Pocket from a Scout uniform

View this record on the National Museum of Australia's website

Type: Uniforms
Place: Surry Hills, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia
Materials: Textile - non specific
Collection: Barry Williams collection
Accession number: 2002.0059.0007

Description

Left side pocket cut from a Scout's khaki woollen shirt. A red and gold embroidered Tenderfoot badge is sewn over the pleat in the middle of the pocket. It has a sewn-on vertical white cotton tape on both sides of it, which forms the rank badge of a Patrol Leader.

About the collection

The Barry Williams collection comprises 53 items of 1940s scout memorabilia, including awards and items of uniform from the Surry Hills scout troop, Sydney. Awards such as badges, cords, shoulder tabs and dated certificates are a complete material record of the donor's progress from scout to king's scout. The collection contains the full range of awards available to scouts in the 1940s, except for two awards. This collection records a scouting experience that is typically Australian. The 1940s marks a stage of great popularity for the Scouting movement when they were a very visible presence in Australia. The Surry Hills scout troop was disbanded in the 1990s, the demise of the group was probably caused by the changing demographic and social values, of the people living in Surry Hills. This collection is a record of a past urban scouting experience in Australia. It is also evocative of some of the social changes that have taken place in Australia, that have contributed to the decrease in popularity, of the scouting movement.

Read live from the Museum's Collection API (12/11/2026, 6:26:31 am). Record last updated by the Museum 2025-02-23. Licence: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/.