About Us

Now a Free House, the Rainbow & Dove is a rural pub & restaurant. It is mentioned in the Doomesday book as a Farmhouse but was certainly a Pub by 1645 when Cromwell's soldiers stopped here. It was also a stop-over for the Post Coach travelling between Cambridge and London. The name "Rainbow" was inherited from the Pub's first known owners Mr & Mrs Rainbow who were farmers, but the "Dove" was added later on after the Rainbow was turned from a farmhouse into a Public House & there were many references to an Ornamental tree shaped as a dove at the top of the Forecourt... (yes really).

 

Teams of horses were stabled here for changing over the various coach teams that passed by. Over time the farmhouse became the Rainbow Inn and the Post coaches stopped here for the horse changeovers.

 

At some time the hedge was trimmed into the shape of a Dove and the name evolved into the Rainbow and Dove Inn. The first photograph was taken around 1850-1860s(est) - the thatched roof had recently been replaced with a clay tile roof. Notice the lack of trees around the pub and Epping Forest in the distance.

 

Around 1932 the Inn was rather rundown, but picked up again as the pilots and other personnel based at the airfield during world war II choose the Rainbow and Dove as a discrete alternative to the pubs based in North Weald village.

 

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