The zombies may provide the walking dead for my Dracula’s America Dark Confederacy posse, but every collection of reanimated Confederate corpses needs somebody responsible for the whole dreadful business. In this case that dubious honour belongs to Reverend Malachi Graves, Necromancer of the Dark Confederacy, accompanied by two particularly unpleasant Ragged Veterans, William Quantrill and William “Mad Bill” Anderson.

Reverend Malachi Graves is the leader of my Dark Confederacy posse and the figure around whom the whole collection is being built. Graves was a preacher once, or at least that is what he claims. Whether his congregation abandoned him, died around him, or subsequently became his congregation again is probably a question best left unanswered. Somewhere along the way his understanding of scripture became decidedly unconventional. Where most preachers promise that the dead shall rise, Reverend Graves seems to have decided there was no particular reason to wait for Judgement Day.

Reverend Malachi Graves

He is also the character who explains why the posse contains four men who have been dead for some considerable time yet continue reporting for duty. Graves is not simply another gunfighter travelling with the band. He is the sinister force holding the Dark Confederacy together, directing its living followers and calling its dead ones back into service. The Ragged Veterans may still be fighting the old war, but Graves has provided them with an entirely new and thoroughly unnatural means of continuing it.

William Clarke Quantrill

For the miniature I want to avoid making him look like a conventional fantasy wizard. Reverend Graves should still belong firmly in the Weird West, looking more like a corrupted frontier preacher than a sorcerer who has wandered in from another game. Dark and weathered clothing, suitably grubby equipment and an unhealthy appearance should do the job nicely. He should look almost respectable from across the street. Getting any closer would probably be unwise.

William “Mad Bill” Anderson

Among those who have gathered around Graves are two men whose reputations hardly require supernatural assistance, William Clarke Quantrill and William “Bloody Bill” Anderson, although for my posse Bloody Bill has become Mad Bill, which seems entirely appropriate.

Quantrill appears here not as the leader of the posse but as one of Graves’ Ragged Veterans. Historically he was one of the most notorious Confederate guerrilla leaders of the American Civil War, his name becoming inseparable from the vicious fighting along the Missouri and Kansas border and particularly the raid on Lawrence in 1863. In the world of Dracula’s America, however, I rather like the idea that Quantrill has survived only to find himself serving somebody considerably more disturbing than himself.

Beside him is Mad Bill Anderson, another product of the brutal border war and a man whose historical reputation for violence was considerable even by the standards of Confederate guerrilla warfare. He rode with Quantrill before eventually operating independently, so having the pair together among the Ragged Veterans gives the posse a nice historical connection beneath all the supernatural unpleasantness.

There is also something rather satisfying about reducing two men accustomed to commanding their own bands to followers of Reverend Graves. Quantrill and Mad Bill may be dangerous, experienced and thoroughly ruthless, but neither of them is the most frightening man in this particular company. That distinction belongs to the quiet preacher standing behind them who can replace fallen comrades without troubling a recruiting office.

Together the three establish exactly what I want from the Dark Confederacy. Reverend Malachi Graves commands the posse and provides its supernatural power, while Quantrill and Mad Bill are two hardened Ragged Veterans who bring their experience, guns and decidedly questionable interpretation of the Lost Cause along with them. Behind them come the other veterans and, of course, the shambling products of Reverend Graves’ rather unconventional ministry.

Most preachers spend their Sundays trying to put people into church. Reverend Malachi Graves spends considerably more time getting them out of the churchyard.

And “Frankly my dear he doesn’t give a Ka-blam”!