Told as a first-person narrative, a young elephant named Shelia describes her life in Belfast zoo and the big change that happened when World War II began.
"At night, enormous machines flew in the air and dropped strange things on the city. Great bangs shook the ground and flashes of orange light burned across the sky. I couldn't see other animals through the smoke. I didn't understand what was happening or where the loud noises were coming from."
Luckily her keeper has a plan. The pair sneak out of the zoo each night and hide back at the keeper's own home. Very young readers will laugh to see Shelia drinking out of the toilet and dusting her skin with flour from an upturned canister. But of course, over the years Shelia keeps growing and eventually she is too big to stay inside. A neighbor reported seeing an elephant on the street and so young Shelia can no longer leave the zoo. Her keeper is not going to let the young elephant suffer and so every evening she went to the zoo and to sit in her enclosure.
This book is based on a true story. During World War II the government in Belfast were worried a bomb would drop on the zoo and all the animals could escape endangering lives. They ordered some of the zoo animals to be killed. Denise Weston Austin was a keeper at the zoo. She rescued Shelia, a baby Asian elephant, and kept her at home during the war. Eventually someone discovered this and so Shelia had to stay at the zoo but during air raids, Denise would rub her ears and stay with her to keep her calm. Shelia survived for twenty-five years after the war. She died in 1966. Denise died in 1997.
If you look closely you can see a tiny elephant beside her grave.
Read more here:
BBC Video (not suitable for young children)
The Secret Elephant is a new book published (Hachette Children's Books) in 2023 and it is available in both a hardcover and paperback edition. See inside this book here.
Here are some books for much older readers that explore the care of animals in a zoo during wartimes.
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