SCOUTING ROUND THE WORLD SCOUTING ROUND THE WORLD JOHN S. WILSON BLANDFORD PRESS • LONDON First published 1959 Blandford Press Ltd 16 West Central St, London WC I SECOND IMPRESSION FEBRUARY 1960 The Author’s Royalties on this book are to be devoted to THE B.-P. CENTENARY FUND of the Boy Scouts International Bureau. PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BY TONBRIDGE PRINTERS LTD., PEACH HALL WORKS, TONBRIDGE, KENT Page 1 SCOUTING ROUND THE WORLD Downloaded from: “The Dump” at Scoutscan.com http://www.thedump.scoutscan.com/ Editor’s Note: The reader is reminded that these texts have been written a long time ago. Consequently, they may use some terms or express sentiments which were current at the time, regardless of what we may think of them at the beginning of the 21st century. For reasons of historical accuracy they have been preserved in their original form. If you find them offensive, we ask you to please delete this file from your system. 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CONTENTS Chapter Author’s Note Foreword 1 Fifty Years of Scouting 2 Early Personal Connections 3 How Scouting Spread 4 The First World War and its Aftermath 5 International Scout Centres – Gilwell Park, Kandersteg, Roland House 6 Scouting Grows Up 7 Coming-of-Age 8 The 1930’s – I 9 The I930’s – II 10 The Second World War 11 Linking Up Again 12 The International Bureau Goes on the Road 13 On to the ‘Jambores de la Paix’ 14 Absent Friends 15 Boy Scouts of America 16 1948-1950 – I 17 1948-1950 – II 18 The World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts 19 1951-1952 20 Latin America 21 The Far East and the Pacific 22 On to a New Phase and New Horizons 23 The Centenary and Golden Jubilee 24 Tradition Appendix Page 2 SCOUTING ROUND THE WORLD PHOTOGRAPHS (at end of book) B.-P. and Lord Somers at the Vogelenzang Jamboree, 1937 The Boy Scouts International Committee at Buckingham Palace, 1945 J.S.W. with Michiharu Mishima, Chief Scout of Japan, 1952 Australian Scouts in camp Philippine Scouts A welcoming party in Singapore, 1953 J.S.W. off on an inland flight in Indonesia, 1953 President and Vice-President of Boy Scouts International Committee with Chief Scout for South Africa, 1957 Father Gustavo Habersperger, Salvador Fernandez and J.S.W., Lima, 1948 Dan Beard, National Commissioner of Boy Scouts of America, with U.S. Scouts Trinidad Scout Steel Band Greek Sea Scout greets J.S.W. at Sea Scout Base, 1950 Work in Patrol Comers, Tel Aviv, 1951 J.S.W. greets Scouters of the Group at Kafr El Dawar Textile Factory, 1950 A Patrol of German Scouts at work International Commissioners meet in Austria, 1951 J.S.W. is informally introduced to Czechoslovak Scouts, Prague, 1947 Pathfinder Scouts on a hike in South Africa A Muslim Boy Scout from Northern Nigeria ‘We aim to teach, in a definite and practical way, brotherhood between the oncoming citizens of the different countries. We teach not so much by precept and instruction as by personal leadership and example.’ B.-P. AUTHOR’S NOTE In my younger days it was my good fortune to captain many a Rugby Football XV and Hockey XI. I realised to the full the importance and value of team play, but I also recognised that leadership was essential if the side was to be knit together. That leadership succeeds best when, while firm, it gives encouragement to the whole side, individually and collectively, whether losing or winning. It is the same with the game of Scouting – a game of a more serious purpose for its leaders, and of a more lasting character for all its players. Its success depends on personal leadership as well as on team work. The Patrol still remains one of its main strengths. The gang of six or eight boys, with one of themselves as Patrol Leader, educate themselves in leadership, team work and responsibility for others. The Patrol method, to a greater or lesser degree, applies to the whole of Scouting in its various branches of Cubs, Rover Scouts and others, in its administration under districts, counties, provinces, countries and also in its international aspect. For thirty-eight years it was my good fortune to be a Patrol Leader in the game of Scouting as District Commissioner in Calcutta, as Camp Chief of Gilwell Park, as Director of the Boy Scouts International Bureau and, more remotely perhaps, as Honorary President of the Boy Scouts Page 3 SCOUTING ROUND THE WORLD International Committee. During the greater part of that time my duties were intimately connected with the growth and development of International Scouting, and that is why I have been asked to write this book. I express my gratitude to many Scout friends for providing me