Elephant Wash
The wonderful picture of elephants outside Woolworths in Nuneaton (on the home page of ‘Our Warwickshire’) reminds me of the connection between Leamington and elephants. Did you know that there was an elephant wash in Leamington? (Yes, I thought it was a leg-pull too when I first heard it!) The first elephant trainer in England was Sam Lockhart, born to a circus family in Leamington in 1850. Sam brought three elephants back from Ceylon and taught them tricks. His circus was a grand building by the River Leam (where the Loft Theatre is now). The elephants were taken down to bathe in the river beside the main Post Office. However their trumpeting disturbed worshippers in the parish church nearby so it was decided to move the animal wash further away. A plan for this appears in an application to the Quarter Session minutes of 1882 (see the photo); this featured as ‘document of the month’ at Warwickshire County Record Office recently.
Want to know more?
The ramp down into the river can still be seen next to the Mill Road foot bridge, with a plaque explaining its function (see photos). If you want to know more there’s a nice little book called ‘Elephants in Royal Leamington Spa’ by Janet Storrie that you can buy at Leamington Library. It’s a children’s book, but interesting for adults to read too.
Comments
Way further back in time, up to around 500,000 years ago, extinct straight-tusked elephants lived as wild animals around what is now Royal Leamington Spa. Remains of these animals (mainly teeth and fragments of tusk and limb bone) have been encountered as fossils in the local sand and gravel pits.
Like you I did think that it was leg pull, but I know now they were winter housed in Leamington. There are three sculpted elephants in Jephson Gardens in front of the tropical glasshouses.
An order for the re-siting of the Public Waterway or Footway was made on the 14th Nov. 1882 by two of the Justices of the Peace John Machen and Henry Hunt Esquires, acting for the Urban Sanitary Authority. The above map can be found in the Quarter Session Minute book QS39/26 1882 on pages 30 & 31.
There is a good article on Sam Lockhart on the Leamington History Group website.
My grandparents, Theo and Queen Doye , rented 1 Warwick New Road during the War. It was know as “The Levens” at the time. My late mother remembered the elephants having been there. Members of the Czech Army stayed there as well as members of the Air Ministry.
.This story is a miss mash of the story of genuine elephant keeper Sam Lockhart born 1851 who lived in Leamington from about 1875 and toured his elephants around the world and performed them occasionally in Leamington. There is no evidence that the elephants were kept in Leamington or that they swam in the Leam etc. No reports in contemporary local newspapers, parish records and no photographs.
In the light of Barrie’s comments I consulted the 1882 Quarter Session minutes approving the re-sited walkway (QS39/26 p. 31). It is described as ‘for the purpose of watering horses and cattle’ but sadly no mention of elephants! It would be interesting to discover the source/s of this widespread urban myth.
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