A 1666 inferno destroyed 87 churches and 13,200 houses—what saved it?

The Spark That Became a Furnace

September 2, 1666 began unremarkably in Thomas Farriner's bakehouse on Pudding Lane near London Bridge. Farriner, the king's baker, banked his oven coals around midnight and went to bed—but by 1 a.m. sparks had ignited flour dust and wooden beams. His family escaped by climbing through an upstairs window onto a neighbor's roof; his maid, too frightened to follow, became the fire's first recorded victim.

London in 1666 was a tinderbox: timber houses leaned so close across alleys that neighbors could shake hands from opposite windows, and a summer drought had left wooden shingles dry as kindling. The city's official response was dismissive—Lord Mayor Thomas Bloodworth was roused at 3 a.m., saw the blaze, and declared a woman could "piss it out." He returned to bed. By dawn, 300 houses had already burned.

Hell on the Thames

By September 3rd, the fire had reached the Thames wharves where warehouses stored oil, tallow, coal, timber, and spirits—fuel that sent flames leaping across the river itself. Samuel Pepys, the famous diarist, watched pigeons hovering until their wings caught fire. He buried his Parmesan cheese and wine in his garden, then fled by boat. King Charles II personally joined firefighting efforts, passing buckets and offering guineas to exhausted workers.

The firestorm created its own weather system. Superheated air rose so violently it generated winds that sucked in fresh oxygen, accelerating the burn. Molten lead from St. Paul's Cathedral roof ran in rivers down Ludgate Hill. The cathedral's stones exploded from the heat—witnesses reported hearing them burst "like grenades." Contemporary accounts describe a roaring so loud that people couldn't hear each other shout, and ash falling like black snow as far as Windsor Castle, twenty miles away.

Desperate Measures and Accusations

Firebreaks became the primary defense strategy, but London's medieval property laws complicated efforts. Homeowners had to give permission for demolition, and many refused, hoping their houses might be spared. On September 4th, Charles II ordered the use of gunpowder to create wider gaps, authorizing the Royal Navy to blast entire rows of buildings. The explosions shook the ground but proved largely ineffective—the fire simply leaped the cleared spaces.

Panic bred paranoia. Mobs attacked foreigners, convinced Catholic agents or Dutch spies had started the blaze—England was at war with both France and the Netherlands. A French watchmaker named Robert Hubert falsely confessed and was hanged at Tyburn despite arriving in London two days after the fire began. The Monument, Christopher Wren's 202-foot column erected in 1677 near Pudding Lane, originally bore a Latin inscription blaming Catholics. Parliament removed it in 1830.

When the Wind Finally Dropped

For three days, strong easterly winds had driven the flames westward through the City, each gust spreading embers ahead of the main blaze to ignite new fires. Fire hooks, leather buckets, and even gunpowder demolitions proved useless against the relentless advance. Survivors despaired as ancient landmarks—the Royal Exchange, the Guildhall, Baynard's Castle—vanished into ash. Then, on the evening of September 5th, the wind suddenly ceased.

Without the wind's driving force, the fire lost its terrible momentum. Firefighters finally gained ground using their rudimentary tools. By September 6th, the Great Fire was contained, though smoldering ruins would burn for months. The final toll: 87 parish churches destroyed, 13,200 houses gone, and approximately 100,000 people—four-fifths of London's population—left homeless. Miraculously, official records list only six deaths, though the true number, particularly among the poor, was certainly far higher. The wind's dying breath saved what remained of one of Europe's greatest cities.