French Boy Scout Uniform Garments: Berets

Figure 1.--Scouts around the world wear many different kinds of caps. Berets like those worn by these French Scouts are some of the most common. Note how one boy carries his beret securely in the epilete of his shirt.

The traditional Boy Scout hat was the lemon-squeezer hat designed by Lord Baden Powell. Scouts wore these hats for decades. Gradually different types of caps were introduced in various countries.

One of the most popular alternatives to the traditional Scout hat was the beret. French Scouts wore berets from an early stage of the development of the Boy Scout movement. The beret was enitially seen as a French garment, which the English and most other countries would have nothing to do with. This changed after World war II and the beret, which is still worn by French Scouts, has become the most common headgear worn by Scouts around the world.

Figure 2.--Scouts are the only French boys which currently wear berets. They tend to wear them differently than boys in the 1930s and 40s.

Style

French Boy Scots initially wore the beret much as school boys did, either pulled down or as a pancake. After World War II, however, as Scouts in other began wearing berets, they tended to wear it at an angle with "attitude," adopting a military style.

French boys no longer wear their berets pulled down as they were once worn in France. Neither have they adopted the military look popular in some other countries. French Scouts tend to wear their berets at a slight angle often flopping over to one side.

Scouts wear badges in their berets. I don;t know a lot about these badges yet, presumably they are the badges of the individual Scout associations.

Color

Figure 3.--French Scouts in the 1990s continue to wear berets. Note the long shorts the boys now wear.

Conventions

Mostly Scouts to my knowledge adopted the beret. I know only a few Cub groups that have worn berets and these are almost all French Cubs. The situation in France is rather complicated as there are so many different Scout associatiions. Some French Cubs have worn the traditiinal English peaked caps, but some have also worn berets.

Uniform standards and French boys', like boys in many European countries, interest in wearing a uniform has declined in recent years. Many Scouts do, however, continue wearing berets.

Figure 4.--Note the badges these boys wear on their berets. As is traditinal in France, it is the black beret that is still worn.