0:00:08 > 0:00:12At the beginning of the Edwardian era, boys of Britain were in danger.
0:00:15 > 0:00:19Unhealthy, unmotivated and under bad influences.
0:00:19 > 0:00:22They were in trouble and needed help.
0:00:22 > 0:00:28Many feared that if they didn't get it, the nation's morality would be fatally undermined
0:00:28 > 0:00:31and the Empire would rapidly decline and fall.
0:00:35 > 0:00:38Salvation came in the unlikely shape of a book.
0:00:40 > 0:00:45It was written by a war hero but was a manual for peace.
0:00:47 > 0:00:51It aimed to mould men but celebrated being a boy.
0:00:54 > 0:01:00It influenced the lives of millions, and it introduced a code of common values around the globe.
0:01:05 > 0:01:09Its name was Scouting For Boys.
0:01:24 > 0:01:27The Scouts are a British institution,
0:01:27 > 0:01:32so much part of the national consciousness that we imagine they've been going forever.
0:01:32 > 0:01:38But actually, scouting didn't win over the nation's affections gradually.
0:01:38 > 0:01:41It was an overnight sensation.
0:01:42 > 0:01:46It all began in 1908 with a best-selling handbook.
0:01:47 > 0:01:51In the 20th century, only the Bible, the Koran
0:01:51 > 0:01:56and the thoughts of Chairman Mao sold more copies than Scouting for Boys.
0:01:58 > 0:02:02How to make buttons out of bootlaces.
0:02:02 > 0:02:05How to fly Britain's flag.
0:02:08 > 0:02:12The boy who apes the man by smoking will never be much good.
0:02:16 > 0:02:21The book is definitely not the expression of a systematic ideology.
0:02:21 > 0:02:24Instead, it is a ragbag of disparate ideas
0:02:24 > 0:02:29held together only by the personality and experiences of one man,
0:02:29 > 0:02:35scouting's maverick founder and Boar War hero, Robert Baden Powell.
0:02:35 > 0:02:39He is pro British Empire but anti men with waxed moustaches.
0:02:39 > 0:02:42And he's completely obsessed by boots.
0:02:46 > 0:02:51It's surprising how much meaning you can read from the boot.
0:02:51 > 0:02:58To wear your heels down on the outside, means that you're a man of imagination and lover of adventure.
0:02:58 > 0:03:03But heels worn down on the inside signify weakness and indecision of character.
0:03:06 > 0:03:13He may have had some peculiar ideas, but Baden Powell was also very charismatic.
0:03:13 > 0:03:17Hello, you boy in the corner there, you ought to be a boy scout.
0:03:17 > 0:03:23You're a fine looking fellow and I know you'd make a jolly good backwoodsman, by the look of you.
0:03:23 > 0:03:26You're ugly enough, anyway.
0:03:26 > 0:03:28Actually, I was never in the Boy Scouts.
0:03:28 > 0:03:35I think at that age I was probably too busy making jokes about Baden Powell's Scouting for Boys...is he?
0:03:35 > 0:03:39Naughty old Baden Powell! Not realising that wasn't a very new joke,
0:03:39 > 0:03:43and that it's always been easy to laugh at Baden Powell and at the Scouts,
0:03:43 > 0:03:47and it's become something of a national tradition to do exactly that.
0:03:47 > 0:03:52But I found re-reading Scouting For Boys, it is an extraordinary book.
0:03:52 > 0:03:56It's very radical and it addresses all sorts of issues that we think
0:03:56 > 0:04:03of as modern - citizenship, what to do with disaffected youth, social responsibility.
0:04:03 > 0:04:07But it's very eccentric, very Edwardian and very English,
0:04:07 > 0:04:12and that's what appealed then, and that's what appeals to me now.
0:04:15 > 0:04:21To try and get the measure of the man behind the movement, I'm off to see the current Lord Baden Powell.
0:04:21 > 0:04:23- Hello.- Hello, how nice to see you.
0:04:23 > 0:04:25Do come in.
0:04:28 > 0:04:31- Here it comes. - Very old fashioned, isn't it?
0:04:34 > 0:04:36What's he doing?
0:04:36 > 0:04:39He's doing his daily exercises.
0:04:40 > 0:04:46I mean, there's no question he was quite a nutcase, really in some ways!
0:04:46 > 0:04:49Throughout his life he'd always got
0:04:49 > 0:04:53this thing he'd got to keep himself up to scratch, as he called it.
0:04:53 > 0:04:57And he was quite preoccupied by personal health all the time.
0:04:57 > 0:05:00And you knew him?
0:05:00 > 0:05:02Well, yes. I was a very little boy.
0:05:02 > 0:05:05- Is that you? - That's me at the age of four.
0:05:05 > 0:05:10When my mother was having her second child I was shovelled off to Kenya and I spend three months with them.
0:05:10 > 0:05:14All I remember is, like a lot of children,
0:05:14 > 0:05:20I was like a rattling cage, I was always asking questions and it was "shut up, shut up, go and play."
0:05:20 > 0:05:25But for the first time in my life somebody said, "Oh yes, I'll explain that to you"
0:05:25 > 0:05:30and I do remember this incredible interest in little boys,
0:05:30 > 0:05:33and I mean that in the nicest way.
0:05:33 > 0:05:37- Yes, well, it's almost impossible to say it now.- Absolutely.
0:05:37 > 0:05:42He could mentally bring himself down to their level and explain things to them in words of one syllable.
0:05:42 > 0:05:44Simple as that, really.
0:05:47 > 0:05:54The first step towards success in training your boy is to know something about boys in general.
0:05:54 > 0:06:00It is well to recall so far as possible what your ideas were when a boy yourself.
0:06:03 > 0:06:05Robert Baden Powell was born in 1857,
0:06:05 > 0:06:12the son of a professor of geometry at Oxford University and the eighth in a family of 10 children.
0:06:14 > 0:06:20The kind of person who was going to invent the Boy Scout which was a very odd institution, I think
0:06:20 > 0:06:26is the sort of boy who would have been thrown on his own resources
0:06:26 > 0:06:28in a way at an early age.
0:06:28 > 0:06:32Baden Powell, when he was only three, lost his father.
0:06:33 > 0:06:40And he became obsessed with the idea of what was said that fathers say to boys that makes them manly later on.
0:06:42 > 0:06:47His widowed mother was, however, pushy enough to get him the best available training as a man.
0:06:51 > 0:06:57He was accepted on a scholarship to one of England's leading public schools, Charterhouse.
0:07:01 > 0:07:04Life here offered Baden Powell a wealth of new experiences.
0:07:04 > 0:07:08Most of them, however, well away from the classroom.
0:07:11 > 0:07:15Outside the school walls was the copse.
0:07:15 > 0:07:22It was here I used to imagine myself a backwoodsman trapper and scout.
0:07:22 > 0:07:26I used to creep about warily looking for signs
0:07:26 > 0:07:32and getting close-up observation of rabbits, squirrels, rats and birds.
0:07:36 > 0:07:41At Charterhouse, Baden Powell also witnessed a well-established scheme
0:07:41 > 0:07:44for turning feckless boys into responsible men.
0:07:48 > 0:07:53Baden Powell was influenced by the prefect system here, but it's not called prefects, is it?
0:07:53 > 0:07:55- It's a monitorial system. - A monitorial system, right.
0:07:55 > 0:07:59So tell me, what is your role? What do you do?
0:07:59 > 0:08:02It is our duty to almost act as quasi teachers
0:08:02 > 0:08:04when teachers are not there.
0:08:04 > 0:08:06So it's our job to look after children
0:08:06 > 0:08:10and make sure that they are feeling comfortable within the school.
