“The fire is out at last; the rain has quenched the last sparks; the embers have ceased to smoke; those walls which have not fallen totter and hang trembling, ready to fall. I see men standing about singly; the tears run down their cheeks; two hundred years ago, if we had anything to cry about, we were not ashamed to cry without restraint; they are dressed in broad-cloth, the ruffles are of lace, they look like reputable citizens. Listen—one draws near another. ‘Neighbour,’ he says, ‘a fortnight ago, before this stroke, whether of God or of Papist, I had a fair shop on this spot.’ ‘And I also, good friend,’ said the other, ‘as you know.’ ‘My shop,’ continued the first, ‘was stocked with silks and satins, kid gloves, lace ruffles and neckties, shirts, and all that a gentleman or gentlewoman can ask for. The stock was worth a thousand pounds. I turned it over six or seven times a year at least. And my profit was four hundred pounds.’ ‘As for me,’ said the other, ‘I was in a smaller way, as you know. Yet such as it was, my fortune was all in it, and out of my takings, I could call two hundred pounds a year my own.’ ‘Now is it all gone,’ said the first. ‘All gone,’ the other repeated, fetching a sigh. ‘And now, neighbour, unless the Company help, I see nothing for it but we must starve.’ ‘Must starve,’ the other repeated. And so they separated, and went divers ways, and whether they starved or whether they received help, and rose from the ashes with new house and newly stocked shop, I know not.”
The Cathedral Church of St Paul as it was before ye fire of London
From a contemporary print.
It is generally believed that the Fire left nothing standing where it had passed. This was not the case. Many of the church towers were left in part. Only the other day in building offices in the City on the site of a church—St. Olave’s, Old Jewry—it was discovered that the lower part of the tower with the stone turret outside belonged to the old church. Many crypts escaped; the walls where they were of brick remained standing in part; in one case a whole court survived the Fire. This case is very curious. On the north-east of Apothecaries’ Hall, with an entrance from Castle Street, was, until a year or two ago, a court called Fleur de Lys Court. At the time of the Fire there stood close beside the court, on the east side, the church and churchyard of St. Anne’s, built after the Dissolution upon part of the old Blackfriars. Remember that the wind was easterly and strong during the Fire. When the roof of St. Anne’s caught fire, therefore, the flames were driven across this court and over it. It would appear that the roof had been injured and part of the upper stories, but not the lower part. The court looked strangely out of keeping with the other buildings. I took my friend Mr. Loftie to see it. He gave it as his opinion at once that the mullions of the windows were of earlier date than the Fire. I afterwards took Mr. J. J. Stevenson, the architect, who made one or two sketches and came to the same conclusion. A few weeks later I found that they were pulling the court down.
The causes of the Fire and the conditions which made its existence possible are thus enumerated by Strype:—
“First, They consider the time of the night when it first began, viz. between one and two of the clock after midnight, when all were in a dead sleep.
Secondly, it was Saturday night when many of the most eminent citizens, merchants, and others were retired into the country and none but servants left to look to their City Houses.
Thirdly, it was in the long vacation, being that particular time of the year when many wealthy citizens and tradesmen are wont to be in the country at Fairs, and getting in of Debts, and making up accounts with their Chapmen.
Fourthly, the closeness of the Building, and narrowness of the street in the places where it began, did much facilitate the progress of the Fire by hindering of the Engines to be brought to play upon the Houses on Fire.
Fifthly, the matter of which the Houses, all thereabouts were, viz. Timber, and those very old.
Sixthly, the dryness of the preceding season: there having been a great drought even to that very day and all the time that the fire continued, which has so dried the Timber, that it was never more pat to take Fire.
Seventhly, the Nature of the Wares and Commodities, stowed and vended in those Parts, were the most combustible of any other sold in the whole City: as Oil, Pitch, Tar, Cordage, Hemp, Flax, Rosin, Wax, Butter, Cheese, Wine, Brandy, sugar, etc.
Eighthly, an easterly wind, which is the driest of all others, had blown for several days together before, and at that time very strongly.
Ninthly, the unexpected failing of the water thereabouts at that time: for the engine at the North end of London Bridge, called the Thames Water Tower, was out of Order, and in a few hours was itself burnt down, so that the water pipes which conveyed the water from thence through the streets were soon empty.
Lastly, an unusual negligence at first, and a confidence of easily quenching it, and of its stopping at several probable places afterwards, turning at length into a confusion, consternation, and despair: people choosing rather by flight to save their goods, than by a vigorous opposition to save their own houses and the whole City.”
This dry reasoning would not satisfy the people. They began to whisper among each other that this was the work of an incendiary and a stranger; a Dutchman, or, more likely, a Roman Catholic. Divers strangers, Dutch and French, were arrested on suspicion of firing the City, but as there was no evidence they were released. What gave some colour to the suspicion was that, in April of that year, certain old officers and soldiers in Cromwell’s army, eight in number, were tried for conspiracy and treason, their design having been to surprise the Tower, to kill the Lieutenant, and then to have declared for an equal division of lands. After taking the Tower their purpose was to set fire to the City. They were all found guilty, condemned, and executed. After the fire there was brought to the Lord Chief Justice a boy of ten, who declared that his father and uncle, Dutchmen both, were the persons who set fire to the house in Pudding Lane with fire-balls. This little villain appears to have been sent off as an impostor.
A View of the Monument of London, in remembrance of the dreadful Fire in 1666. Its height is 202 Feet.