Pub History

Click photos to enlarge - L' Oasis (formerly The Three Crowns) third from left in first photo.

L' Oasis Stepney has had a long and proud history as a public house, dating back to c.1900 when it was built. Formerly known as The Three Crowns, the name changed in 1999 when current landlord John Cleary took over the licence.

 

Boasting many original features, including a listed ornamental ceiling (click photo to enlarge) and highly decorative glazed tiles (click photos to enlarge) , this spacious pub (and now also dining room) retains a sense of history sadly disappeared elsewhere in the East End.

 

 

STEPNEY

The Domesday Book of 1086 describes Stepney as an arable area with meadows, pastures and woodland with a population of 900 which included Hackney. In medieval times the parish of Stepney extended east from the City as far as the River Lea and north from the River Thames as far as Hackney.

At the end of the 16th century there was a period of rapid growth in population with the development of the riverside and eastern suburbs of the City. For civil purposes Stepney had been divided up into four hamlets - Ratcliffe, Limehouse, Poplar and Mile End, but because of the increase in buildings and inhabitants new hamlets were created. Bethnal Green (in 1597), Shadweil (in 1645), Spitalfields (in 1662), St. George in the East (in 1670), Mile End New Town (in 1691) and Bow (in 1719). Whitechapel and Bromley St. Leonard were already separate parishes.

The name Stepney now meant little more than a geographical area around St. Dunstan's church but revived in the 19th century as the name of a registration district. In 1900 the Borough of Stepney was formed and comprised of various civil vestries, parishes and liberties bounded by the City, Bethnal Green and Poplar. This industrial suburb had a population of about 300,000, many living in poverty and overcrowded conditions. The main industries were dock labour and the manufacture of clothing with many employed in warehouses and shops.

During World War Two more than a third of the houses were made uninhabitable and most of the others damaged by bombing, as were the docks, warehouses and business premises. Stepney became part of the London Borough of Tower Hamlets in 1965.

Greenwood's Maps 1827:

For further information on local Stepney history please click on the following link Exploring East London

 

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