BOY SCOUTS’ CHIEF.

Hawera Star, Volume XLIX, 13 August 1929, Page 9

BOY SCOUTS’ CHIEF.

COM ING-OF-AGE CELEBRATIONS. ■ALrAVj'OitlAij U) JAC'IV CO KN v\ Ei/ij, V.C. LOI\DON, June 2«. r.uri jeliicoe, wiio, until n.e became President, oi tne Britisn Legion, was County Commissioner for London Boy Scouts, opened, in .June, six cottages m memory ol Boy Scout Jack Cornwell, V.C.' .Jack Cornwell was one of the 11 members of the Boy Scoutmovement to gain the \ ictoria Cross during the Great War. in ease it was awarded posthumously. The cottages are at Hornchurch, Essex. They are for naval men disabled in the war and their families. The first two will be occupied by comrades of Jack Cornwell, wno served with hint on H.M.S. Chester before lie was killed in the Battle of Jutland. H.M.S. Chester was constructed in the shipyards at Birkenhead, where next July and August 50,000 Boy Scouts from 25 parts of the British Empire and 41 otner nations, will take part in the movement’s coming-of-age world jamboree at Arrowe Park. These world-famous shipyards and other great industrial centres in the l north will be visited by each of the foreign and overseas Scouts during their stay in Arrowe Park.

Boy Scout Jack Cornwell, \ .C. , is also commemorated in the Boy Scout movement itself by the Cornwell Scout Decoration —an award the qualifications for which require a very high standard of character, devotion to duty and physical courage. Out of 2,000,(XX) Boy" Scouts in the world only 41 have obtained this coveted decoration. so high are the standards to be attained. PAGEANT FOR THE PRINCE. On July 31 the Duke ol Connaught will formally open the jamboree from the Royal Box in Arrowe Park, and the following evening the Prince of Wales, Chief Scout for Wales, representing the Ring, will arrive in camp. The next day he will attend a rally and pageant of nations held in his honour. Prince George, who lias iecently become Commodore of the Sea Scout branch of the movement, will visit the jamboree on August 3, ana will attend a special display at West Kirby marine lake \\ hile this is in progress the Wolf Cubs will hold a, rally at. Arrowe Park, and the Chief Scout will be present during the ceremony known as the Grand 1 Howl. Among the Scouts present there will |>e troops of blind, deaf, dumb, and crippled members ol the movement; while at intervals during the jamboree the Chief Scout will receive the veterans of the movement that is, those with IS years’ service and more. The public will have opportunities of inspecting the camps, and every afternoon there will he special entertainments in the arena. An open-air theatre and a cinema will he provided in the camp, and several events will be broadcasted, including the speeches by the Prince of Wales and the Duke of Connaught and the Chief Scout and the massed thanksgiving service, _ and part of the service to be held in Liverpool Cathedral on August 11. HEALTH AND HAPPINESS. To-day the movement is active in 42 different countries, with a membership of nearly 2,000,000. A remarkable point, about the movement. General Sir Robert BadeaiPowell remarked at a luncheon, was that it had found no enemy except among the Communists. These have declared war upon ii because it was capturing the youth of the different countries. ‘■Looking hack,” he ' commented, “on the development during the past--20 years, with all the handicap of firststarting as a new thing and then meeting the heavy setback incidental to four years of war just at the critical stage of our existence, one may reasonably visualise a tremendous growth of the movement during the next 20 years. At present it only touches the fringe of the boyhood, hut one. may hope that with increase of popular symnathv and support it will go on to influence a tangible proportion of the youth of eacli nation. “Tf it succeeds in this it should help to bring about a healthier, happier and more helpful citizen hood in each country, and at the same ' time a stouter link of mutual comradeship between' the future men of the different countries such as should ensure peace and goodwill in place of unrest and selfish antagonisms in the world.”