They say that an organization whose goals are not clear to people for a long time cannot exist. Scouts have been around for over a hundred years …
Who goes where, but we just go straight
Through the darkness to the light of the fire.
Goodbye dad, goodbye mom
Goodbye little sister.
The flame is flaring up
For the whole earthly space, And time teaches us first.
You burn, burn my fire
My friend, my friend, my travel companion.
You burn, burn my fire
My friend, my friend, my travel companion.
The history of the scout movement. Who does not remember the film or the book "Dagger" and its sequel "Bronze Bird" by Anatoly Rybakov? In the first one, the heroes are trying to fight the half-dead scouts, and in the second they find themselves in a pioneer camp, very similar to the scout camp. And everyone, most likely, knows that the scout movement, as before, now exists in Russia and is popular all over the world. But how did it arise, how did it develop, and how did it function in Russia? We will tell you about all this today …
And it was so, the famous naturalist writer and artist Ernest Seton-Thompson came up with the idea to create a children's squad "Woodcraft Indians" - "Forest Indians". No sooner said than done! And then he also wrote about it. And not only wrote - in 1906 he sent his notes to Baden-Powell, who was already known for his articles in the press about the shortcomings of preparing English recruits for the war with the Boers in Africa. In a very colorful way, he described, for example, how they drank water from the river, upstream of which … mules urinated into it! It is not surprising, Baden-Powell wrote, that many of the soldiers then suffered not from bullets, but from dysentery. And not limited to criticism, he decided to create a completely new public youth organization that would prepare British boys for military service in advance.
And… created! Moreover, his organization was so successful that for his services to the country, King George V of England elevated him to the rank of baron and gave him the title: "Lord Baden-Powell of Gilwell." They began to call the members of the new organization scouts, that is, scouts, and initially it was aimed specifically at the pre-conscription training of English boys.
But over time, her goals became broader, and not only a scout organization for boys appeared, but also for girls. Because they also wanted to do the same thing that their brothers did.
The essence of scouting, according to Baden-Powell, was an informal approach to the educational process based on practical exercises in nature, while children acquire the skills of survival in the forest, with hiking and boating and practicing various sports.
The scouts' uniform was also very attractive: a military-cut shirt with epaulettes, shorts and a hat copied from the hat of the British army volunteers. It was also obligatory to wear special scout ties, and the scout could tie a tie only after doing some good deed. A very important matter was "patrolling": several scouts went in search of good deeds and, having completed these deeds, reported them to their elder. And he was already deciding whether they could tie ties the next day or not.
The heraldic fleur-de-lis and the shamrock became the emblem of the scout movement.
The origin of the scout motto is associated with the fact that on February 12, 1908, in an article in the Boy Scouting magazine, the founder of the scout movement, Colonel Sir Robert Stevenson Smith Baden-Powell, wrote the following:
“Be prepared to die for your country if need be; so when the moment comes, leave the house with confidence and without thinking about whether you will be killed or not."
So the scout motto was born: "Be ready!" and a tip - "Always ready".
The very first nine-day scout camp was organized by Baden-Powell in August 1907 on Brownsea Island near Poole, Dorset.
Moreover, as already noted, he relied on his experience in Africa, where in 1899 Colonel Baden-Powell was the commandant of the Mafeking fortress, besieged by the Boer army. Since there were only a little more than a thousand soldiers in his garrison, he organized an auxiliary military unit from … local boys, whom he entrusted with reconnaissance and delivery of reports through the positions of the Boers. It turned out that the boys fought no worse than adults, they were brave, resourceful, and distinguished by their diligence. Only thanks to the ingenuity of Baden-Powell, he was able to hold out with his garrison for a full 207 days, until reinforcements came to the city.
This is how the colonel came to the conclusion that it is necessary to train military intelligence officers from childhood. He became a general and did everything in his power to bring his ideas to life. And soon, namely in 1908, he wrote and published the book "Scouting for boys" - "Scouting for boys", which has become such a book for many thousands of children and adults.
And in less than a year, there were already 14,000 scouts in England. And in 1910, an organization for girls and girls, parallel to the Boy Scouts, appeared - "Girl Guides".
The talented artist Pierre Joubert, who became a scout at the age of 14 and then drew wonderful illustrations for books and magazines about scouts for several decades, also made a very large contribution to the scout movement.
