"Newcastle Whitecoats; regiment or regiments?" Topic

Does anyone know how many whitecoat regiments Newcastle had? It seems he raised enough foot for an army but sometimes they make it sound like it was only on regiment of foot?

The Marquis of Newcastle had a single regiment, and these definitely wore material of undyed cloth, so it would have been off white, probably grey or creamy, the colours of wool.
2 regiments from Newcastle's army, namely Percy's Whitecoats and Pinchbeck's Greycoats were seen in Oxford, so I believe it's safe to say its likely some, if not all regiments in Newcastle's army wore 'White' coats.

I imagine someone has more info than me, as mine is simply from Wikipedia and the Osprey ECW books.

So there is a difference between the Marquis' own regiment in white and other regiments raised under the umbrella of his area who might also have worn white?

Thanks for the input it's valuable. Maybe I should get this Osprey? Whichever one it is.

And, is there a list of all the regiments in Newcastle's army?

Check Peter Young's Marston Moor for the regiments, MiniPigs. But think sheep country. As Herkybird says, you're more likely talking talking unbleached, undyed sheep's wool than anything brighter. If you want a guess, probably almost all Newcastle's regiments of foot wore something close to white. It's cheap and ready to hand, and it sorts them out from Eastern Association red and Scots hodden gray.

Also Reids all the Kings Men has a good list of Newcastle's Rgts. In 1643 Newcastle seems to have recruited the best part of 10,000 foot but by Marston Moor was left with only 3-4000 in 7 'battalions' on the battlefield, which seem to have been made from 20-odd regiments.

As far as we know several of Newcastle's regiments were white coats but exactly which ones, apart from Newcastle's own, is a matter of debate. Possibly all or a majority of his army wore them.

I am about to start these next :-)

You need to make a distinction between the regiments the Marquis of Newcastle raised himself in Northumberland and Durham in the summer/autumn of 1642. These he took into Yorkshire at the end of 1642 in support of the Yorkshire Royalists who had recruited their own regiments. Combined they became Newcastle's Royalist army.

The Yorkshire regiments could have had any colour coat: Parliamentary sources mention a Royalist black coated regiment in the attack on Weatherby in December 1642; and again a red coated soldier captured during the siege of York in 1644.

'Newcastle's regiments', if they refer to anything specific, could refer to the troops he recruited in Northumberland and Durham.

Off the top of my head, the troops the Marquis marched into Yorkshire were c. 5000. 3000+ foot, plus horse and dragoons (which were in the van of the assault on the bridge at Piercebridge over the Tees -they might have had grey coats i.e. 'off white'? some sources say).

The composition papers for Northumberland and Durham (see Surtees Society) indict someone (whose name escapes me) for procuring 3000 "Scotch bonnets" for the Marquis. This would be enough headgear to furnish three foot regiments, or one double regiment and another.

And it might be that it is these regiments who wore coats of undyed wool, who were with the Marquis from the very creation of his army, who saw themselves as an elite, and the remnants of which made the supposed last stand on Marston Moor in 1644.

So the short answer is: 3 (or two, if Newcastle's own regiment was a double regiment).
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@4DJones

Short answer is 3?: YouTube link

I seem to remember reading something a long time ago, a quote associated with Newcastles White Coats – "leave them plain, and we will dye them with the blood of our enemies" or some such.

Sounds a tad dramatic now though. But presumably, from the comments above, this was probably referring to the Northumberland and Durham units.

The Osprey books are a very old one 'The English Civil War armies' by Peter Young, and the 'Soldiers of the English Civil war (1)' by Keith Roberts.(Elite 25)

Google: The Royalist Army in Northern England 1624-1645 Peter Robert Newman. It's a PDF download. Volume ii has a list, with commentary, on just about all known Royalist officers in the Northern Army, and for colonels, their regiments.

Volume i is a history of the war in the North 1642-45. The Bibliography and chapter notes make many references to primary sources -the only way to go if one's serious about this. Just about all Osprey book sources are secondary, although nice pictures.

Another factor to be considered is that throughout the war evidence shows that clothing issued changed frequently – the records for Essex's army makes it clear that not only were recorded coat colours of the regts at Edgehill not adhered to as they reequipped but that there could well be variation within the same regt as clothing was bought in batches.

With regard to the North, it appears that many of Fairfax's Northern Association wore grey coats. A very likely probability is that alongside white coats both are really undyed wool of varying shades dependent on the fleeces missed into varying batches of cheap available cloth.

When you look at the 7 battalia that marched out of York to fight at Marston Moor, the only one likely to have be homogenous in composition is Newcastle's own regiment which because of status (and its originally larger establishment as a double regiment) had been maintained. The other 6 battalia were composite groupings of soldiers from perhaps 18+ depleted units. This does allow a wargamer to show great variation in shades of coat and styles/hues of colours borne even within battalia.

Agree with 4DJones…. Newmans 2 vol pdf's are his doctoral thesis from i think york university. In any case they cover about all the known information on the Northern Royalist army.

In my case based on that & flags recovered after marston moor …i choose to also believe about 3 regiments though they may have been brigaded.

But get your own copy of them in any case.