with material which has helped me to give a wider picture of how Scouting grew in its early days. I am also grateful to Mrs. A. G. (Eileen) Wade for her help in checking the earlier chapters, with their many references to the Founder of Scouting and Guiding, the late Lord Baden-Powell, to Mr. William Hillcourt for his suggestions in regard to later chapters, and to Mr. E. E. Reynolds for reading it all and giving me his informed advice. I repeat with added emphasis a sentence from the ‘Envoi’ which the Boy Scouts International Committee permitted me to add to the last Biennial Report that I wrote on their behalf for presentation to the International Scout Conference of 1953: ‘It is difficult for me adequately to express my gratitude for the many courtesies and kindnesses extended to me on visits and at world gatherings and conferences. I have a rich possession in memories of international Scout events and of my brother Scouts.’ J. S. WILSON FOREWORD This is a book which will surely have its interest for, and give delight to, all those who speak Jamborese, the language of Scout friendship and understanding. It tells of a small ‘acorn’ of an idea which developed in a few years into an immense ‘tree’ with branches spreading all across the world. I can think of no one more fitted to tell the story than ‘Belge’ Wilson, who has served the Movement for so long, both in the Founder’s life-time and ever since; first as a Scouter in India, then as the world-known Camp Chief of Gilwell Park, and eventually as Director of the Boy Scouts International Bureau. It is of the Committee of this Bureau that we gratefully count him as our ‘President’ – in thought, if not still in fact. It is a history book, but – unlike some history books – it makes happy and constructive reading, and will bring to many of its readers the happiest of memories of good days in the open air shared with good comrades of other lands, of other creeds, of other colours, all linked by the magic names of ‘Scouting’ and ‘B.-P.’. Here within these pages the romantic plan unfolds itself as something that brings all peoples together, for indeed ‘A Scout is a Brother to every other Scout’; and what a promise this can hold in the days to come for better understanding and goodwill in the world. World Chief Guide Vice-President of the Boy Scouts International Committee. Page 4 SCOUTING ROUND THE WORLD - I - Fifty Years of Scouting When did Scouting begin? – an idea in B.-P’s mind in the 1890’s – an article in ‘ The Boys’ Brigade Gazette’, 1906 – two pamphlets, 1907 – Scouting’s spectacular growth – girls included – a natural growth – including younger and older boys – Sea Scouts – Air Scouts – handicapped Scouts – Scouters – old Scouts – effect of Scouting on adult life – Sir Winston Churchill’s summary HOUGH Scouting was presented to the world through the experimental camp that B.-P. conducted on Brownsea Island in August 1907, it had been a long time in the making. It is T difficult to fix on any precise date when the idea first entered the Founder’s mind. His schooldays at Charterhouse, his holidays with his brothers, his early days with the army in India, his activities in various small campaigns in South Africa, his defence of Mafeking, his loyalty, his sense of service, his attraction to and for young people, all played their part in the conception of the Boy Scouts. He always asserted that it was others who, having read his small military text-book Aids to Scouting (1899), urged him on; but we have the evidence of the American Frontier Scout, Major Frederick Burnham, that B.-P. talked of his ideas round their camp-fires in the veldt; and that was in the 189o’s. Again, B.-P. always insisted that he had merely put together the ideas and practices of men in many other countries, from the days of the Knights of King Arthur’s Round Table up to the twentieth century. Be that as it may, The Boys’ Brigade Gazette in June 1906 contained an article on ‘Scouting for Boys’ by Major-General R. S. S. Baden-Powell, Hon. Vice-President of the Boys’ Brigade. In May 1907 B.-P. issued two pamphlets headed Boy Scouts. These were more objective. The first, ‘A Suggestion’, contained the pregnant sentence: ‘The following scheme is offered as a possible aid towards putting on a positive footing the development, moral and physical, of boys of all creeds and classes, by a means which should appeal to them while offending as little as possible the susceptibilities of their elders.’ The italics are mine, to emphasise the all-embracing character which made the scheme a new departure in the training of ‘the rising generation on to the right road for good citizenship’.