GIRL GUIDES South Africa - 1st Bergvliet Brownie Pack

23/08/2026

21/08/2026

During the First World War, British intelligence entrusted sensitive messages to teenage girls because the Boy Scouts had proved too noisy and unreliable.

When war broke out in 1914, the organization that would become MI5 needed messengers inside its offices. Boy Scouts seemed like the obvious choice. They were already being used across Britain for wartime duties, guarding railway bridges, assisting with communications and even working as temporary messengers for the Home Office.

Inside the Security Service, however, the experiment did not go particularly well.

According to MI5's own later account, the Boy Scouts proved "feckless and noisy." So intelligence officials replaced them with Girl Guides.

The girls they wanted were remarkably young: between 14 and 16 years old. But the requirements were specific. A Guide had to be of "good standing, quick, cheerful and willing."

These teenagers were now carrying messages through the offices of Britain's counterespionage service while the country was hunting German spies.

There was even a performance system. Patrol leaders awarded the girls marks each day. At the end of the month, the patrol with the highest score received a prize picture, which they were allowed to keep until another patrol beat them the following month.

It sounds almost absurdly innocent beside the work happening around them.

Britain's intelligence officers were intercepting communications, tracking suspected enemy agents and confronting a new kind of wartime espionage. Moving information through that secret bureaucracy were teenage Girl Guides whose reliability had earned them a job originally intended for boys.

More than a century later, MI5 itself still tells the story.

The Boy Scouts were too noisy.

So they called in the girls.

30/07/2026

Girl-led Advocacy is about influencing people to make decisions that will bring about an equal world where all girls can thrive.

Make sure YOU have the platform to add YOUR voice about the governance of our country.

Register this weekend to vote in South Africa's next elections.

Not old enough to vote yet? You can still take the opportunity to start the conversation with your Ranger Crew about your rights as a South African and as a woman. And make a list of ways you can be a good citizen.

Then tick off the clauses in your "Community Service and Advocacy" Adventure badge!

30/07/2026

In the world of AI and our entire lives online, join us to find out how you can Surf Smart!

19/07/2026

27/04/2026

Fully focused on a memory game. Training for Kon-Tiki Cub and Brownie competition.
Cape West GIRL GUIDES SA

09/04/2026

Making our interpretation of Mexican Sombreros
Cape West GIRL GUIDES SA Girl Guides South Africa