0:08:10 > 0:08:13We don't look at ourselves as policemen, we look at ourselves as carers.
0:08:13 > 0:08:18Oh right, that sounds a very thought-through line. Have you said it before?
0:08:18 > 0:08:20I've never said that before, no.
0:08:22 > 0:08:27In the Scouts, Baden Powell would transform prefects into patrol leaders.
0:08:29 > 0:08:31Give full responsibility
0:08:31 > 0:08:36and show full confidence in your patrol leaders.
0:08:36 > 0:08:40Expect a great deal from them, and you'll get it.
0:08:40 > 0:08:46The whole ulterior object of the scheme is to form character in the boys.
0:08:46 > 0:08:49To make the manly,
0:08:49 > 0:08:50good citizens.
0:08:54 > 0:09:00Baden Powell would devise other ways to introduce the public school ethos into the Scouts.
0:09:02 > 0:09:08England's young gentlemen had long been taught that good sportsmanship was not just for the playing field.
0:09:08 > 0:09:11It was an attitude for the whole of life.
0:09:11 > 0:09:18This sentiment was expressed in a popular poem, Vitae Lampada by Henry Newbolt.
0:09:18 > 0:09:24Scouting for Boys gives instructions for acting it out in a show.
0:09:29 > 0:09:32The sand of the desert is sodden red.
0:09:32 > 0:09:36Red with the wreck of the square that's broke.
0:09:38 > 0:09:44The gatling's jammed and the Colonel dead, and the regiment blind with dust and smoke.
0:09:45 > 0:09:51The river of death has brimmed its banks and England's fire and honour remain.
0:09:51 > 0:09:54The voice of a schoolboy rallies the ranks.
0:09:54 > 0:09:57Play up, play up, and play the game!
0:10:03 > 0:10:10It's the ultimate Victorian public school poem - the equation of playing field and battlefield.
0:10:10 > 0:10:12The Empire as a great game.
0:10:12 > 0:10:17All wrapped up in as sentimental hymn to decent, understated patriotism.
0:10:17 > 0:10:19It is ridiculous, of course.
0:10:19 > 0:10:21But hugely effective.
0:10:21 > 0:10:25Baden Powell wanted to use it to inspire boys of every class.
0:10:29 > 0:10:35Many Edwardians assumed public school values were the privilege of public schoolboys.
0:10:35 > 0:10:37But Baden Powell was more ambitious.
0:10:39 > 0:10:44Baden Powell wanted scouting to cross to traditional class divides,
0:10:44 > 0:10:46which he called artificial, anyway.
0:10:46 > 0:10:53His vision was not just for boys from the cloister, but boys from the inner-cities.
0:10:53 > 0:10:56The fourth Scout law states that "a scout is a friend to all"
0:10:56 > 0:11:01and underneath that it says, in big letters, "a scout must never be a snob".
0:11:04 > 0:11:07For a man of his class, Baden Powell's insistence that all scouts
0:11:07 > 0:11:12were equal may have been surprising, but it was genuine.
0:11:12 > 0:11:17At this time, cricketers at Lords went in through different entrances -
0:11:17 > 0:11:19players and gentlemen.
0:11:19 > 0:11:22And " It's not cricket" is a phrase that denotes everything
0:11:22 > 0:11:28that we like to think of as British fairness but, society in Edwardian England was anything but fair.
0:11:28 > 0:11:32And he had a pretty good gut feeling that that was so.
0:11:32 > 0:11:36At the same time he was frightened by the Labour Party.
0:11:38 > 0:11:44So he had these two sort of almost schizophrenic, opposite ideas to motivate him.
0:11:46 > 0:11:52We are all socialists, in that we want to see the abolition of the existing brutal anachronism of war
0:11:52 > 0:11:59and of extreme poverty and misery shivering alongside superabundant wealth, and so on,
0:11:59 > 0:12:04but we do not quite agree as to how it is to be brought about.
0:12:06 > 0:12:08Baden Powell was very worried by what he called
0:12:08 > 0:12:11professional agitators, going round, stirring up trouble.
0:12:11 > 0:12:16He writes, "there are a lot of men howling about their rights,
0:12:16 > 0:12:18who have never done anything to earn their rights.
0:12:18 > 0:12:22Do your duty first, and you will get your rights afterwards.
0:12:24 > 0:12:30I was once accused of mistrusting men with waxed moustaches.
0:12:30 > 0:12:33Well, so, to a certain extent, I do.
0:12:33 > 0:12:37It often means vanity, and sometimes drink.
0:12:42 > 0:12:46But why should anyone listen to the thoughts of Baden Powell?
0:12:46 > 0:12:49Well, because he was the most famous man in Britain.
0:12:49 > 0:12:55This is just the tip of the iceberg of all the merchandise devoted to celebrating Baden Powell.
0:12:55 > 0:13:01It is all here - there is the Baden Powell alarm clock, Baden Powell shaving mirror,
0:13:01 > 0:13:04Baden Powell spoons ,
0:13:04 > 0:13:06Baden Powell egg cup.
0:13:06 > 0:13:08There is an ostrich egg,
0:13:08 > 0:13:12painted with the face of Baden Powell.
0:13:12 > 0:13:14The Baden Powell's cigars.
0:13:14 > 0:13:16He would have hated that, because he hated smoking.
0:13:16 > 0:13:20And it wasn't just artefacts - there was music to accompany them.
0:13:20 > 0:13:26Here we have the Baden Powell March - "a patriotic song for Our Hero, BP."
0:13:26 > 0:13:29Hurrah, hurrah, hurrah, whizz-bang, whizz-bang.
0:13:29 > 0:13:32Lots of rhyming of the word "fought" with "jolly good sort".
0:13:32 > 0:13:36Why was he so ridiculously famous?
0:13:36 > 0:13:40Well, he was the heroic defender of Mafeking,
0:13:40 > 0:13:43a small town in South Africa.
0:13:43 > 0:13:48# Hurrah, oh be free for who they have fought
0:13:48 > 0:13:52# Hurrah, hurrah, hurrah
0:13:52 > 0:13:55# He's just the right sort
0:13:55 > 0:13:57# Our hero, BP
0:13:57 > 0:14:01# Hurrah, hurrah, hurrah! #
0:14:01 > 0:14:06Baden Powell was the surprised recipient of national fame and military glory.
0:14:08 > 0:14:14After school, he joined the Army and for over 20 years served diligently, right across the empire.
0:14:19 > 0:14:22He was never a standard-issue military man.
0:14:22 > 0:14:27Instead he was fascinated by a form of reconnaissance work, known as scouting.
0:14:28 > 0:14:32The covert scrutiny of an area, to gather information.
0:14:32 > 0:14:36It needed initiative, observation skills, and self-reliance,
0:14:36 > 0:14:40and Baden Powell excelled at all of them.
0:14:40 > 0:14:43He gained a reputation as a bit of a maverick.
0:14:43 > 0:14:47But became one of the army's youngest colonels.
0:14:51 > 0:14:54In 1899, the Boer war broke out.
0:14:54 > 0:14:57Baden Powell was sent to South Africa,
0:14:57 > 0:15:03under orders to engage the enemy in the north of the region, with the help of local recruits.
0:15:03 > 0:15:07It soon became clear that the advancing Boers had superior manpower,
0:15:07 > 0:15:11so Baden Powell decided to hold out in the town of Mafeking.
0:15:13 > 0:15:19Even 70 years later, Baden Powell's exploits at Mafeking can inspire small boys.
0:15:19 > 0:15:24Including me - I wrote a project about the Boer War when I was 11.
0:15:24 > 0:15:27I wrote, "Baden Powell, though remembered for the Boy Scouts,
0:15:27 > 0:15:29"is hardly ever given credit for his defence of Mafeking."
