Photograph showing half length portrait of Lord Baden-Powell, in uniform, signed at the bottom 'Robert Baden Powell13.10.01' and inscribed Mafeking 13 Oct.1899 to 17 May 1900'. Robert Stephenson Smyth Baden-Powell, first Baron Baden-Powell of Gilwell, became renowned not only as the founder of the Boy Scouts and Girl Guides, but also as a popular military hero. His army career began in 1876, when he joined the 13th Hussars in India. His duties also took him to Africa and elsewhere, and he made a speciality of reconnaissance and scouting. Baden-Powell retired form the army as a Lieutenant-General in 1910, but meanwhile, in 1907, he had held the first experimental camp for a group of boys, on Brownsea Island. This led to the beginning of the Boy Scout movement, which, as it developed, claimed all his time. King Edward VII had shown a great interest in the new movement and, after the King's death, Baden-Powell was supported in his work for the Boy Scouts by King George V and the Royal Family, as well as by foreign rulers, such as Tsar Nicholas II.