About Us/Our History

The 11th Stirlingshire, now the 11th Bridge of Allan, started in the winter of 1909, only 2 years after Baden Powell initiated the movement with its first camp on Brownsea Island in August 1907. By 1914 Stirlingshire had 450 scouts across 16 troops as seen below for a gathering on Bannockburn Day of that year.

Cub Scouts (or Wolf Cubs as then known) began in 1916, although we don’t know exactly when they were started in Bridge of Allan. Soon after in 1920, Rover Scouts for older boys began – they became Venture scouts in 1967 and as of 2003 Explorer Scouts.

Beaver Scouts began in Canada in 1973, but didn’t get going in the UK until 1986.

1924 saw the 44th Stirlingshire start at Hurst Grange School (or Beaconhurst as it is now known) – and, perhaps not co-incidentally, in that year thirteen boys from Bridge of Allan went to the Imperial Jamboree at Wembley joining 10,000 others from the UK and 1000 invited from 25 countries in the Commonwealth. They performed a Highland Dancing exhibition for which they won an award.

Scouting in Bridge of Allan has seen a few periods of abeyance – the two great wars of course resulted in a ramp down of operations, and in 1974 the Scout Troop disbanded leaving only Cubs to run. At some point both Scouts and then Beavers restarted and by 2009 when the Group celebrated its own Centenary, it was flourishing and growing in numbers with Scout, Cub and Beaver Sections and a healthy pool of Explorer Scout Young Leaders.

In 2014 accommodated all the potential eager Beavers on the waiting list.

2021 Sep We were lucky to be selected as one of the first 9 Groups pioneering Squirrels in Scotland. We have 16 Squirrels who attend every week and take part in a large range of activities both within the hall but also out and about as much as possible. It has been a huge success and the Young People have also taken part in all of our Group activities – Lochearnhead Group Camp, Remembrance Parade, Shoe Box Appeal, Barrwood FunDay, as well as Disitrict Beaver and Squirrel activity days -to name a few.

2022 Jan -we started a partnership with Stirling Autism Provision to provide Scouting to members of the provision as part of their school day. This happens every Friday morning during term time and ranges in activities either within the classroom, out in the garden or their Tiny Farm, or trips out for the day such as activity days up at Invertrossachs where they have been frequently seen out on the water or shooting arrows at the soft archery targets. They have also ventured over to Barrwood to experience Caving and Bouldering