0:15:29 > 0:15:31Not strictly true.
0:15:31 > 0:15:35But controversial openings are very important in histories.
0:15:35 > 0:15:39"He got the men to obey him to the letter, and they succeeded, doing as they were told.
0:15:39 > 0:15:42"He baffled the enemy with bluff and tactics."
0:15:42 > 0:15:45And here he is.
0:15:47 > 0:15:49About to do it.
0:15:55 > 0:15:58Right from the outset, Baden Powell was heavily outnumbered.
0:15:58 > 0:16:02There were about 2,000 armed men in Mafeking.
0:16:02 > 0:16:051,100 of them white, the rest, native.
0:16:05 > 0:16:08Only about a quarter of all of them had any sort of military training.
0:16:10 > 0:16:14These lot were facing 6,000 Boers.
0:16:17 > 0:16:20This was no ordinary engagement.
0:16:20 > 0:16:23And it tested Baden Powell as a leader and as a strategist.
0:16:25 > 0:16:31It also crystallised the ideas that would later form the core of Scouting for Boys.
0:16:34 > 0:16:40Baden Powell was assisted in his defence of the town by an unlikely force, a group of boys,
0:16:40 > 0:16:43gathered together before the siege started.
0:16:43 > 0:16:46They became a sort of unofficial cadet corps.
0:16:46 > 0:16:52They performed a vital role, taking messages between the various defenders.
0:16:52 > 0:16:55Often on bicycles and under fire.
0:16:56 > 0:17:00In later life Baden Powell would recount the stirring story
0:17:00 > 0:17:03of the cadets at Mafeking to inspire English boys.
0:17:05 > 0:17:08I said to one of these boys on one occasion,
0:17:08 > 0:17:13"You will get hit one of these days riding about like that when shells are flying."
0:17:15 > 0:17:18And he replied, "I pedal so quick, sir, they'd never catch me."
0:17:21 > 0:17:24Could any of you do that?
0:17:33 > 0:17:36Much of Baden Powell's subsequent reputation
0:17:36 > 0:17:41was based not on his complex military strategies, but on his use of tricks and ruses,
0:17:41 > 0:17:45to try and fool the Boers into thinking the British were better equipped than they were.
0:17:45 > 0:17:49They didn't have any mines, but Baden Powell got these men
0:17:49 > 0:17:53to walk out beyond the perimeter carrying big black boxes.
0:17:53 > 0:17:56Then to bury them deep in the sand at intervals.
0:17:56 > 0:17:59Then, later on, he let off a stick of dynamite in the same area,
0:17:59 > 0:18:03and the Boers were convinced they were laying a minefield.
0:18:03 > 0:18:07Another of his tricks was to stake out all these posts along the front,
0:18:07 > 0:18:11and then to have men moving between them as if they were laying barbed wire.
0:18:11 > 0:18:14They weren't, because they didn't have any barbed wire.
0:18:14 > 0:18:19But the Boers couldn't see that, and so, they believed that the whole of this front was fortified.
0:18:19 > 0:18:24Again, it was slightly bonkers but a brilliantly effective ruse.
0:18:28 > 0:18:32Despite such daring innovations, Baden Powell's problems magnified.
0:18:32 > 0:18:34The town was shelled.
0:18:34 > 0:18:37Many were injured or died.
0:18:37 > 0:18:41Horses were killed for meat,
0:18:41 > 0:18:43and food was heavily rationed.
0:18:43 > 0:18:51Yet convinced he must lead by example, Baden Powell's positive attitude remained unshaken.
0:18:51 > 0:18:58People expect you to be able to give them an idea of how long the food's going to hold out.
0:18:58 > 0:19:01And you have to, effectively, pretend to be omniscient.
0:19:01 > 0:19:03You have to be ultra-calm.
0:19:03 > 0:19:09And Baden Powell had been a very successful amateur actor and he knew what was required.
0:19:09 > 0:19:12He could act really cool.
0:19:12 > 0:19:17The siege lasted 216 days but, throughout it,
0:19:17 > 0:19:22Baden Powell's performance - because, in a sense, that's what it was - was extraordinary.
0:19:22 > 0:19:26He managed to maintain not only a stiff upper lip but a smile, as well.
0:19:26 > 0:19:30When he wasn't pulling stunts against the Boers,
0:19:30 > 0:19:34he was putting on plays in the town or staging games,
0:19:34 > 0:19:41and when the public at home heard of his exploits, they glowed with pride. This was true British grit.
0:19:41 > 0:19:44# Bravos for BP
0:19:44 > 0:19:46# Ring, ring the bells, ring
0:19:46 > 0:19:50# Bravos, bravos, bravos
0:19:50 > 0:19:52# For Mafeking's king
0:19:52 > 0:19:54# Our hero... #
0:19:54 > 0:20:00When Mafeking was finally relieved in May 1901, the nation erupted with joy.
0:20:00 > 0:20:03Baden Powell was proclaimed a national hero.
0:20:03 > 0:20:06# ..To die for our duty
0:20:09 > 0:20:11# And we'll never give in
0:20:11 > 0:20:13# Said BP! #
0:20:17 > 0:20:23The British may have been the ultimate victors, but the Boer War left the nation badly shaken.
0:20:23 > 0:20:29Mafeking was one redeeming highlight in an otherwise undistinguished colonial war.
0:20:29 > 0:20:34One of the reasons the British army performed so badly was that, compared to the Boers,
0:20:34 > 0:20:38the healthy outdoor farmers-turned-soldiers,
0:20:38 > 0:20:41the British troops had been weak and sickly.
0:20:41 > 0:20:46The director general of the War Office had even issued a memo warning that between 40% - 60%
0:20:46 > 0:20:50of the men trying to enlist, had been declared unfit for service.
0:20:53 > 0:20:59The Edwardian establishment was terrified that, after a century of rapid industrialisation,
0:20:59 > 0:21:02Western society might be, in their words, "degenerating".
0:21:06 > 0:21:12A deeply influential book at the time was Max Nordau's Degeneration,
0:21:12 > 0:21:15which saw, in modern urban culture,
0:21:15 > 0:21:23a kind of frantic pace that he believed would lead to the decline of the West.
0:21:23 > 0:21:30The dead, carried off by heart and nerve diseases, are the victims of civilisation,
0:21:30 > 0:21:34the consequences of states of fatigue and exhaustion,
0:21:34 > 0:21:38of the vertigo and whirl of our frenzied life.
0:21:40 > 0:21:44The Victorian factories had made the nation wealthy,
0:21:44 > 0:21:48but they had also manufactured a urban underclass.
0:21:48 > 0:21:54Undernourished and underexercised, their offspring were now the Edwardians' problem.
0:21:54 > 0:21:57Some thinkers suggested that degeneracy was hereditary,
0:21:57 > 0:22:02and should be eradicated by enforced sterilisation.
0:22:02 > 0:22:05But Baden Powell was no pessimist.
0:22:05 > 0:22:08And he was not prepared to write off the nation's youth.
0:22:09 > 0:22:14When somebody's a great national hero, they're a great national hero to boys,
0:22:14 > 0:22:17and quite spontaneously, little boys' groups,
0:22:17 > 0:22:21they might be choirs, they might be little local clubs,
0:22:21 > 0:22:24who had asked him to be their patron, he sent them advice.
0:22:24 > 0:22:29When ordinary people began to buy a book he'd written called "Aids to Scouting"
0:22:29 > 0:22:33he realised that, although they were originally designed for soldiers,
0:22:33 > 0:22:37the same techniques could work for civilian boys.
0:22:37 > 0:22:41Scouting is a character-building exercise.
