with semigloss black for the ironwork.  Some of my references suggested black or dark grey for carriages too - but I have a book full of pictures of 15th century re-enactors, and they all seem to go for dark red, and it looks great, so I did them all that way.

All over tawny / orange.  Not really matched up to any of the existing factions, but sort of themed to go with Oxford, though without the ostentatious blue star.  Some references also cite tawny as a main colour for Percy livery.  Most importantly, I love orange - and on these miniatures it looks great.

The more commonly-seen Percy livery of red and black - and of course, also serviceable as Buckingham / Shrewsbury, or just because red and black look so dramatic together.  The Perry gun comes with four crew, as seen, and with more time (and if requested) I'd have been tempted to ring the changes and do some head swapping.  Metal heads are easily twisted off (using pliers), then a quick file down of the stump.  If you're using the Perry plastic heads, they need filing or chopping flat at the base before supergluing in place.

Richard III - the most likely owner of the guns present at Bosworth, though the scheme also works for Edward IV for earlier battles.  Works very nicely with white sleeves / hose too.  

Finally, an overall white scheme (Clifford / Conyers / Dacre) - not especially matched to anyone at Bosworth, but nice and neutral.  of course, if the new owner wants to use the guns with other factions / armies, it would be the easiest thing in the world to mix-and-match the crew figures such that each gun had four differently-clad crew members.