Song Video
Lyrics
To Bombay
A traveling circus came
They brought an intelligent elephant
And Nellie was her name
One dark night
She slipped her iron chain
And off she ran to Hindustan
And was never seen again.
Ooooooooooooo. .
Nellie the Elephant packed her trunk
And said goodbye to the circus
Off she went with a trumpety-trump
Trump, trump, trump
Nellie the Elephant packed her trunk
And trundled back to the jungle
Off she went with a trumpety-trump
Trump, trump, trump.
Night by night
She danced to the circus band
When Nellie was leading the big parade
She looked so proud and grand
No more tricks
For Nellie to perform
They taught her how to take a bow
And she took the crowd by storm.
The head of the herd was calling
Far, far away
They met one night in the silver light
On the road to Mandalay
So Nellie the Elephant packed her trunk
And said goodbye to the circus
Off she went with a trumpety-trum
Trump, trump, trump.
Ooooooooooooo. .
Nellie the Elephant packed her trunk
And said goodbye to the circus
Off she went with a trumpety-trump
Trump, trump, trump
Nellie the Elephant packed her trunk
And trundled back to the jungle
Off she went with a trumpety-trump
Trump, trump, trump.
Information About Nellie The Elephant
This song was written in 1956 by Ralph Butler and Peter Hart.
They did not know an elephant named 'Nellie'.
Ralph Butler was a famous British songwriter who was born in 1886. He wrote or co-wrote about 14 songs from the 1920's to the mid-1950's. He used his pseudonym, or fake name, Jake Wallis for some of these songs.
The original version of "Nellie the Elephant" was sung by a child actress named Mandy Miller. She went on to star in ten movies but was most famous for her rendition of this song.
A punk rock band called Toy Dolls recorded a cover of this song which would make its way to number four on the singles chart in the United Kingdom in 1984.
Instructors would often use this song to teach CPR (cardiopulmonary resuscitation). The tempo of this song was calculated to be about 105 beats per minute and the recommended beats for CPR is 100 beats per minute. There was even a study conducted on the effectiveness of "Nellie the Elephant" when administering CPR versus other songs and no music at all.