An aerial view of the Jamboree camp at Ermelunden, outside Copenhagen. From: Boy Scouts of America, The National and World Jamborees in Pictures, 1937

Bill Hillcourt writes about the Second World Jamboree outside Copenhagen, Denmark:

"The Jamboree camp, organized by the Danish Scout leaders, met with Baden-Powell’s highest approval. It was pitched on a grassy plain surrounded by ancient beech trees in Ermelunden, a forest a few miles north of Copenhagen. Unlike the first Jamboree at which Scouts had been quartered in dormitories at Olympia or in military bell tents at Richmond and fed by a catering firm, the Danish leaders had based the second Jamboree in Denmark squarely on B-P’s own kind of scouting, as expounded in Scouting for Boys. The boys, organized in troops and patrols, had brought their own equipment, had pitched their own camp, were cooking their own meals, were taking part in special scoutcraft events. Close to five thousand Scouts from twenty-four nations and a large number of British colonies were living together through sun and rain in a genuine Boy Scout camp, mingling with each other, making friends with each other, using ‘jamboreese’ for communication when they didn’t know each other’s language. The pattern established in Denmark became the pattern for all future world Jamborees.

"On the day of Baden-Powell’s arrival, the whole Jamboree gathered at the Copenhagen stadium for a parade to honour their Chief and for a public exhibition of the world’s scoutcraft activities. In spite of a drenching downpour, an enthusiastic crowd of Copenhageners filled every seat of the vast open-air structure and remained faithfully until the last country had put on its part of the display. The Scouts, soaked to the skin, marched back to camp through the streets of Copenhagen, singing in the rain.

"The weather was no better on the closing day when Denmark’s King Christian X and Queen Alexandrine, accompanied by B-P and Olave, reviewed all the Scouts at a Royal parade. ‘I have seen great numbers of Scouts in my life,’ B-P said in his speech, ‘but I have never seen any as wet as you!’

"For three days after the Jamboree, Scout leaders from thirty-four nations met in the Council Chambers of Copenhagen’s Town Hall to share their experiences, discuss their problems, deliberate the future of scouting. To two official observers from the League of Nations it was an astonishing performance. No speaker, no voter on final resolutions spoke on behalf of his own country but on behalf of the good of the world Scout movement as a whole as he saw it. Baden-Powell had expected to see ‘Scout Spirit’ at work at the conference but the reality gave even more hope for the future than he had thought possible."

From: Bill Hillcourt with Olave, Lady Baden-Powell, Baden-Powell-Two Lives of a Hero, Boy Scouts of America, 1964

		Baden-Powell Photo Gallery 2nd World Jamboree,1924
		The 2nd World Jamboree, 1924

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