The Great Fire of London
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Transcript The Great Fire of London
The Great Fire of London
September 1st
1666
The fire begins
Thomas Farynor was a baker who lived in
Pudding Lane in London.
On Saturday September 1st he thought he
had put out all his oven fires and went to
bed.
BUT….. One of his ovens was still alight!
Soon the whole
house was on fire!
Farynor and his
family climbed out of
a window and
crawled across the
roof to safety.
But… the wind blew
the fire into the
stables of the Star
Inn nearby.
The fire was
spreading rapidly.
Samuel Pepys
Samuel Pepys got
up that night to see
what was happening
but then he went
back to bed again.
Fires were very
common in London
at that time.
BUT… this was no
ordinary fire!
Samuel Pepys’s Diary
Samuel Pepys wrote a diary in a sort of code that
is called shorthand.
Here is what he wrote about that night.
“September 2nd. Jane called us up about 3 o’clock
in the morning, to tell us of a great fire they saw in
the city.”
Samuel Pepys
buried all his most
valuable things in
his garden.
He buried his best
wines, important
papers about his
work in the Navy,
and, of course,
his diary.
The fire spreads
The fire spread from
house to house and
then along London
Bridge and the bank
of the River Thames.
Most of the houses
were timber framed
and had thatched
roofs.
They were built very
close together.
The fire spread easily
, blowing down the
narrow streets.
By Sunday the fire
was still spreading.
The whole of London
was in danger.
Many Londoners had
to escape.
They loaded their
belongings into carts
or boats and left their
houses to burn.
Fighting the fire
Watchmen and
constables tried to
put out the fire.
They used buckets
and syringes filled
with water from the
river, public wells
and fountains.
BUT… the summer
of 1666 had been
very hot and most of
the fountains were
Syringes like this
were used to fight
the Great Fire of
London.
The end of the fire
The Lord Mayor of
London did not
know how to stop
the fire.
Samuel Pepys went
to see King Charles
II to ask him for
help.
He sent soldiers to
to help the
firefighters.
The soldiers pulled
houses down with
iron hooks.
They even used
gunpowder to blow
up houses in the
path of the fire.
BUT…
the fire continued to
spread.
Finally the, on
Wednesday September
5th, the wind changed
direction and the fire
stopped spreading.
BUT…
most of London had
been destroyed.
13,000 houses and 86
churches has been
burnt down.
Even St Paul’s
Cathedral had gone.
A New London
Great architects like Sir
Christopher Wren
helped plan the new
city.
Most new buildings
were built of brick or
stone.
They wanted to build
the streets wider to
stop any new fires
The
BUT…
this would have cost a
lot of money.
Only a few new wide
streets were built.
Most new buildings
were built where the
old ones stood.
A monument was built
to commemorate the
fire.
Monument