SCOUTING

[Sir George Smyth Baden-Powell, explorer and colonial official, brother of the founder of the Scouting movement Sir Robert Baden-Powell.] Autograph Signature cut from letter.

Author: 
Sir George Smyth Baden-Powell (1847-1898), explorer, author, commissioner in Victoria, Australia, the West Indies, Malta and Canada, and brother of Sir Robert Baden-Powell, founder of the Boy Scouts
Publication details: 
No date or place.
£20.00

See his entry, and those of his father and brother, in the Oxford DNB. On rectangle of paper, roughly 8.5 x 3.5 cm. In good condition, lightly aged, with the 'Powell' of the signature slightly smudged, and traces of glue from mount on reverse. Reads '[...] and Love [...] / Yours truly / George Baden-Powell'.

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[The Birth of the Scout Movement?: R. B. Haldane and Baden-Powell’s ‘scheme’.] Typed Note with cyclostyled sigature from the future Lord Chancellor Richard Burdon Haldane to ‘General Baden-Powell’, regarding a meeting with Sir Edward Ward.

Author: 
[The Birth of the Scout Movement? R. B. Haldane [Richard Burdon Haldane (1856-1928), 1st Viscount Haldane, Lord Chancellor] [Lord Baden-Powell [Sir Robert Baden-Powell (1857-1941)]; the Boy Scouts]
Publication details: 
23 May 1906. On embossed War Office letterhead.
£280.00

‘Scouting for Boys’ did not begin its serialized publication until January 1908, but Baden-Powell’s entry in the Oxford DNB states that it was Haldane, as Secretary for War, who ‘persuaded him that character training should be at the centre of any scheme of boy instruction’, following a ‘major inspection’ of the Boys’ Brigade by him as Vice-President at Glasgow in April 1904. 1p, 4to. In fair condition, lightly aged, with slight creasing and a short closed tear to one edge. Reads: ‘Dictated. / 23rd. May 1906. / Dear General Baden-Powell, / Thank you for your letter.

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[Ralph Reader, Broadway and West End theatrical impressario.] Typed Letter Signed to theatre historian W. J. Macqueen-Pope, thanking him for writing about ‘the new Award’ [perhaps the Novello?] and giving his news.

Author: 
Ralph Reader (1903-1982), Broadway and West End theatrical impressario associated with Scouting movement Gang Show and FA Cup Final community singing [Walter James Macqueen-Pope (1888-1960)]
Publication details: 
26 June 1957; on his letterhead, 14b Fitzjohn’s Avenue, NW3 [London].
£42.00

From the Macqueen-Pope papers. See his entry in the Oxford DNB. 1p, 12mo. In good condition. Signed ‘Ralph’ and addressed to ‘Dear Popie’. It was ‘extremely good’, ‘and typical too’, of MP to write to him ‘about the new Award’. He is ‘at Newcastle now with the Val Parnell Summer Show and we ring up on Monday’. MP will know ‘what we shall be going through at the moment!’ He ends by thanking him ‘VERY [sic] much for writing’.

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Typed Note Signed "J. Buchan" to Arthur Poyser, City of London Boy Scouts (first ever Troop by some accounts, inspired by Baden Powell's 1907 experiment), re-founder of the City of London Boy Players.

Author: 
John Buchan, novelist, later Lord Tweedsmuir, Governor-General of Canada
Publication details: 
[Headed Notepaper] Thomas Nelson and Sons Publishers, 5 November 1910
£175.00

With printed pamphlet. Letter is one page, 12mo, tipped on to page extracted from personal album of Arthur Poyser, trimmed to fit a plastci envelope, with a small nick not affecting text, illustrating his career with the City of London Boy Scouts and the Boy Players (album offered separately). Buchan is only free for luncheon on the Wednesday but would be happy to discuss "the book" [the first "Scouts' Song Book" published in 1912) with him then.

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