0:22:41 > 0:22:44It teaches self-discipline,
0:22:44 > 0:22:50observation, inquisitiveness, these are all, to Baden Powell, good qualities.
0:22:51 > 0:22:57Baden Powell agreed to use Aids to Scouting as the basis for a new work,
0:22:57 > 0:23:01which would promote the health and well-being of British youth.
0:23:05 > 0:23:08The Edwardians were the first generation to go football-crazy.
0:23:08 > 0:23:12But then, as now, not everybody approved.
0:23:12 > 0:23:15The idea of being a fan, of spectating
0:23:15 > 0:23:20rather than participating, did not appeal to Baden Powell.
0:23:20 > 0:23:22He believed in a healthy mind in a healthy body.
0:23:22 > 0:23:24Mens sano in corpore sano.
0:23:24 > 0:23:27That was the real goal for a boy.
0:23:30 > 0:23:35My heart sickens at thousands of boys and young men,
0:23:35 > 0:23:40pale and narrow-chested, hunched up miserable specimens,
0:23:40 > 0:23:45smoking endless cigarettes, numbers of them betting.
0:23:45 > 0:23:52All of them learning to be hysterical, as they groan or cheer in panic unison with their neighbours.
0:23:56 > 0:24:01For Baden Powell, physical and moral health went hand in hand.
0:24:01 > 0:24:07And when the men of Britain were strong, so was the country itself.
0:24:12 > 0:24:15No body part was neglected in the quest for national vitality.
0:24:18 > 0:24:20To be healthy and strong,
0:24:20 > 0:24:25you must keep your blood healthy and clean inside you.
0:24:25 > 0:24:30This is done by breathing in lots of pure, fresh air
0:24:30 > 0:24:35and by clearing out all dirty matter from inside your stomach.
0:24:35 > 0:24:39Which is done by having a rear, daily, without fail.
0:24:41 > 0:24:47If there is any difficulty about it one day, drink plenty of good water
0:24:47 > 0:24:52and practice body twisting exercises. And all should be well.
0:24:56 > 0:25:00What struck me, editing the book,
0:25:00 > 0:25:06was the number of times Baden Powell talks about orifices.
0:25:06 > 0:25:08Mouths, anuses,
0:25:08 > 0:25:11eyes, ears, all the openings of the body.
0:25:11 > 0:25:19It seems to me that this reflects Baden Powell's concern with national self-defence,
0:25:19 > 0:25:25with the keeping the body of the nation disciplined and controlled.
0:25:25 > 0:25:29Not allowing any inroads to disease and infection.
0:25:31 > 0:25:36Unlike traditional educationalists, Baden Powell believed it was in the national interest
0:25:36 > 0:25:39for boys to show initiative.
0:25:39 > 0:25:43And he charged each scout with doing a good turn every day.
0:25:47 > 0:25:51Do you need a hand with that box?
0:25:55 > 0:25:57There we go.
0:25:59 > 0:26:02Good morning. Would you like some help crossing the road?
0:26:02 > 0:26:09'Despite his best efforts, many of the issues a century ago are still high on the social agenda today.'
0:26:13 > 0:26:17I'm going to see David Lammy, MP for Tottenham, in London,
0:26:17 > 0:26:20Minister for Culture, and more importantly,
0:26:20 > 0:26:26former cub scout, to discuss Baden Powell's influence on New Labour.
0:26:26 > 0:26:29At what age did they get you?
0:26:29 > 0:26:32- Oh God! Seven?- Seven. Right.
0:26:32 > 0:26:34And you, All joking apart,
0:26:34 > 0:26:38a pretty formative four years at that time?
0:26:38 > 0:26:41Oh yeah. I remember...
0:26:41 > 0:26:46a particular week in which the whole purpose
0:26:46 > 0:26:51was to knock on people's doors, to say, "Can we wash your car?"
0:26:51 > 0:26:53in a Cubs' uniform.
0:26:53 > 0:26:54You would get money...
0:26:54 > 0:26:57It was Bob-A-Job Week.
0:26:57 > 0:27:00You would get money for doing that.
0:27:00 > 0:27:05But it was also, this was bringing you into contact with the neighbourhood.
0:27:05 > 0:27:08It was that, or Knock Down Ginger - knock the door up and run away.
0:27:08 > 0:27:14But this time you knocked on the door, you got some money and you did something useful. It's a great thing.
0:27:14 > 0:27:21The subtitle for Scouting for Boys, is actually "a handbook for instruction in good citizenship".
0:27:21 > 0:27:27He says "Indifferent citizenship is and always has been the progeny of indifferent government."
0:27:30 > 0:27:33Yeah... I...
0:27:33 > 0:27:38I suspect what Baden Powell would say is that citizenship
0:27:38 > 0:27:42is not just something that is kind of learned in the classroom.
0:27:44 > 0:27:48It is something about being a citizen and learning that,
0:27:48 > 0:27:53with a group of other people, and with a wider community.
0:27:53 > 0:27:57At one point, he's talking about socialism.
0:27:58 > 0:28:00I hope he's nice about socialism...
0:28:00 > 0:28:06Well, he claims to be a socialist at one point, which, again, I think would surprise a lot of people.
0:28:06 > 0:28:09He is less the sort of Tory...
0:28:09 > 0:28:12hate-figure that people imagined.
0:28:12 > 0:28:15What Baden Powell was keen on was community.
0:28:15 > 0:28:21I suspect that he had a kind of Gordon Brown sense of prudence
0:28:21 > 0:28:24and hard work...
0:28:24 > 0:28:26Oh yes! It's all in there.
0:28:26 > 0:28:28And of thrift, and of duty.
0:28:28 > 0:28:34So there's a lot there for Labour folk, but there's a lot there, also,
0:28:34 > 0:28:36for the kind of One-Nation Tory.
0:28:36 > 0:28:43But, are the virtues Baden Powell encouraged in Scouts really as highly valued today?
0:28:44 > 0:28:50Baden Powell writes about boys sort of loafing around on street corners, smoking, doing nothing.
0:28:50 > 0:28:54He said he wanted to teach them something useful. Do you do first aid?
0:28:54 > 0:29:00Yeah, on a number of camps, everyone has to know a certain amount of first aid, on camp.
0:29:00 > 0:29:02In here, he describes an incident.
0:29:02 > 0:29:07A woman was drowning in a pond and there were five useless boys on the side,
0:29:07 > 0:29:11who didn't save her, because they couldn't swim, and couldn't do first aid.
0:29:11 > 0:29:16- That wouldn't be you, would it? - I've been trained in first aid, to a fairly moderate level,
0:29:16 > 0:29:19but we're given the skills so that we know what to do...
0:29:19 > 0:29:23Right, if I had a heart attack now, could one of you save my life?
0:29:23 > 0:29:26- Probably.- I'm hoping.
0:29:30 > 0:29:37By 1906, Baden-Powell was convinced that his scheme could turn dissolute boys into decent citizens.
0:29:37 > 0:29:41And he began to write a version of what would become Scouting For Boys.
0:29:42 > 0:29:46But it took the help of a hard-nosed salesman to galvanise him
0:29:46 > 0:29:50and turn his modest proposal into a national sensation.
0:29:50 > 0:29:56Arthur Pearson was proprietor of the Daily Express, and a media magnate of his day.
0:29:56 > 0:29:59Baden-Powell, who had a suspicion of business people,
0:29:59 > 0:30:03also knew how the world worked, that he needed a man like Pearson.
0:30:03 > 0:30:05He didn't want to need him.
0:30:05 > 0:30:10In fact, he hated the idea of it, but without him, it couldn't happen.
0:30:12 > 0:30:18By summer 1907, Baden-Powell had completed a first draft.
