A simple example using SimpleJdbcTemplate.
The Spring JDBC Template just needs a DataSource. This DataSource automatically initializes an HSQL DB with the schema.sql script.
<bean id="dataSource"
class="org.springbyexample.jdbc.datasource.HsqldbInitializingDriverManagerDataSource">
<property name="sqlScriptProcessor">
<bean class="org.springbyexample.jdbc.core.SqlScriptProcessor"
p:sqlScripts="classpath:/schema.sql" />
</property>
</bean>