Diamond Jubliee Beacons

Over 4200 Beacons were lit across the United Kingdom, Channel Islands, Isle of Man, Commonwealth and Overseas UK Territories in celebration of The Queen's Diamond Jubilee on Monday 4th June. As the Queen is the patron of the Scouts we registered early on The Queen's Diamond Jubilee Beacons Website, in fact we were the 75th to book to be part of this historic event.

Gillingham Scouts Beacon lit at Buckmore park

8th Sheppey Scout Group lights a Queen’s Diamond Jubilee Beacon on Sheerness seafront, at the end of Sheerness Jetty.

We looked for a suitable site for a Beacon in Sheerness and the Jetty on the seafront looked the best. After some negotiating with Swale Council we gained permission to use Sheerness Jetty for the night.

Next we had to design and build a Beacon, this was made from an old steel beer barrel and a scaffold pole, with a lot of cutting, grinding and some welding we had a wood fuelled Fire Basket Beacon. The local community were invited to the event as were the whole of 8th Sheppey Scout Group.

We started to erect the Beacon and install the public barriers at 20:45 ready to light the Beacon at our allotted time of 22:10; this made us the first Beacon on Sheppey to light and the only Scout Group in Swale to be part of the event.

Any member of 8th Sheppey who attended was given a Jubilee medallion engraved to commemorate the event. The weather was kind to us and the event was a great success, it was well attended by the group and the public.

The Sheppey Scouts District Commissioner Melvin Wilson who came to see us light the beacon said “The Beacon had been a great success”

Robert Fountain the Group Scout Leader of 8th said “I would like to say a special thanks to Chris Berrill the group quartermaster who helped me design and build the Beacon”

Westerham Scouts lit this massive beacon as part of the Queen’s Jubilee celebrations.