(Photos by FLAG member)
Why does Royal Leamington Spa have so many elephants?
Look closely and you’ll find them everywhere; sculptures in public spaces, references in local businesses, illustrations in cafés, even children climbing across bronze elephant backs in the town centre. It is one of Leamington’s most charming and unexpected visual motifs, and much of it can be traced back to one extraordinary Victorian showman: Sam Lockhart.
Born in 1850 into a circus family, his father described himself on the census as a “Professor of Gymnastics”. Sam Lockhart began his career as an acrobat before becoming one of the most celebrated elephant trainers of his age. His travelling circus toured internationally and, while working in Burma, he acquired the elephants that would make him famous.
Lockhart later settled for a time in Leamington Spa, and local stories still cling to the town. One enduring tale claims that circus elephants were washed in the river near what is now known as Elephant Walk in Priory Terrace. Historians debate the truth of it, but it is easy to imagine: elephants famously adore water, and the riverside setting feels entirely plausible.
Fragments of this elephant history continue to surface. During the redevelopment of the former council offices on Warwick New Road, large bones, believed to be those of an elephant, were reportedly discovered in the grounds, though quicklime had badly damaged them. Nearby street and business names quietly preserve the memory too: Wilhelmina Close on Warwick New Road and the Haddie & Trilby bakery on Dale Street both reference members of Lockhart’s famous troupe.
When Sam Lockhart died, the Leamington Courier described him as a “retired giant of the entertainment industry," a fitting epitaph for a man whose presence still echoes through the town’s visual culture more than a century later.
If you want to read more about him I suggest clicking this link.
The Three Graces, by Philippa Downes, Livery Street, Leamington Spa, Bronze
Philippa says:
"Recently we installed three bronze elephants titled ‘The Three Graces ‘
in Regents Court, Royal Leamington Spa commissioned by New River Retail.
They were sculpted out of polystyrene and plaster , then were taken to
the bronze foundry to be moulded and cast in bronze. The whole process
took around five months from start to finish. They were a great piece to
work on and it’s lovely to see the local children interacting and
playing on the elephants now they are in place" .
She describes herself as " Sculptor, prop maker and effect specialist"
The Three Graces were commissioned by New River Retails for the new Livery Street, and celebrate Sam Lockhart who lived in Leamington Spa for over eighty years and shows the most famous of his troupe, Wilhelmina, Haddie and Trilby.
Elephant Seat by Nicholas Dimbleby (1946-2024) Stone and bronze.
1978 Commissioned by Warwickshire County Council
Above is a round seating area with three elephant sculptures around the circular seat. There is a child on the back of the elephant closest to the camera. It was made in 1978, and was sited in what is now the inside of the Royal Priors Shopping Centre, but at the time it was outside in Whiteshead Court. It was re-sited in the Jephson Gardens in 2015
Dimbleby began his career as an assistant to abstract sculptor William Pye in London. After briefly living in rural France, he returned to the UK and established a studio in Devon, where he settled permanently.He worked on public and private projects, including portraits of sports personalities such as rugby player Jonny Wilkinson and rower Steve Redgrave He also produced private commissions for the British royal family, including a lifecast of Lady Louise Windsor for her parents, Prince Edward and Sophie, Duchess of Edinburgh, and several pieces commissioned by King Charles III when he was Prince of Wales. He also created sculpture of Captain Cook on High Green, Great Ayton. (Wiki)
Placed quietly beside the river, the sculpture feels almost like a continuation of Leamington’s elephant folklore, it's an artwork that keeps the town’s curious circus history alive in bronze and stone.
