Fire

Saturday,
1 September 1666
9pm

The king's baker Thomas Farryner in Pudding Lane prepares for the Sabbath and then goes to bed.

Sunday,
2 September 1666
1–2am

Fire starts in the bakery and soon catches hold. The Farryner family jumps from the roof. Their maid, too afraid to leap, becomes the fire's first victim. 'The fire … continued all this night … conspiring with a fierce eastern wind in a very dry season' John Evelyn.

3am

Fire has consumed Pudding Lane and the Star Inn on Fish Street Hill and gained hold in Thames Street. 'Lord's Day … Jane called us up about 3 in the morning to tell us of a great fire they had seen in the city' Samuel Pepys.

4am

The parish constable and watchmen arrive and contact the lord mayor Sir Thomas Bludworth. He goes back to bed, observing: 'Pish! A woman might piss it out!'

7am

'Jane comes and tells me that she hears that about 300 houses have been burned down tonight by the fire we saw' Samuel Pepys.

8am

'I walked to the Tower … and there I did see the houses at the end of the bridge all on fire … nobody to my sight endeavouring to quench it, but to remove their goods and leave all to the fire' Samuel Pepys.

10am

Pepys goes to Whitehall: 'So I was called for and did tell the King and Duke of York what I saw. And that unless His Majesty did command houses to be pulled down, nothing could stop the fire.'

3pm

Pepys, commanded to tell the lord mayor to demolish buildings as fire breaks, encounters Bludworth in Cannon Street. On receiving the king's message, he cries 'like a fainting woman': 'Lord, what can I do? I am spent, people will not obey me. I have been pulling down houses but the fire overtakes us faster than we can do it.'

6pm

Navy workers propose blowing up buildings to create bigger gaps between them 'but this some tenacious and avaricious men, aldermen, etc. would not permit, because their houses must have been of the first' John Evelyn.

7pm

Londoners begin to abandon hope and prepare to evacuate.

9pm

Pepys goes to an ale house on Bankside and sees 'one entire arch of fire from this to the other side of the bridge and in a bow up the hill, for an arch of above a mile long'. John Evelyn describes the night as 'light as day for 10 miles round about'.

Midnight

The fire has burned along the river front for about half a mile and engulfed an area running from the river close to Queenhithe, through Bush Lane, to the top of St Michael's Lane and Fish Street Hill at Cannon Street, and east to Love Lane.

Monday,
3 September 1666
4am

'About 4 o'clock in the morning, my Lady Babington sent me a cart to carry away all my money and plate and best things to Sir William Rider's of Bethnal Green, which I did, riding myself in my nightgown … And, Lord, to see how the streets and the highways are crowded with people …' Samuel Pepys.

9am

The duke of York is put in charge of fire-fighting operations. Fire posts are set up around the City. French, Dutch and Catholics are locked up for their own protection because of rumours of a 'foreign' plot.

11am

Securing a boat, Pepys returns to move the rest of his furniture downstream and bury wine and Parmesan cheese in his garden.

2pm

The fire crosses Cornhill and the Royal Exchange is destroyed: '[The fire] burned both in breadth and length the churches, public halls, Exchange, hospitals, monuments and ornaments, leaping after a prodigious manner, from house to house and street to street' John Evelyn.

3pm

Lombard Street, the financial heart of the City, is destroyed.

5pm

'All the sky was of a fiery aspect, like the top of a burning oven, and the light seen above 40 miles round about ... Above 10,000 houses all in one flame, the noise and cracking and thunder of the impetuous flames, the shrieking of women and children … London was, but is no more!' John Evelyn.

6pm

Lady Hobart writes to her husband: 'I am all most out of my wits, we have packed up all our goods & cannot get a cart for money, they give 5 & 10 pound for carts … I fear I shall lose all I have and must run away. O pray for us now …'

7pm

The fire, travelling slowly east, reaches Billingsgate.

9pm

The fire destroys Castle Baynard at Blackfriars.

Midnight

The fire has consumed Gracechurch Street and west part of Fenchurch Street. It has halted at Leadenhall, thanks to an alderman with 'a hatful of money' who bought enough labour to stop it.

Tuesday,
4 September 1666
8am

The fire is at its most furious – 10 times larger than on Sunday night.

Noon

The fire from Cornhill meets others from east and south and bursts into Cheapside, the City's market, 'with such a dazzling light and burning heat and roaring noise by the fall of so many houses together that was very amazing' Thomas Vincent. The Thames can be seen – beyond smoking ruins – for the first time since the Romans.

2pm

Attempts are made to halt the fire at the river Fleet by pulling down houses on either side, but flames bridge the gap and consume Bridewell, the City's corn store and St Bride's Church. Sion College burns down.

3pm

Pepys organises naval dockyard workers to save the Navy Office, near the Tower, by blowing up surrounding buildings. The Tower – containing a gunpowder magazine – is saved in the same way.

4pm

Efforts are concentrated on saving Whitehall by creating a firebreak at Somerset House.

6pm

The fire reaches the Temple, but is put out by dusk.

8pm

Flames reach Old St Paul's.

9pm

The Guildhall's roof and interiors have burned. Because of oak construction, they continue to glow like 'a bright shining coal as if it had been a palace of gold or a great building of burnished brass' Thomas Vincent. The City's records remain safe in the crypt.

Wednesday,
5 September 1666
1am

St Paul's is in flames and its lead roof begins to melt: 'The stones of Paul's flew like granados [grenades], the melting lead running down the streets in a stream and the very pavements glowing with fiery redness' John Evelyn. Books stored in St Faith's Chapel by London stationers go up in smoke.

7am

The queen leaves for Hampton Court.

8am

With fire threatening Whitehall – 'Oh, the confusion there was then at that Court!' John Evelyn – orders go out for the use of gunpowder to blow large gaps between buildings.

9am

The east wind drops: 'It now pleased God by abating the wind, and by the industry of the people, when almost all was lost, infusing a new spirit within them, that the fury of [the fire] began sensibly to abate about noon' John Evelyn.

10am

Fire is brought under control at the Temple, Fetter Lane, Holborn Bridge and Smithfield.

Noon

The lord mayor and his men eventually put out the fire threatening Cripplegate – 'where the King himself was seen helping the soldiers' Samuel Pepys.

Thursday,
6 September 1666
2am

An outbreak of fire at the Temple is dealt with by residents, the duke of York and his gunpowder being locked out.

Noon

Except for a few localised blazes, the fire is officially out. It has consumed nearly 400 acres within the City's walls and 63 acres outside them, as well as 87 churches, 44 livery halls, 13,200 houses – at a cost of £10 million. Only five deaths are recorded.

Midnight

'I lay down and slept a good night about midnight … It is a strange thing to see how long this time did look since Sunday, having been always full of variety of actions and little sleep … And I had forgot almost the day of the week' Samuel Pepys.