The Oxford antiquary Thomas Hearne dined at "the ale house by the great elm tree" in 1716 and said it was "now near a hundred years old, as they say". In 1725, he recorded the death, at 87, of "old Mr Jackson, head cook of Merton College" who had been born at the inn and whose nephew now ran it.

At inclosure, 1830, the inn and over an acre of ground were held on lease by Mark and James Morrell, the Oxford brewers. The ground became allotments and c1980, a development of 14 houses called Cordrey Green. The great elm lasted until the 1970s, when Dutch Elm Disease finished it off and it had to be replaced by an oak. The present building is in late-Victorian "Tudor" style; it is still Morrell's but the company no longer belongs to the family.