0:30:19 > 0:30:23He was now ready to put his theories into practice.
0:30:28 > 0:30:32He invited 20 boys for a camping holiday off the coast of Dorset,
0:30:32 > 0:30:35on Brownsea Island.
0:30:37 > 0:30:43Some came from public schools, others, already working, were from local church boys' clubs.
0:30:49 > 0:30:53But for all of them, it was a unique opportunity.
0:30:56 > 0:31:00For Edwardian boys, the idea of camping on a small island
0:31:00 > 0:31:03conjured up images of exoticism and intrigue.
0:31:03 > 0:31:07They were following in the footsteps of Robinson Crusoe and Treasure Island.
0:31:07 > 0:31:12And Baden-Powell wanted to reinforce this idea of being cut off from civilisation
0:31:12 > 0:31:14and forced to depend on their own resources.
0:31:14 > 0:31:18So he didn't have them camp here, within sight of Poole,
0:31:18 > 0:31:24but he had them camp a mile away, on the wildest, furthest side of the island.
0:31:27 > 0:31:31The native boys of the Zulu and Zwazi tribes
0:31:33 > 0:31:37learned to be scouts before they're allowed to be considered men.
0:31:37 > 0:31:42When a boy is about 15 or 16, he is taken by the men of his village,
0:31:42 > 0:31:45stripped of all his clothes...
0:31:45 > 0:31:48and painted white from head to foot.
0:31:48 > 0:31:51He is given a shield and small spear,
0:31:51 > 0:31:53and he is turned out of the village
0:31:53 > 0:31:56and told that he will be killed if anyone catches him
0:31:56 > 0:31:59while he is still painted white.
0:32:02 > 0:32:09Many Edwardians had only a superior curiosity about other races, but some, like Baden-Powell,
0:32:09 > 0:32:13had a genuine admiration for those they ruled.
0:32:13 > 0:32:15Within British imperial law,
0:32:15 > 0:32:20there was a social, Darwinist ranking of the nations,
0:32:20 > 0:32:25in which, of course, British were at the top,
0:32:25 > 0:32:29but they were recognised to be a certain noble tribe's noble peoples
0:32:29 > 0:32:33who distinguished themselves by their muscle on the battlefield.
0:32:37 > 0:32:40Despite his admiration for some African traditions,
0:32:40 > 0:32:46Baden-Powell thought better of sending British boys naked into the Dorset woods.
0:32:46 > 0:32:51Instead, he'd arranged for basic amenities to be provided on a small campsite.
0:32:53 > 0:32:56The trip was covered by a lot of the local newspapers
0:32:56 > 0:33:01and, clearly, their editors were thrilled to have a national hero operating on their patch.
0:33:01 > 0:33:03This is the Bournemouth Guardian.
0:33:03 > 0:33:06It explains how the camp was set up, and then says,
0:33:06 > 0:33:11"The boys are to learn how the experienced scout can find life wherever he may find himself,
0:33:11 > 0:33:17"to taste the delights of wild adventure and to track Red Indians."
0:33:17 > 0:33:22This being Dorset, there weren't any red Indians, but there were pheasants.
0:33:22 > 0:33:25The idea was the boys had to track the pheasants,
0:33:25 > 0:33:30get close enough to them, not to kill them, but to photograph them, then report back to camp.
0:33:30 > 0:33:33And this was a classic Baden-Powell technique -
0:33:33 > 0:33:37to relocate the thrills of the Wild West in the South West.
0:33:47 > 0:33:54This is a set of extraordinary photographs, taken on that first camp in 1907,
0:33:54 > 0:33:56and it shows the boys literally here,
0:33:56 > 0:34:00taking part in the various exercises that Baden-Powell had dreamt up.
0:34:00 > 0:34:04Now, that looks like a game boys would enjoy.
0:34:04 > 0:34:09Jump head first out of a tree and see if anyone catches you.
0:34:09 > 0:34:11That does look fun!
0:34:14 > 0:34:16This is a manly game.
0:34:16 > 0:34:17This one's called The Struggle.
0:34:17 > 0:34:23It does look quite peculiar, but it's basically people pushing their chests against each other.
0:34:23 > 0:34:27It's meant to get the heart pounding, according to Baden-Powell.
0:34:29 > 0:34:30First aid.
0:34:30 > 0:34:34This one is called Dragging An Insensible Man,
0:34:34 > 0:34:38but in this case it's a boy sitting up and laughing, which ruins it.
0:34:38 > 0:34:42They're clearly enjoying being outdoors,
0:34:42 > 0:34:47playing games, dangerous games, and learning practical skills.
0:34:50 > 0:34:54When they were camping, Baden-Powell needed to collect the boys together,
0:34:54 > 0:34:56so what did he use? A whistle?
0:34:56 > 0:35:00No, he used this, which is a kudu horn,
0:35:00 > 0:35:07made from antelope, which he picked up when he was a soldier in the Matabele Campaign, in 1896.
0:35:07 > 0:35:11The Ndebele people use it for generating fearsome war cries,
0:35:11 > 0:35:14but it's very good for collecting together small boys.
0:35:14 > 0:35:16LONG, DEEP NOTE
0:35:21 > 0:35:26THEY SPEAK ZULU IN UNISON
0:35:31 > 0:35:34At night, Baden-Powell taught the boys Zulu war chants
0:35:34 > 0:35:39and enthralled them with tales of his overseas adventures.
0:35:39 > 0:35:42Once, I went butterfly-hunting in Dalmatia.
0:35:42 > 0:35:46Batteries had been built upon these mountain tops and it was my business
0:35:46 > 0:35:50to investigate their positions, strength and armaments.
0:35:50 > 0:35:56I took a sketch book, a colour box and a butterfly net in my hand,
0:35:56 > 0:36:01and I was above all suspicion to anyone who met me.
0:36:01 > 0:36:06They did not look sufficiently closely into the sketches of butterflies
0:36:06 > 0:36:09to notice that the delicately drawn veins of the wings
0:36:09 > 0:36:14were exact representations in plan of their own fort.
0:36:18 > 0:36:21In Scouting For Boys, Baden-Powell concludes a letter
0:36:21 > 0:36:24that one of the boys had written to him after the camp.
0:36:24 > 0:36:30"The most important thing that a great many boys need to learn is to look at the bright side of things
0:36:30 > 0:36:33"and to take everything by the smooth handle. I, myself,
0:36:33 > 0:36:38"found that a great lesson. I shall never find words enough to thank you for teaching me it."
0:36:38 > 0:36:44And that ethic of keep smiling through became a cornerstone of scouting.
0:36:48 > 0:36:50Invigorated by the success of Brownsea,
0:36:50 > 0:36:56Baden-Powell returned to civilisation and to completing Scouting For Boys.
0:37:00 > 0:37:05His original manuscript is now kept here, at the Scout Association's headquarters
0:37:05 > 0:37:08at Gilwell Park, in Essex.
0:37:11 > 0:37:15So this is it? The book that launched the entire movement?
0:37:15 > 0:37:18The manuscript for the book that launched...
0:37:18 > 0:37:21There it is, handwritten.
0:37:23 > 0:37:26I must say, I thought it would be more organised than this.
0:37:26 > 0:37:30I thought Baden-Powell would have taken his motto, and been more prepared.
0:37:30 > 0:37:35I get the impression that he was just jotting down things as they came to him.
0:37:35 > 0:37:39I don't think he actually sat down and mapped out
0:37:39 > 0:37:43what he was going to do before he put pen to paper.
0:37:43 > 0:37:46These are the chapter headings here, and it says, "Chapter 3 -
0:37:46 > 0:37:51"campaigning, camp life, resourcefulness, colonial life etc."
