BADEN-POWELL
Memories of world’s most famous Scout
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n Nyeri, St Peter’s cemetery is the final resting place of Lord Robert BadenPowell of Gilwell, who in 1908 founded the Scouting Movement. Today, there are thought to be as many as 45 million Scouts worldwide. Baden-Powell was a man of his time with a range of talents. As well as being an excellent fisherman, a fine polo player and a fearless big-game hunter, he was a highly regarded watercolourist and an accomplished sculptor and took a keen interest in cine-photography, then in its infancy. Above all, however, Baden-Powell was a soldier at heart. In fact, he rose to the rank of Inspector General of Cavalry in the British Army at a time in history when the horse was still the principal means of carrying men and arms into battle. Even today, the Scouting Movement’s activities can be traced to the bush craft that Baden-Powell learned as a cavalry officer during his time in southern Africa. Baden-Powell first visited Kenya in 1906 and like many others of his generation he was immediately taken with the country and, in particular, the area around Mount Kenya. He never forgot his time in Kenya and many years later he and his wife Olave chose to live full-time in Nyeri with its delightful climate and views of Mount Kenya. The now elderly couple rented a modest one-room cottage in the grounds of
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Mount Kenya Guide 2016/2017
the Outspan Hotel and within walking distance of Nyeri. Baden-Powell named his new home Paxtu. The strange name came about because it was Baden-Powell’s second property named Pax (Latin for ‘peace’), so it became known as Pax Two or Paxtu. Baden-Powell, who had earlier recuperated at Outspan after an illness, bought a share of the hotel to pay for his cottage. Sadly, his final years in Nyeri were short-lived. On 8 January 1941, aged 83, the founder of Scouting died and was later buried in St Peter’s Cemetery.
Headstone His gravestone bears a circle with a dot in the centre – the trail sign for ‘going home’ or ‘I have gone home’. Otherwise, the headstone simply bears the words ‘Robert Baden-Powell, Chief Scout of the World’ surmounted by the badges of the Boy Scouts and Girl Guides. It sums up the man who led a simple life and wanted little in the way of material possessions. When his widow Olave died 36 years later in 1977 in England, her ashes were flown to Kenya and interred next to her husband. For anyone who has been a Boy Scout or a Girl Guide, a visit to the cemetery is certainly worthwhile and a chance to pay homage to a truly great man.