THE local legend of a tunnel running from Boscombe Hippodrome to King’s Park has surfaced again.

Emily Manns, a student at the Arts University Bournemouth, and John Browne, the former chairman of Boscombe Forum, are certain the tunnel existed and was used to transport some of the more dangerous circus animals to the theatre with the least amount of disruption and alarm to the public.

From the beginning of the last century Indian elephants were paraded down the local high street, including Christchurch Road in Boscombe, much to the delight and amusement of residents.

The Bournemouth Echo and the Bournemouth Graphic often published adverts to publicise circuses visiting the Hippodrome such as the Royal Italian Circus with its ‘educated elephants’, horses, ponies, dogs, monkeys and apes, or the Carmo Show boasting various animals, such as elephants, lions, leopards and monkeys.

The most exotic circus to come to the Hippodrome was Chapman’s Continental Zoo Circus.

It claimed to have ‘the greatest collection of wild animals ever seen on a stage’ with Royal Bengal tigers taking part in the ‘Great Cossack Riding Act’, polar bears from the Arctic, a troupe of musical comedy elephants, Liberty horses, Black Himalayan bears, sea lions, a group of forest-bred lions and a boxing kangaroo, as well as snakes and speciality dances and plenty of clowns.

With twice nightly and matinee performances on Wednesday and Saturday, the animals would have had to be stored somewhere safe before each act.

Emily visited the venue, which is now called the O2 Academy Bournemouth.

She was told that what appeared to be the entrance to a tunnel at the theatre is now closed for health and safety reasons and if any tunnels did exist they would have been blocked by the nearby Sovereign Centre development.

  • Please contact Echoes if you know anything about Hippodrome tunnel.