The White Horse

The White Horse is the oldest pub for which we have records and is also the only one still surviving in the village today. Licence records give John Negus as the licensee in 1765, and that surety and guarantor was given by Salmon Linton on payment of an annual sum of £20.  The licence was reviewed annually. Various other landowners were given over the years as guaranters including Isaac Radford, Stephen Linton, William Day, Frances Cole, John Gifford, Daniel Radford, Richard Papworth. All public houses and inns in the area were licenced by a Justice of the Peace under the Longstowe Hundreds Quarter Sessions. Records give the licensee as John Linton (1792), John Miller (1793–1796), and Thomas Prior (1796–1797).

The White Horse was originally located by the crossroads, on the corner of Water Lane and Longstanton Road (then Alehouse Green). However, a newspaper report dated 2 March 1805 in the Cambridge Chronicle indicates that the pub was burnt down:

On Saturday last, about 10 in the forenoon, a fire broke out at the White Horse public house at Oakington in the county, which was entirely destroyed, with a considerable part of the furniture

The 1834 enclosure map shows a public house further down the road, on a site where the Limes house once stood in what was then called Sheeps Green. The pub is not named but was probably the White Horse because there are various reports from the Cambridge Chronicle in 1814, 1818 and 1840 of Auction Sales of Estate and Household effects of deceased previous persons being held there.

From at least 1879 to 1904 the White Horse also served as a butcher’s and the meat hooks are said to still be in the loft.

The White Horse is currently owned by Greene King and the current landlord is Trevor Holmes. You can visit the pub’s website at https://www.whitehorse-oakington.co.uk/