Coaching Inn. It's origin is uncertain, but in the 15th century it was owned by the Poynings family and was known as the Crossed Keys or Crowned Keys. It may have been renamed in honour of Queen Elizabeth I. In the seventeenth century it belonged to the family of John Harvard. The coming of the railways signalled the end of most of the coaching inns in Southwark, and the Queen's Head, although surviving longer than a lot of its neighbours, eventually became a railway depot.
Credit for this entry to: Alan Patient of www.plaquesoflondon.co.uk