In Russia, the idea of scouting has spread very quickly. Already on April 30, 1909, Colonel Oleg Ivanovich Pantyukhov (from 1919 - senior Russian scout) lit the first scout bonfire in Pavlovsky Park. The next year, in the 1st Petersburg men's gymnasium, the Latin teacher V. G.
Nicholas II received the book of Baden-Powell in 1910, and it turned out that he also thought about the need for pre-conscription training of young people, especially those called up from the countryside. The tsar ordered to translate the book into Russian and publish it in the printing house of the General Staff building.
But … for some reason we often don't even know how to copy a good “there” “here”. The name of the Russian scouts was given to Petrovsky - "funny", and the whole scouting was reduced to drill training and shagistics. The movement soon collapsed.
Then Captain A. G. Zakharchenko was sent to England to study the experience of scouting. And he studied it and created a scout squad in Moscow. But she, too, fell apart. The children did not like to walk in formation every day. What is the interest in this?
So the real founder of scoutism in Moscow was not an officer, but the editor of the magazine "Vokrug Sveta" V. A. Popov.
Only in August 1914 in Russia a "Society for the Promotion of Boy Scouts" or "Russian Scout" was created. Vice-Admiral Ivan Bostrem stood at the head of the society, and O. Pantyukhov became its vice-chairman.
Well, in 1915, the heir himself, Tsarevich Alexei, signed up for scouts. In the same year, the first scout congress was held in Russia, which approved the charter, structure and symbols of domestic scoutism. And the movement began to widen.
In the fall of 1917, there were 50,000 scouts in 143 cities in Russia. Scout songs appeared, for example, the same “pioneer song” “Potato” was originally a scout song.
After the October Revolution, the scout movement split into two directions.
White Scouts adhered to traditional scouting values, but at the same time, attempts began to combine scouting with revolutionary ideology. The "pioneers" of Innokentiy Zhukov appeared, the "Yukists" - "young communist scouts" wearing red ties, and even "red scouts".
There were also apolitical "forest brothers" - "pathfinders of the forest", guided by the books of Seton-Thompson.
But in 1919 the Komsomol declared war on the scouts. The persecution of scouts intensified especially since 1922, when the authorities decided to create a children's communist organization. The organization was created, but it turned out to be impossible to come up with better than what was invented by Baden-Powell. And the call "Be ready" with the recall "Always ready", and ties, and bonfires - all borrowed from the "bad scouts." Although the goal of the organization was completely different: to educate the replacement of the Komsomol, and ultimately - future staunch Bolshevik party members.
A number of scout organizations were able to hold out until the spring of 1923, and in May hold a scout meeting near the village of Vsekhsvyatskoye in the Moscow region. Its participants walked dressed in scout uniforms and with banners. But it ended badly for them: the meeting was dispersed, and the organizers were arrested for counter-revolution. Nevertheless, underground scouts existed in the USSR and even established contacts with scouts in exile and with O. Pantyukhov. This continued until 1927.
Another informal children's movement in the USSR was the Timurov movement. To which the official Komsomol members and communists were at first wary and even accused Gaidar of opposing the Timurovites to the pioneers. But the Timurovites did not have an organization as such, it was a form of assistance to the families of the Red Army soldiers, which turned out to be useful for society. The movement was quickly taken over by a pioneer organization, and it became one of the areas of his work.
Restored, or rather, let's put it this way: the scout movement in the USSR was allowed in 1990. But the rebirth of Russian scouting has been slow. In 2007, there were only 30,000 scouts in Russia, and there was no single organization. In the spring of 2019, a scout movement was born in Russia on the basis of such a Christian organization as the Salvation Army.
Scouts are usually divided by age: 5-7, 8-11 and 12-17 years old.
The ideas of the scout movement formed the basis of the Hitler Youth movement in Germany from 1926 to 1945. The attractiveness of membership for young people was also in the fact that it was associated with a risk to life. And quite real. So, from 1931 until the end of January 1933, more than 20 members of the Hitler Youth were killed in various clashes with the same young opponents of Nazism.
The organization of scouts also exists in J. Orwell's dystopia novel "1984". And, it is clear that, describing the totalitarian society there, he simply could not do without showing the extremely ugly forms of such an organization. In Oceania scouts, children are taught to spy on their parents by eavesdropping through the door with a special tube, and if something goes wrong - immediately inform the police of thoughts.
Well, today there are only two international scout organizations: the World Organization of the Scout Movement and the World Association of Girl Scouts.
