In the Historical MSS. Report IX. there are many deeds and documents in which this street is mentioned. Roman remains have been found here.
In the street stood the College of Physicians built by Wren.
The first house of the College was that of Linacre, physician to Henry VIII., the founder of the College in Knightrider Street: the Physicians then moved to Amen Corner and, after the Fire, to Warwick Lane, where they continued until 1823 when the new College in Pall Mall East was opened by Sir Henry Halford.
There were two famous inns in Warwick Lane, of which one was the Bell.
“Archbishop Leighton used often to say that if he were to choose a place to die in, it should be an Inn; it looking like a pilgrim’s going home, to whom this world was all as an Inn, and who was weary of the noise and confusion in it. He added that the officious tenderness and care of friends was an entanglement to a dying man; and that the unconcerned attendance of those that could be procured in such a place would give less disturbance. And he obtained what he desired; for he died [1684] at the Bell Inn in Warwick Lane.”
THE OXFORD ARMS, WARWICK LANE
The inn has gone, but Old Bell Inn Yard, now a railway booking-office wagon yard, is there to mark the site. On the west side was an equally famous inn, the Oxford Arms.
At the Oxford Arms Inn lived John Roberts, from whose shop issued the majority of the squibs and libels on Pope. The inn was south of Warwick House.
Views of this picturesque old inn have been preserved in the Crace collection.