This year is the Queen’s Scout Working Party’s 75th Anniversary and we would like to contact old members and invite them to the celebration event we have planned in October. Unfortunately, our membership records don’t extend particularly far back so there are many former members of the QSWP whom we are unable to contact directly.
This year, the QSWP is celebrating its 75th anniversary, and we would like to invite all current and former members to join us at a celebration event taking place at Gilwell Park on Saturday 5th October. The event will include a drinks reception, an evening meal, and entertainment. For more information and to register to attend the event, please visit http://www.qswp.org.uk/75th.html.
Thanks for your help.
Yours in Scouting,
James
And here’s a bit more information about the Queen’s Scout Award which started off as the King’s Scout Award:
Balmoral Castle in Scotland has been the scene of many famous occasions. One of the most famous in the history of Scouting occurred in October 1909 when Lieutenant-General Robert Baden-Powell was spending a weekend with the Royal Family.
Just before dinner, at a private interview with the King, Edward VII, Baden-Powell was told that for all his services to the Country, and especially for founding the Boy Scouts, he was to be made Knight Commander of the Royal Victorian Order. During a long conversation after dinner the new Knight, hero of Mafeking, told the King a good deal more about the Scouts, and suggested that boys who passed special tests for efficiency should be ranked as King’s Scouts.
The King agreed to this and in return suggested that Sir Robert should bring the Scouts to Windsor for a Royal Review. The first official announcement appeared the following month in the Headquarters Gazette. Baden-Powell wrote, ‘A new badge with the rank of King’s Scout has been approved for those Scouts who prove themselves able and willing to serve the King, should their service at any time be required by him.’
In order to be a King’s Scout a boy had first of all to be a First Class Scout, which meant passing ten tests, and then pass another four badges out of a list of seven, one of which had to be the Pathfinder Badge.