The wonderful thing about our North Star 1672 range is that the figures will do for many different nations armies in the period 1665-1680. This is  because it is a time just before uniforms, and the figures are all dressed in the fashions common amongst soldiers throughout Western Europe.  
This of course includes Britain.  The years covered by our range is called the Restoration Period in  Britain as it was the time the monarchy, represented by Charles II,   was restored after the English Civil War.   It was also the genesis of the British Army. Britain, tired of soldiers  and war, had disbanded much of it’s forces after the Civil War and  Oliver Cromwell’s reign. With the return of Charles II to England in  1660, the units still under arms swore allegiance to the King and  became the senior units of the British Army. Some of the infantry regiments:  Coldstream Guards Grenadier Guards Scots Guards 1st Regiment (Royal Scots) 2nd Regiment (The Queen’s) 3rd Regiment (The Buffs) st
Colour.
the Limpopo River into the country which became known as  Matabeleland, in the west of modern Zimbabwe. This was a  well watered country with plenty of grazing, and had the  further advantage that it was easily defensible. To the north an almost impassable forest stretched away to the Zambezi, while  the south and west were protected by the rugged Matopo  Hills. The main road from the south entered the country via  the precipitous Mangwe Pass, which was easily defended by a regiment stationed at a nearby kraal. The only vulnerable  frontier was on the east, where it bordered on the territory of  the local Shona tribes. But Mzilikazi defeated the Shona,  reduced them to vassalage, and enjoyed a period of relative  peace until his death in 1868 (though his last fight with the  Boers was as late as 1847, when he sent an "impi" back south  across the Limpopo in search of more cattle). Lobengula and  the Defeat of the Matabele. Mzilikazi's favourite son Lobengula succeeded to the throne in 1870, after a brief civil war, and soon resumed his father's  career of conquest. His armies campaigned in all directions,  consolidating his power over the neighbouring tribes and in  some areas even extending it. Among their opponents and  victims in this period were the Tswana in the west, and the  Barotse, Tonga and Ila beyond the Zambezi. In about 1887 the  Tonga, fed up with the depredations of local Chikunda slave  raiders, rashly invited Lobengula to come and help sort them  out. An "impi" duly arrived and wiped out the slavers, but the  Tonga had not taken the precaution of hiding their cattle, and  of course the Matabele found the temptation irresistible. They  went home with all the beasts they could round up in payment  for their services, then over the next few years came back  twice more for the rest of what they described as "our cattle  which we have left among the Tonga", inflicting immense  damage in the process. But Lobengula was careful to avoid trouble with white men,  and he encouraged hunters and traders (including the famous  elephant hunter F. C. Selous) to visit his country. A British  Resident named Captain Patterson was sent to Bulawayo in  1878. Patterson was an arrogant character who insisted on  travelling wherever he liked against the king's orders; one day  he and his whole party disappeared, and it was rumoured that  Lobengula had had them murdered, but nothing was ever  
proved, and the British, preoccupied by then with events in  Zululand, took no action. Lobengula raised no objection when  in 1885 Britain established a Protectorate over Bechuanaland to  the west (now Botswana), which had once been a favourite  Matabele raiding ground. This conciliatory attitude, as well as  the remoteness of the country, enabled the Matabele to retain  their independence long after the defeat of their Zulu cousins in  the south. But by the late 1880s the impetus of the European  "Scramble for Africa" was unstoppable. Cecil Rhodes In October 1888 Cecil Rhodes sent agents of his British South  Africa Company to trick Lobengula into signing away the  mineral rights in his kingdom. The king soon saw through this  con trick, but was persuaded to allow prospectors to enter the  country anyway. Then in May 1890 Rhodes revealed his true  intentions, despatching a heavily armed "Pioneer Column" from  Bechuanaland, consisting of about two hundred civilians with  an escort of four hundred British South Africa Company and  Bechuanaland Police. Avoiding a direct confrontation with  Lobengula, the invaders skirted around Matabeleland proper  and marched into Shona territory further north, where they built  a fortified post at Fort Salisbury. Lobengula protested, but held back from giving his "impis" the  order to attack. In doing so he missed what may have been his  only chance to keep his kingdom. Soon the white colonists were building more forts, establishing farms and mines, and luring  young Shona and Matabele men to desert Lobengula and work  for them. In 1891 Mashonaland became a British Protectorate,  situated at the very point where the borders of Matabeleland  were most exposed to attack. Many of the Shona welcomed the  whites as protectors against their Matabele masters, and took  the opportunity to thumb their noses at them from the imagined  security of the new settlements. But the king was not prepared  to put up with disrespect from his own "dogs", as he called the  Shona. In June 1893 a rebel chief stole some Matabele cattle, an  "impi" was sent across the border in pursuit. The warriors had  instructions not to molest the whites, but they slaughtered many of their Shona employees, burnt their kraals and took all the  cattle they could find. One white settler at Fort Victoria recalled  how "insolent Matabele swaggered through the streets of the  
NSA1010 - Chief and Izinduna