My Adventures as a Spy

By: Robert Baden-Powell, Michael Bartlett

Narrated by: Michael Cochrane

Length: 1 hr and 19 mins

Publisher's Summary

Robert Baden-Powell's memories of some of his espionage operations between the 1880s and the outbreak of the First World War. AUTHOR: Robert Baden-Powell was born in 1857 and is probably best remembered as the hero of the siege of Mafeking in 1899/1900 during the Boer War and as the man who started the Scout and Guide Movements. He wrote many books over the course of his life, some of which he illustrated himself. This book was first published in February 1915, seven months after the outbreak of the First World War, and is a collection of anecdotes and memories about the work of spies, based on his own experiences in Africa, Europe and Asia.

ABRIDGER: Michael Bartlett is a writer with much radio, television and stage plays to his credit, though perhaps he is best known for writing “The Archers” for Radio 4 and “Rainbow” for Thames Television. He is also a producer and has directed plays, readings and documentaries for the BBC, for commercial radio and for audio publication. READER: Michael Cochrane has appeared in many plays in the theatre, on television and on radio as well as in a number of films. He has also read many audio books, including the Gold Award winning “Lord Edgware Dies”. His recent television appearances include “General Simmerson in “Sharpe’s Challenge” and Judge Hynes in “Wire in the Blood”. He also plays Oliver Sterling in “The Archers” on Radio 4. MUSIC: The piano music, Baden-Powell Schottische, is played by Alexandra White.

©1915 The Scout Association (P)2006 Crimson Cats Audio Books

Critic Reviews

"Frederick the Great said 'when Marshall Soubise goes to war he is followed by 100 cooks but when I take the field I am preceded by 100 spies.' Were any of them, though, as good at playing the Great Game as the legendary founder of the Boy Scouts on whose collection of autobiographical stories first published in 1915, this charming and hilarious piece is based? Too bad we can't see his maps of enemy positions cunningly concealed in drawings of butterfly wings. Do modern boy scouts learn how to do that?" (Sue Arnold, The Guardian)