0:37:51 > 0:37:53Not terribly linked, are they?
0:37:53 > 0:37:57- I mean, it is more or less, will there be a bit of this and a bit of that?- Yes,
0:37:57 > 0:38:03and, to some extent, that helps the readability of the book. The boys could dip in and dip out of it...
0:38:03 > 0:38:04Yes.
0:38:04 > 0:38:06..as they fancied.
0:38:06 > 0:38:08This is a bit he's just torn out.
0:38:08 > 0:38:13Think he's borrowed a bit of President Roosevelt's speech.
0:38:13 > 0:38:18It's about the qualities of good soldier. Baden-Powell's crossed out "soldier" and written "Scout".
0:38:18 > 0:38:24It's a very wide selection of material that he's read from, and cross-referenced into this book.
0:38:24 > 0:38:27There's even Greek philosophers he's quoting.
0:38:27 > 0:38:31He's quoting American pioneers. He's lifting chunks from Kipling.
0:38:31 > 0:38:33Here we are, we've got knots.
0:38:33 > 0:38:40"To tie a knot seems to be a simple thing, and yet there are right ways and wrong ways of doing it."
0:38:40 > 0:38:42He's written something else in over the top.
0:38:42 > 0:38:47"Lives depend on an knot being properly tied," is his afterthought.
0:38:47 > 0:38:50Which is so very true!
0:38:50 > 0:38:53- And these are his drawings? - They are his drawings.
0:38:53 > 0:38:59It's quite difficult to actually draw a knot that people can follow and copy.
0:38:59 > 0:39:02- Yes.- There's terrible clarity. You could follow that.
0:39:02 > 0:39:05- Do you think?- Yes, I do.
0:39:05 > 0:39:08Two half hitches. That one looks hard, doesn't it?
0:39:08 > 0:39:11- No.- Even in diagram form.
0:39:11 > 0:39:16When you open this, your job, your movement, everything here
0:39:16 > 0:39:19comes from his notes on some bits of lined paper, doesn't it?
0:39:19 > 0:39:24From these pages. It is quite amazing to think that the whole Scout movement
0:39:24 > 0:39:30has flowed from him sitting down and scribbling these notes.
0:39:30 > 0:39:33A bit like the Ten Commandments in the Christian tradition.
0:39:33 > 0:39:35I'm sure he'd be flattered by that.
0:39:39 > 0:39:43In January 1908, when Scouting For Boys was set for publication,
0:39:43 > 0:39:46Arthur Pearson orchestrated the marketing.
0:39:48 > 0:39:51He decided that, rather than publish it as a single volume,
0:39:51 > 0:39:57it should first be serialised in separate parts, which you had to wait for and could collect.
0:39:58 > 0:40:02Scouting For Boys was a success virtually from day one.
0:40:02 > 0:40:09By the time the sixth fortnightly instalment came out, boys were queuing to buy it.
0:40:09 > 0:40:16Baden-Powell's original idea was that Scouting would piggyback on existing boys' movements.
0:40:16 > 0:40:22But then, when the book came out, Scouting appealed in such a way
0:40:22 > 0:40:25that boys wanted to Scout themselves.
0:40:25 > 0:40:29So, Baden-Powell had more or less to scramble
0:40:29 > 0:40:33to catch up with the wildfire success of the book,
0:40:33 > 0:40:36so the movement followed the book.
0:40:36 > 0:40:39It's one of the few, if not only, instances, I think,
0:40:39 > 0:40:45in world history, of a book having generated a movement.
0:40:47 > 0:40:53And one of the secrets of the movement's success is right there, in the opening section.
0:40:57 > 0:41:02This is a very famous painting of a Scout, and it shows a boy in that classic Scout uniform.
0:41:02 > 0:41:07I think we've all seen it so often that you forget how very odd it is.
0:41:07 > 0:41:14The hat is a South African hat from the constabulary where Baden-Powell was serving.
0:41:14 > 0:41:19Then the shirt, which is a long army shirt worn in India and Afghanistan.
0:41:19 > 0:41:24Basically, the Army had fashioned it on the traditional Muslim shirt.
0:41:24 > 0:41:27Shorts - which no-one in this country wore at all.
0:41:27 > 0:41:31Parents had to cut off long trousers to make them fit.
0:41:31 > 0:41:33So it's an odd collection of things,
0:41:33 > 0:41:37but Baden-Powell always claimed they were all practical.
0:41:37 > 0:41:40The hat, you could carry water in.
0:41:40 > 0:41:43The shirt, if you put two of the shirts together,
0:41:43 > 0:41:50shoved the staves that the scouts carry, they turn into a stretcher. The scarf turned into a sling.
0:41:50 > 0:41:52Again, for emergencies.
0:41:54 > 0:41:57The figure here on the right isn't a Scout.
0:41:57 > 0:42:02The suggestion is, in a fairly obvious way, that he's blessing the entire Scout movement.
0:42:05 > 0:42:09Baden-Powell also ordained a hierarchy of officers,
0:42:09 > 0:42:11invented a Scout salute...
0:42:13 > 0:42:15..and he composed a Scout oath.
0:42:15 > 0:42:20On my honour, I promise to do my duty to God and the King.
0:42:20 > 0:42:23I will try to help others, whatever it costs me.
0:42:23 > 0:42:26I know the Scout law, and WILL obey it.
0:42:28 > 0:42:33Crucially, the Scout law wasn't a list of forbidden acts, but one of positive aims.
0:42:35 > 0:42:38A Scout's honour is to be trusted.
0:42:38 > 0:42:40A Scout is loyal.
0:42:40 > 0:42:44A Scout's duty is to be useful and to help others.
0:42:44 > 0:42:49A Scout is a friend to all, and a brother to every other Scout.
0:42:49 > 0:42:54In Scouting For Boys, Baden-Powell also gave the movement something critical -
0:42:54 > 0:42:58the impression it already had a history.
0:42:58 > 0:43:02The British Empire had quite a propensity for inventing traditions.
0:43:02 > 0:43:08In other words, for making up a movement, an idea, an organisation,
0:43:08 > 0:43:11and then passing it off, or indeed marketing it,
0:43:11 > 0:43:15as something traditional and conventional
0:43:15 > 0:43:17and steeped in the past.
0:43:17 > 0:43:23Scouting, of course, does so by harking back to what Baden-Powell calls "the scouts of history".
0:43:25 > 0:43:29In the old days, the knights were the scouts of Britain,
0:43:29 > 0:43:33and their rules were very much the same as the Scout law, which we have now.
0:43:33 > 0:43:38We are their descendants and we ought to keep up their good name
0:43:38 > 0:43:40and follow in their steps.
0:43:43 > 0:43:49Baden-Powell even suggested that Scouting had a lineage that led all the way to the king.
0:43:49 > 0:43:54He noted that the King signs himself RI - Rex Imperator, the emperor.
0:43:54 > 0:44:01He says "Imperator" comes from two Roman words, "Im" and "Perare",
0:44:01 > 0:44:05which together mean "prepare for", that is, to be prepared,
0:44:05 > 0:44:09which, rather neatly, makes the King the Chief Scout.
0:44:09 > 0:44:11It's neat, but it isn't true.
0:44:11 > 0:44:18"Imperator" just means he who rules, but no-one was going to object, and certainly not the King.
0:44:21 > 0:44:26Edward VII returned the favour in autumn 1909, when he knighted Baden-Powell.
0:44:29 > 0:44:34By now, the Scout movement had over 100,000 members.
0:44:34 > 0:44:38Scout troops were patrolling across the country.
0:44:39 > 0:44:43And a spin-off magazine was flying off the newsstands.
0:44:46 > 0:44:49Scout fever had gripped the nation.
