The Lion and Serpent Sculpture

This photo was taken in the mid to late 1950s and shows a local resident sitting on the Lion and Serpent sculpture, and her brother standing in front of it. The Woodhouse Moor Methodist church can be seen in the background on the left. It was demolished in the early 1970s. A block of flats called Cumberland Court was built on the site.

The Lion and Serpent sculpture was made by Benjamin Sharp, free of charge. Mr Sharp also worked on the staircase sculptures in Leeds Central Library. It was placed on the Moor in June 1883 very close to the Adam and Eve Garden (now the location of the Victoria Memorial). After the Second World War, it was moved to a more open site between the children’s playground and the clock/water fountain. Students began to paint the sculpture from the 1980s onwards, and in the late 1990s following a hammer attack, it was removed from the park. No one seems to know if it still exists.