Oct 1957

THE SCOUT GROUP During the term much progress was made both by Scouts and by Senior Scouts. The highlights of this progress were the gaining of three Queen's Scout badges and four Bushman's Thongs by the Senior Scouts and of nine First Class badges by the Scouts. The three new Queen's Scouts are A. D. Best, J. M. Smith and K. A. Steel, and they represented us at the Jubilee Jamboree at Sutton Goldfield.

Many more boys are now interested in staying in the Scout Group during their School careers, and we are faced with the problem of whether to restrict the entry into the Senior Scout troop and maintain a waiting list or to increase the size of the troop to unmanageable numbers in order to accommodate all who qualify to come up from the Scout troop. The latter also is growing rather cumbersome. More younger Scouts than ever are wanting to spend a second year in the Scout troop, and this will, of course, leave fewer places for Scouts from St. Olave's or new Peterites, and make it difficult for us to accept boys who have never been Scouts before. The only answer is to double the number of Scouters, especially as we have no Senior Scouts this year who will be eligible for warrants.

This last year has been notable for the fact that no fewer than four Senior Scouts were awarded warrants as Assistant Scoutmasters. In addition to those listed in an earlier "Peterite", S. J. S. Wroe was presented with his warrant this term, and he has been a great asset in helping to run the Senior Scout troop. We were very glad to welcome M. G. Sykes back to the fold after a number of years with the C.C.F. Though we could not offer him a warrant, we greatly valued his assistance with the Scout troop both during term, when he was on permanent loan, and at camp. To these two, and to D. R. Holt, D. J. Oldman and D. Pfluger we offer our thanks for their help and our best wishes for the future. We hope that their recent experience will not deter them from renewing their warrants with some other Scout Group.

A successful Field Day was held on 25th June. Before we left, the Group paraded in the Scout Room and was inspected by the Head Master, who also presented their warrants to Mr. Holbeche and to Wroe. We were able to take the opportunity of expressing our thanks to the Head Master for our new Scout Room and for the continual support and encouragement he gives to the Group. A fleet of buses transported us to the Helmsley area, where both Senior School sections took part in map-reading exercises. The Scouts were dropped by patrols to find their way by a given route to a rendezvous on the moors. Meanwhile the. Senior Scouts were blindfolded and, after a circuitous journey on to the moors, were dropped in pairs with a map, but with no indication of where they were, and told to make for the same rendezvous. Judging by the results, about 80 per cent of Senior Scouts are capable of finding their bearings in strange and 49