0:44:53 > 0:44:56Scouting offered something special that other groups didn't.
0:44:56 > 0:45:01At its core was a belief in the positive power of playing and make-believe.
0:45:01 > 0:45:06Scouting For Boys is peppered with ideas for staging little plays,
0:45:06 > 0:45:09dramatising poems, putting on a show.
0:45:09 > 0:45:16It encouraged each boy to imagine himself as a potential hero on the bigger stage of life.
0:45:20 > 0:45:27Playing and playacting had always been central to Baden-Powell's understanding of the world.
0:45:27 > 0:45:32Peter Pan, one of the most popular shows of the age, was especially dear to him.
0:45:36 > 0:45:43Baden-Powell was particularly fixated on it, even more so than its standard enthusiastic audience.
0:45:43 > 0:45:49I think that was because the figure of the boy who never grows up,
0:45:49 > 0:45:51who never loses his milk teeth,
0:45:51 > 0:45:55who never has to confront the horrors of sexuality,
0:45:55 > 0:45:59was to him a very, very compelling image.
0:46:01 > 0:46:08The idea that Scouts were boys on the brink of sexual maturity was a problem for Baden-Powell.
0:46:09 > 0:46:14And the thought that they might be tempted to indulge in self-abuse,
0:46:14 > 0:46:17as the Edwardians termed it, horrified him.
0:46:19 > 0:46:25But, in typically forthright manner, he drafted a section of Scouting For Boys to confront it directly.
0:46:25 > 0:46:30No prudish sentimentality for him.
0:46:30 > 0:46:32He even checked his copy with his mother.
0:46:34 > 0:46:38Pearson, his publisher, however, was much more coy.
0:46:38 > 0:46:42He rejected the original, and Baden-Powell was forced to replace it
0:46:42 > 0:46:47with a watered-down version for instructors only.
0:46:47 > 0:46:53This is from the appendix on masturbation, and this is what he wants to say.
0:46:53 > 0:46:56"Now the result of self-abuse is always..." Mind you, always!
0:46:56 > 0:47:00"..that the boy, after a time, becomes weak and nervous and shy.
0:47:00 > 0:47:02"He gets headaches, palpitations of the heart,
0:47:02 > 0:47:08- "and if he carries on too far, he very often goes out of his mind and becomes an idiot."- Yes.
0:47:08 > 0:47:10- It's quite extreme, isn't it? - It's very extreme.
0:47:10 > 0:47:15It's more extreme than even fairly conservative medical authority
0:47:15 > 0:47:20would have gone in the early 20th century.
0:47:20 > 0:47:23But there was a huge amount of anxiety about masturbation.
0:47:23 > 0:47:30Huge anxiety around masturbation, because, on the one hand, it caused all these problems with health -
0:47:30 > 0:47:36it led to consumption, insanity, etc - and, on the other hand, there's an argument that
0:47:36 > 0:47:41it's a manifestation of a lack of self-discipline, it erodes the willpower.
0:47:41 > 0:47:48If a boy gets into this habit, he will not be a fit person to govern the Empire.
0:47:48 > 0:47:52Part of me thinks Baden-Powell is trying to do something healthy by saying,
0:47:52 > 0:47:54"We're far too prudish about this."
0:47:54 > 0:47:58I think it's good that he's actually ventilating, he's talking about it.
0:47:58 > 0:48:03We want to get this out in the open, out into the healthy fresh air and sunlight.
0:48:03 > 0:48:06Why do you think his publisher wouldn't put it in?
0:48:06 > 0:48:13There is this concern in saying, "Oh, God, there's this terrible habit that boys get into at school,
0:48:13 > 0:48:17"in adolescence, and they learn it from their evil companions."
0:48:17 > 0:48:18Yadda, yadda...
0:48:18 > 0:48:21"..We should warn them about it."
0:48:21 > 0:48:25And then others will come back and say, "No, they are pure innocent little lambs.
0:48:25 > 0:48:28"You will just put this evil thought into their minds."
0:48:28 > 0:48:31It's like the sex education debate,
0:48:31 > 0:48:37about whether you tell them, or whether you tell them about it and they go and do it!
0:48:38 > 0:48:44Don't lark about with a girl who you wouldn't like your mother or sister to see you with.
0:48:44 > 0:48:49Don't make love to any girl unless you mean to marry her.
0:48:49 > 0:48:56Despite his confident assertions, Baden-Powell was no expert on the charms of the opposite sex.
0:48:57 > 0:49:04Whereas he would often apply the word "beautiful" to a man, he would never apply it to a woman.
0:49:04 > 0:49:08She might be good-looking, but he would then often qualify it
0:49:08 > 0:49:12with a word like "heavy-ish" or some sort of slightly derogatory remark.
0:49:12 > 0:49:16I obviously read Baden-Powell's diary remarkably carefully.
0:49:16 > 0:49:20There was an entry in the diary which said, just, "Went to Charterhouse,
0:49:20 > 0:49:25"saw Todd's photograph album, naked boys in trees - excellent."
0:49:25 > 0:49:30I'm sure it was nothing sort of overtly sexual.
0:49:30 > 0:49:36But, clearly, Baden-Powell did very much enjoy looking at these naked boys.
0:49:39 > 0:49:44For Edwardian society, an aesthetic appreciation of the young male form
0:49:44 > 0:49:47was distinct from finding it sexually arousing.
0:49:49 > 0:49:53Whilst works like these were being exhibited in public,
0:49:54 > 0:49:59no-one saw Baden-Powell's interest in boys' bodies as evidence of paedophilia, or even homosexuality,
0:49:59 > 0:50:02least of all, Baden-Powell himself.
0:50:03 > 0:50:05Times have changed.
0:50:07 > 0:50:12If Baden-Powell tried to start Scouting today, I don't think he'd have got very far.
0:50:12 > 0:50:16Media interest in a national hero no longer stops at the bedroom door.
0:50:16 > 0:50:19And an unmarried, unattached, confirmed bachelor
0:50:19 > 0:50:26who admired pictures of naked boys would be unlikely to be allowed to be in charge of a youth movement.
0:50:26 > 0:50:32However, Baden-Powell scholars still don't agree on his true inclinations.
0:50:32 > 0:50:38It should be possible to speak of a sexual preference that is, in a way, a non preference.
0:50:38 > 0:50:41"I don't want to do this sex thing!"
0:50:41 > 0:50:47I genuinely believe that Baden-Powell was the eternal Peter Pan,
0:50:47 > 0:50:53and that, rather than being a repressed gay man, he was in fact asexual.
0:50:53 > 0:50:57He thought that, actually, men who did commit too early
0:50:57 > 0:51:00to sexual relationships with women were contaminated.
0:51:00 > 0:51:02Which I think, in a way, is...
0:51:02 > 0:51:05You don't think that unless you're gay.
0:51:07 > 0:51:12Baden-Powell may have backed away from women, but they didn't shy away from him.
0:51:12 > 0:51:18Yet he didn't give marriage any serious thought until his mother began to put him under pressure.
0:51:18 > 0:51:23Olave Soames was only 23 to Baden-Powell's 54
0:51:23 > 0:51:26when he met her in 1912.
0:51:27 > 0:51:31She was a tomboy, interested in sports and games,
0:51:31 > 0:51:36and they shared an instant rapport, marrying less than a year later.
0:51:36 > 0:51:43She was completely un-clothes-conscious, never painted her face, as it was described.
0:51:43 > 0:51:47Baden-Powell thought the best women weren't very much interested in sex,
0:51:47 > 0:51:50and I think that that would be true of her.
0:51:50 > 0:51:53He did get her pregnant with Peter,
0:51:53 > 0:51:57and he managed subsequent pregnancies,
0:51:57 > 0:52:01but after that, he slept out on a balcony for the rest of his life.
