Person    | Female  Born 22/2/1889  Died 25/6/1977

Olave Baden-Powell

Categories: Children, Community / Clubs

Countries: Kenya

Born Olave Soames in Derbyshire. 1912 met Robert Baden-Powell on a trans-Atlantic ocean liner. They discovered that they shared a birthday, even if they were 32 years apart. This didn’t stop them marrying only 10 months later. 1919 -1938 lived in Hampshire in a house called Pax Hill. They had 3 children and also brought up Olave’s 3 nieces when their mother died early.

Olave helped her husband in the usual ways at the time (typing, driving) but did not actually originate the Girl Guides. This was set up by Robert and his sister Agnes. In 1915 Olave began by organising Guiding in Sussex and her success there led to her becoming Chief Guide in 1918. She led the Guides for the next 40 years.

From October 1938 until Robert's death in January 1941 the Baden-Powells lived in Kenya. When she returned, in 1942, her Pax Hill home was being used by the Canadian military so she moved into a 'grace and favour' apartment in Hampton Court (1943-76). Died in a care home in Surrey.

This section lists the memorials where the subject on this page is commemorated:
Olave Baden-Powell

Commemorated ati

Pax House

This plaque was unveiled in the centenary year of Olave's birth.

Read More

Other Subjects

Albert Edward Dack

Albert Edward Dack

Albert Edward Dack is the boy lying on his side on the front right in the photograph of the scout troop. Albert Edward Dack was born on 1 August 1899 in Walworth, the fourth of the ten children of...

Person, Children, Community / Clubs, Tragedy

2 memorials
Moses Jethro James

Moses Jethro James

Drowned in the 1898 HMS Albion disaster, aged 14. Buried in grave 2 at the memorial in East London Cemetery.

Person, Children, Tragedy

1 memorial
Peggy Jones

Peggy Jones

One of the 11 "children of England" present on 7th July 1933 when The Princess Royal laid a foundation stone for a nurses home for the Great Ormond Street Children's Hospital.

Person, Children

1 memorial
Idris Alfred Newnham

Idris Alfred Newnham

From Ian Wallis's JustGiving page: "It was Idris Newnham, a boy about my age and a family friend, who had a particular type of muscular dystrophy (Duchenne), which is a genetic disorder that causes...

Person, Children

1 memorial
Benjamin Waugh

Benjamin Waugh

Social reformer and minister. Born in Settle, Yorkshire. Whilst working in the slums of Greenwich, he became appalled at the deprivations and cruelties suffered by children. He wrote 'The Gaol Crad...

Person, Children, Religion, Social Welfare

4 memorials