Robert Baden-Powell: Difference between revisions

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After having been educated at Charterhouse School, Baden-Powell served in the British Army from 1876 until 1910 in India and Africa. In 1899, during the Second Boer War in South Africa, Baden-Powell successfully defended the city in the [[Siege of Mafeking]]. He started writing books on military topics in order to better train soldiers. Several of his military books, written for military reconnaissance and scout training in his African years, were also read by boys.  

Based on those earlier books, he wrote ''[[Scouting for Boys]]'', published in 1908 by Cyril Arthur Pearson, for youth readership. During writing, he tested his ideas through a camping trip on [[Brownsea Island]] in 1907, which is now seen as the beginning of Scouting. After his marriage with [[Olave Baden-Powell|Olave St Clair Soames]], he, his sister [[Agnes Baden-Powell]] and notably his wife actively gave guidance to the Scouting Movement and the [[Girl Guides|Girl Guides Movement]].

Baden-Powell was born at 9 Stanhope Street, Paddington in London, in 1857. He was the seventh of eight sons among ten children from the third marriage of Reverend, a Savilian professor of geometry at Oxford University. His father died when he was three, and as tribute to his father, the family name Powell was changed to Baden-Powell. Subsequently, Robert Baden-Powell was raised by his mother, Henrietta Grace Powell née Smyth, a strong woman who was determined that her children would succeed. Baden-Powell would say of her in 1933 "The whole secret of my getting on lay with my mother.

After attending Rose Hill School, Tunbridge Wells, Baden-Powell was awarded a scholarship to Charterhouse, which is a prestigious public school. His first introduction to Scouting skills was through stalking and cooking game while avoiding teachers in the nearby woods, which were strictly out-of-bounds. He also played the piano and violin, was an ambidextrous artist, and enjoyed acting. Holidays were spent on yachting or canoeing expeditions with his brothers.

In 1876, Baden-Powell joined the 13th Hussars in India. He enhanced and honed his military scouting skills amidst the Zulu tribesmen in the early 1880s in the Natal province of South Africa, where his regiment had been posted, and where he was mentioned in despatches. During one of his travels, he came across a large string of wooden beads, worn by the Zulu king Dinizulu, which was later incorporated into the [[Wood Badge]] training programme he started after he founded the Scouting movement. Baden-Powell's skills impressed his superiors and he was subsequently transferred to the British secret service.

On the outbreak of World War I in 1914, Baden-Powell put himself at the disposal of the War Office. No command, however, was given him, for, as Lord Kitchener said: "he could lay his hand on several competent divisional generals but could find no one who could carry on the invaluable work of the Boy Scouts.

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Baden-Powell died on January 8, 1941 and is buried in Nyeri, Kenya, near Mount Kenya.

On his return from Africa in 1903, Baden-Powell found that his military training manual, ''Aids to Scouting'', had become a best-seller, and was being used by teachers and youth organisations. Following a meeting with the founder of the [[Boys' Brigade]], Sir William Alexander Smith, Baden-Powell decided to re-write ''Aids to Scouting'' to suit a youth readership, and in 1907 held a [[Brownsea Island Scout camp|camp on Brownsea Island]] for twenty-two boys of mixed social background to test out the applicability of his ideas. Baden-Powell was influenced by Ernest Thompson Seton, who founded the Woodcraft Indians. Seton gave Baden-Powell a copy of his book ''The Birch Bark Roll of the Woodcraft Indians'' and they met in 1906. ''[[Scouting for Boys]]'' was subsequently published in six instalments in 1908.  

Boys and girls spontaneously formed [[Troop|Scout troops]] and the [[Scouting]] movement had inadvertently started, first a national, and soon an international obsession. The Scouting movement was to grow up in friendly parallel relations with the Boys' Brigade. A rally for all Scouts was held at Crystal Palace in London in 1909, at which Baden-Powell discovered the first [[Girl Guide and Girl Scout|Girl Scouts]]. The [[Scouting|Girl Guides]] movement was subsequently founded in 1910 under the auspices of Baden-Powell's sister, Agnes Baden-Powell. Baden-Powell' friend, [[Juliette Gordon Low]], was encouraged by him to bring the movement to America, where she founded the [[Girl Scouts of the USA]].

[[February 22]], the joint birthday of Robert and Olave Baden-Powell, is marked as [[World Thinking Day|Founder's Day]] by Scouts and [[Thinking Day]] by Guides to remember and celebrate the work of the Chief Scout and Chief Guide of the World.

Baden-Powell made many paintings and drawings and wrote many articles, monographs, letters, and over thirty books, of which ''Scouting for Boys'' was the most famous.

*1884: ''Reconnaissance and Scouting''

*1914: ''Quick Training for War''

*1908: ''Scouting for Boys''

*1935: ''Scouting Round the World''

*1905: ''Ambidexterity'' (co-authored with John Jackson)

*1940: ''More Sketches Of Kenya''

In 1937 Baden-Powell was appointed to the [[Order of Merit]], one of the most exclusive awards in the [[British honours system]], and he was also awarded 28 decorations by foreign states.

The [[Bronze Wolf]], the only distinction of the [[World Organization of the Scout Movement]], awarded by the [[World Scout Committee]] for exceptional services to world Scouting, was first awarded to Baden-Powell by a unanimous decision of the then ''International Committee'' on the day of the institution of the Bronze Wolf in Stockholm in 1935. He was also the first recipient of the [[Silver Buffalo Award]] in 1926, the highest award conferred by the [[Boy Scouts of America]].

Baden-Powell was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize for the year 1939, but the Norwegian Nobel Committee decided not to award any prize for that year due to the start of World War II.

*[http://www.pinetreeweb.com/B-P.htm Baden-Powell]

*[http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/17300 The Story of Baden-Powell], by Harold Begbie, at Project Gutenberg

*[http://www.scoutsbadenpowellstatue.org.uk Baden-Powell statue on Poole Quay to celebrate the centenary of the first ever scout camp on Brownsea Island]

[[Category:Needs to be ScoutWikified]]

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