0:52:01 > 0:52:06There was a single bed on a veranda outside the front of their house.
0:52:06 > 0:52:10It was an open veranda, and he would go upstairs to bed,
0:52:10 > 0:52:14having sat around a fire, sat almost on the embers to keep warm,
0:52:14 > 0:52:18then go upstairs, climb into bed with two blankets and a pillow,
0:52:18 > 0:52:22and they'd come out in the morning, in the winter, and dust the snow off him!
0:52:22 > 0:52:24Quite extraordinary!
0:52:29 > 0:52:32The boys of Britain at the start of the 20th century
0:52:32 > 0:52:35had no interest in the romantic life of the Chief Scout.
0:52:35 > 0:52:41They were just thrilled that, unlike most Edwardian adults, he refused to patronise them.
0:52:43 > 0:52:47He entrusted them with civic tasks, like giving first aid,
0:52:47 > 0:52:49or directing people in fog.
0:52:49 > 0:52:53Responsibility, he believed, developed character.
0:52:55 > 0:52:59Of course, this had its funny side, and Baden-Powell was the first to admit
0:52:59 > 0:53:03that his fad of Scouting might appear ridiculous,
0:53:03 > 0:53:05and others were quick to join in the joke.
0:53:05 > 0:53:09This is a Punch cartoon from as early as 1909,
0:53:09 > 0:53:13which seems to be laughing at the idea of the Scouts coming to the rescue.
0:53:13 > 0:53:18It shows a very small boy attempting to help a rather large lady across the beach.
0:53:18 > 0:53:21And he says, "Fear not, Grandma!
0:53:21 > 0:53:24"No danger can befall you now - I'M with you!"
0:53:24 > 0:53:29Yet, crucially, its titled Our Youngest Line Of Defence.
0:53:29 > 0:53:30And this isn't any old lady.
0:53:30 > 0:53:34This is Mrs Britannia, who stands for the entire British Empire,
0:53:34 > 0:53:38which the Scouts have been charged with saving.
0:53:39 > 0:53:43Remember that the Roman Empire 2,000 years ago
0:53:43 > 0:53:48was comparatively just as great as the British Empire of today.
0:53:48 > 0:53:52It fell at last chiefly because the young Romans
0:53:52 > 0:53:56gave up soldiering and manliness altogether.
0:53:58 > 0:54:01Don't be disgraced like the young Romans,
0:54:01 > 0:54:03who lost the empire of their forefathers
0:54:03 > 0:54:09by being wishy-washy slackers, without any go or patriotism in them.
0:54:09 > 0:54:11EXPLOSION
0:54:13 > 0:54:18Edwardians were obsessed with the idea of losing the British Empire.
0:54:19 > 0:54:22When thinking of a really serious enemy, like the Germans,
0:54:22 > 0:54:27most senior Army officers were convinced that we might lose,
0:54:27 > 0:54:30and it would be the loss of the Empire, our country, our national wealth.
0:54:30 > 0:54:33It would have been really a catastrophe.
0:54:36 > 0:54:42By 1914, a generation of boys had been immersed in the book's patriotism,
0:54:42 > 0:54:46and primed to see themselves as literal protectors of the nation.
0:54:48 > 0:54:53Every boy ought to learn how to shoot and to obey orders,
0:54:53 > 0:54:57else he is no more good when war breaks out than an old woman,
0:54:57 > 0:55:00and merely gets killed like a squealing rabbit,
0:55:00 > 0:55:02unable to defend himself.
0:55:05 > 0:55:09So it might seem that the First World War was the call to arms
0:55:09 > 0:55:12which Baden-Powell had been preparing for all along.
0:55:20 > 0:55:24Baden-Powell insisted that every boy be able to handle a weapon.
0:55:24 > 0:55:29But he refused to see his Scout movement as a sort of military cadet force.
0:55:29 > 0:55:34Indeed, Baden-Powell defended himself against charges of militarism in Scouting For Boys.
0:55:34 > 0:55:38He said there was a world of difference between self-defence,
0:55:38 > 0:55:42standing up to bullies on the international stage, and bloodthirsty warmongering.
0:55:45 > 0:55:47When an eminent public man wrote to me
0:55:47 > 0:55:50that I ought not to teach boys soldiering
0:55:50 > 0:55:54because, as he puts it, he hates war like the devil,
0:55:54 > 0:55:59I felt bound to reply that, had he seen anything of war himself,
0:55:59 > 0:56:03he would, like most soldiers, hate it WORSE than the devil!
0:56:06 > 0:56:10Rather than see his Scouts become a branch of the armed forces,
0:56:10 > 0:56:13the Chief Scout offered his boys for civilian duties -
0:56:13 > 0:56:17running errands, working in Red Cross centres,
0:56:17 > 0:56:20and coast-watching.
0:56:20 > 0:56:25But the war inevitably took its toll on the Scouting movement.
0:56:26 > 0:56:31A quarter-of-a-million former Scouts and Scout masters fought for King and country,
0:56:31 > 0:56:34of whom 10,000 died.
0:56:36 > 0:56:40Among the fatalities were five of the 20 boys
0:56:40 > 0:56:44who joined Baden-Powell on Brownsea Island back in 1907.
0:56:52 > 0:56:56After the catastrophe of world war, Baden-Powell decided that Scouting
0:56:56 > 0:56:59had to become a force for world peace.
0:56:59 > 0:57:03The imperialism of the original handbook was soon eclipsed
0:57:03 > 0:57:07by the internationalist message of global Scouting.
0:57:08 > 0:57:10That's what we're after -
0:57:10 > 0:57:13to try and breed, in the next oncoming generation,
0:57:13 > 0:57:17that spirit of friendship, comradeship and goodwill,
0:57:17 > 0:57:21which is the true foundation for peace in the world.
0:57:23 > 0:57:29That hope proved illusory, but the Scouting ideal continued throughout the 20th century,
0:57:29 > 0:57:35even though other youth movements with less worthy aims borrowed heavily from its trappings.
0:57:35 > 0:57:37The communist Soviet Pioneers.
0:57:37 > 0:57:39The Italian young fascists.
0:57:39 > 0:57:42And, infamously, the Hitler Youth.
0:57:47 > 0:57:52But to assume that all boys in shorts are brainwashed storm troopers in waiting
0:57:52 > 0:57:57does a grave injustice to Baden-Powell's Edwardian experiment.
0:57:57 > 0:58:01After all, which of these movements didn't mind what religion you were?
0:58:01 > 0:58:05Or what colour? Or what class?
0:58:05 > 0:58:11And which of them instructed their members to smile and whistle under all circumstances?
0:58:13 > 0:58:18One of Baden-Powell's favourite mottos was, "get a laugh on."
0:58:18 > 0:58:21His movement was always a mixture of earnestness and playfulness.
0:58:21 > 0:58:25He wanted to instruct boys how to cut down trees,
0:58:25 > 0:58:28but he couldn't resist adding, "Don't chop your leg off!"
0:58:28 > 0:58:31That's why the book is still so engaging.
0:58:31 > 0:58:34And despite being firmly rooted in the Edwardian era,
0:58:34 > 0:58:38he was trying to address issues that still resonate today.
0:58:38 > 0:58:42Inner-city deprivation, boys without role models, unhealthy lifestyles,
0:58:42 > 0:58:44the need for citizenship.
0:58:44 > 0:58:47Amazingly, it's all in there.
0:58:47 > 0:58:51Which is why, 100 years later, I think it's still worth saluting.
0:59:14 > 0:59:18Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd - 2007
0:59:18 > 0:59:22E-mail subtitling@bbc.co.uk