Roger Meridale's Company of Pike
Of a Pike Officer:
You’ll have read elsewhere on this site about the history, the travel, friendships and all-night parties that make up the Blackwell’s experience. For those of us in the pike block there is something which is at least as important as any one of those, and that is the battle. Blackwell’s is a fighting regiment – if you’ve ever had the misfortune to witness one of the play acting displays occasionally mounted by lesser units, fear not, that is not the way we do it and never will be. In fact, pike fighting is the only mass martial art which is practised in Britain (or possibly anywhere in the world) today. Whereas other combat sports place you on a level playing field against a carefully matched opponent, with us it is team against team, on whatever terrain and in whatever conditions we might be. Many is the time that Blackwell’s have found themselves fighting uphill against two or three times as many enemy, yet we don’t cry foul – we relish it! That is the nature of the game.
And here is the real joy of the pike: numbers, or weight, or strength alone are never enough to prevail. Rather, the unit that is disciplined motivated and whose members fight for each other as well as themselves, will take the day time and again. Moreover, there are almost no restrictions – or indeed optimums – as regards age and gender. Our insurance allows you onto the battlefield at 16 and after that it’s up to you – our oldest active pikeman is over sixty (and will undoubtedly be fighting past 70) and we have representatives of all generations in between. We always also have a number of female pikemen in our ranks, who receive no special consideration nor ask for any. What we do find though is that, whenever in life you start, pike fighting is almost impossible to give up.
At time of writing (summer 2009), Blackwell’s pike block has a fearsome (and still growing) reputation as the best in either army of the English Civil War Society. Yet this should in no way put you off. When you first pick up an unwieldy 16-foot wooden pike – all the while discovering that armour is heavy and uncomfortable and nothing like in the films – the experience will seem quite daunting, but by the end of the weekend you’ll have mastered the basics and contributed to two more glorious Blackwell’s victories. There’s no star system: everyone who puts on the black jacket is immediately as much of a Blackwell as a 30-year veteran because, once we’re out there, if we don’t all hang together we get hurt. Needless to say, once the battle is over, the ensuing party is probably just that little bit more vivid for the sweaty but victorious pikemen than for everybody else.
Apologies if this is all a stream of conscientiousness – it’s difficult to summarise something that’s been an essential element of one’s life for twenty years. Read between the lines though and I hope you’ll see that we’re onto something a little bit special here. And I hope even more that you’ll be tempted to come and give it a try.
Dave Webb
Officer of Pike
Sir Thomas Blackwell’s Regiment of Foote
Of a Pike Sergeant:
I joined Blackwell’s in 1991. A friend from work, knowing that I played rugby, had been gently persuading me to give the ECWS a try, and after years I ran out of excuses. With nothing much happening one weekend, I went with a couple of mates to South Weald near Brentwood in Essex for the day. Just to have a look.
I was feeling a little apprehensive, not confident that I could control an 18 foot broom handle, but on the battlefield the adrenaline starts to take over and everybody in black is your mate and you fight as a single animal. I had no idea how long we fought, but suddenly it was all over then we were recounting our exploits over a brew in the beer tent.
Over the years I have met so many people from around the country who have become good friends, meeting up with them in some of the nicest parts of England; it seems to be more of a family get-together than a battle.
Blackwell's pike block is the hardest and sharpest in the King's Army; that's not a hollow boast - we know it because the people we fight tell us so. We will never be complacent though - we only ever want to improve, fighting harder, drilling sharper, and looking out for each other. To qualify as a Blackwell you just have to don a black coat.
Rob Bishop, Sergeant of Pike, Sir Thomas Blackwell’s Regiment of Foote
