Robert Baden-Powell's sexual orientation
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A few modern authors, upon examining Baden-Powell's life and papers from the perspective of late-twentieth century understanding of sexuality, have explained his life-long interest in boys as the result of a strong erotic attraction to masculine beauty, principally in the form of young males. Among these historians are Tim Jeal, the author of Baden-Powell, a widely praised biography which takes a compassionate view of a man he considers to have lived a life of repressed homosexuality, and Michael Rosenthal of Columbia University, in his The character factory: Baden-Powell and the origins of the Boy Scout movement.
Other historians have commented less favorably on his presumed attractions, such as Kenneth Morgan of Oxford who refers to Baden-Powell's "probable pederasty" as a character defect covered up by the media of his time.[1] Nonetheless, despite his alleged attraction to youths, Baden-Powell is thought to always have remained chaste with his scouts, and he did not tolerate Scoutmasters who indulged in 'escapades' with their charges.
[edit] On his interest in males
Two modern biographers of Baden-Powell, Michael Rosenthal of Columbia University and Tim Jeal, consider him to have been a repressed homosexual. Tim Jeal's work, researched over five years, was published by Yale University Press and well-reviewed by the New York Times[2], the Washington Post and other publications of record.[citation needed] As James Casada writes in his review for Library Journal, it is "a balanced, definitive assessment which so far transcends previous treatments as to make them almost meaningless."[3]
The most intense relationship of Baden-Powell's life is widely believed to have been with a younger man, Kenneth McLaren, a boyish looking British Army officer whom Baden-Powell had grown fond of when they first served together in India. Baden-Powell nicknamed McLaren affectionately "The Boy," and remained close to him throughout his life, until his friend chose to marry — against Baden-Powell's advice — a woman below his station. Their friendship was the cause of intense jealousy on the part of Baden-Powell's wife.
Along with many other pieces of evidence for his contention, Jeal mentions as illustrative an episode which occurred in November 1919. While on a visit to Charterhouse, his old public school, he stayed with an old friend, A. H. Tod, a bachelor teacher and housemaster who had taken large numbers of nude photographs of his pupils as part of a photographic record of public school life. Baden-Powell's diary entry about his stay reads: "Stayed with Tod. Tod's photos of naked boys and trees. Excellent." In a subsequent communication to Tod regarding starting up a Scout troop at the school, Baden-Powell mentions his impending return visit and adds: "Possibly I might get a further look at those wonderful photographs of yours." (Jeal, 1989, p. 93)
Tod's pictures survived until the 1960s, when they were destroyed reportedly in order to "protect Tod's reputation." According to R. Jenkyns, the album contained nude boys in poses which were in his opinion "contrived and artificial." There is no reason to suspect that either Tod or Powell's relations were anything but chaste, and the pictures were in keeping with the contemporary tradition of male art exemplified by Henry Scott Tuke's paintings, Baron Wilhelm von Gloeden's photography, and others.
Jeal also mentions that Baden-Powell "…consistently praised the male body when naked and denigrated the female. At Gilwell Park, the Scouts' camping ground in Epping Forest, he always enjoyed watching the boys swimming naked, and would sometimes chat with them after they had just 'stripped off.'" (Personal communications between Jeal and old Scouts, Jeal, 1989, p.92)
Despite his appreciation for the beauty of boys, Baden-Powell is not known to have acted on his suspected attraction with any of the boys, nor did he tolerate scoutmasters who indulged in sexual escapades with their charges, recommending flogging for such offenses. (Jeal, 1989, p.510) Indeed, he was adamant about the need to restrain the sexual impulse, especially in his communications with boys. He incorporated a graphic prohibition against masturbation in early scouting manuals (so graphic that Cox, his printer, refused to run the presses till the mention was watered down), and into his eighties carried on correspondences with individual Scouts exhorting them to control their urge for "self-abuse." He subscribed to the commonly held turn-of-the-century opinion that the practice led to disease, madness and sexual impotence. His views were not shared by all. Dr. F. W. W. Griffin, editor of The Scouter, wrote in 1930 in a book for Rover Scouts that the temptation to masturbate was "a quite natural stage of development" and steered scouts to a text by H. Havelock Ellis that held that "the effort to achieve complete abstinence was a very serious error." (Jeal, 1989, pp. 93–94)
However most of the argument comes from Baden-Powell's admiration of the male body. From the physical view he regarded the body as the best example of the beauty of nature, and with that of God, the creator. In much of his other writing he stressed the important of being healthy and strong. As an example he told about some Swazi chiefs with whom he met some gymnastic instructors. The chiefs were not fully satisfied until they had had the men stripped and had examined themselves their muscular development.
[edit] On his relationships with women
Baden-Powell often expressed disfavor towards female bodies, generally in contrast to his appreciation for male ones, which he admired and found "clean". At age fifty-five, he married twenty-three-year-old Olave St Clair Soames.
Their relationship held hints of masculine attraction as well, as she altered her appearance to suit him. She flattened her breasts[citation needed], cut her hair, and wore her scout-like Guide uniform. However, as Olave was the World Chief Guide, wearing her uniform to Guiding functions would have been appropriate.
Olave and Robert Baden-Powell had three children.
Baden-Powell was also engaged at one point to Juliette Low, but they broke it off.[citation needed]
[edit] Footnotes
- ↑ Jeal, Tim (1989). Baden-Powell. Hutchinson, pp. 74–109.
- Rosenthal, Michael. The character factory: Baden-Powell and the origins of the Boy Scout movement.
