Still familiar to shoppers in Chester's Foregate Street, even though it has long ceased serving beer, is The Royal Oak (no. 44). Above we see it sometime in the 1970s and below as it appears today.

The inn was listed in Cowdroy's Directory in 1789 when the licencee was Mrs Faulkener. The licencee in 1828 was Elizabeth Morris, in 1850-57 Thomas Sudlow, in 1880 (when it appears in a Cheshire directory as no 34) Margaret Holland, in 1902 Henry Cross, in 1910 William Tidswell, in 1914 Peter Lawson, in 1942 Jas. Eugene Kimpton.

On the same site formerly stood an inn by the name of The Sign of the Crow which was first mentioned in documents in 1580 when the landlord was William Cotgrave- who was also a fishmonger.

A carved date, 1607, appeared on the front of the second building and its name had changed to The Royal Oak by 1703. The entire inn was once again rebuilt in 1920 and this date, together with the construction date of the first inn- mysteriously altered to 1601- was inscriped on the facade.

The pub sadly closed down in the 1980s and later became a branch of the electrical retailers Dixon's, and then Curry's, which in turn closed in 2009. In May 2011, it was announced that the grocery chain Waitrose was to establish a convenience store within the old pub, this in addition to its planned full sized store on the site of the Boughton Retail Park not too far away on the banks of the Shropshire Union Canal. Through all these changes, this fine building has happily retained the old pub name and carved oak tree on its frontage.

The Chester historian Frank Simpson wrote in 1926 that at one time there were no less that five public houses adjoining each other on this spot.