Francis Gidney - First Camp Chief of Gilwell

ln 1908 a 16 year old pupil at Lichfield Grammar School had started a Scout troop. His name was Francis Gidney. He went on to Cambridge, graduating in 1914 in which year he volunteered.  In France he was promoted to the rank of Captain, was seriously wounded and invalided out of service before the Armistice" Frank Gidney at once struck Baden-Powell as the perfect 'boy man'., he had a boyish sense of humour and a natural enthusiast. Appointed Camp Chief of Gilwell in May 1919, he immediately displayed a showman's love of circus tricks and entertainments, as well as a fascination with tree climbing and log cabins.
 
Gidney's camp fires' at Gilwell would be enlivened by exhibitions of axe- and knife-throwing, as well as by 'shooting displays in which concealed pins rather than bullets popped strings of balloons. He encouraged amateur dramatics and kept a resident quartet of singing Rovers. 'Gidney brought a touch of controlled lunacy to the place', recalled an early helper. The boys who visited Gilwell adored him, as did many trainee Scouters.

He was so amusing and cheerful that, when offering him the Job, Baden-Powell had never guessed that the war had broken his health, leaving him a slowly dying man. Nor had he been aware of the precariousness of his marriage. Mrs Gidney was a twice-married former actress who had never been accepted by Gidney's family $he cared little for Scouting and could not settle at Gilwell. But ill-health and domestic unhappiness did not stop Gidney devising excellent training courses for Scouters on subjects as diverse as camp gadgets, bridge building, axemanship and camp hygiene. While Gidney played the part of Scouter, the Scouters-in-training became the boys in patrol. The Scouters camped in their patrol and spent the whole of their eight days together. They had to leamt how to train their boys through game. The spectacle of bank managers, shopkeepers and clergyman solemnly building bridges with staves and twine, and then sitting sedately on logs in semi-circles listening to the jovial Frank Gidney explaining how to imitate animal calls, was certainly memorable.
 
Gidney died from the effects of his war wounds at the age of 36, only five years after leave Gilwell. Before that his marriage had foundered. He worked briefly as a master at a preparatory school in Bournemouth before returning to his parents' house to die. On his deathbed he wrote to Baden-Powell - the perfect Scout to the end. 'l have tried to "smile and whistle" through it all' he declared, echoing Baden-Powell's famous exhortation. The Gidney Memorial log Cabin was opened by Baden-Powell at Gilwell on Easter Sunday 1930.