What Happened Immediately After London Was Destroyed By The Great Fire Of 1666?

When the Great Fire broke out, many Londoners blamed England's enemies. The English were feuding with the French and the Dutch, stoking fears that their enemies had set fire to the capital as part of a planned invasion of England. The people of London attacked foreigners all over the city. A mob lashed out at a Dutch bakery while the fire still raged, a blacksmith accosted a Frenchman with an iron bar, and the Duke of York had to intervene to save the life of a Swedish diplomat strung up by a group of Londoners.

Londoners feared the French may have carried explosives into the city. In a moment of great fear and resentment, a mob mutilated a French woman who they thought carried bombs in her apron, while another mob almost dismembered a Frenchman carrying tennis balls because they mistook them for explosive devices.

The fire completely burned 80% of the area within London's medieval walls, leaving behind only a few stone ruins and left at least 65,000 people homeless. In the early days after the fire, when the ground in many places was still too hot to walk on, displaced Londoners camped in fields outside the walls. Soon, many traveled to villages outside of the capital or other parts of the city. 

The housing shortage caused rent prices in London to rise exponentially. Within only days, leasing costs rose about 200%, but within two weeks, houses grew 10 times more expensive. Rental and leasing prices remained high through 1668, but even though the city was expensive, many merchants and tradesmen were willing to pay these extraordinary prices.

As London tried to recover from the fire, Robert Hubert tried to flee the country. When authorities stopped Hubert, he confessed to setting the fire. A 26-year-old watchmaker's son, Hubert claimed that he worked for a French gang that wanted to destroy London, but his bizarre story changed during his October trial.

Hubert declared himself a Catholic, even though witnesses claimed he was a Protestant. Evidence emerged that Hubert wasn't even in London during the fire. Although the judge presiding over the trial doubted Hubert's guilt, the man was declared guilty and received the death sentence. Only weeks after the fire stopped burning, Hubert hanged at Tyburn. 

After the Great Fire, a government committee investigated the outbreak. Londoners showed up with testimony that pointed the finger at Catholics. William Tisdale reportedly overheard an "Irish Papist" warn that there would be a "sad Desolation" in London in September 1666. Mr. Light from Ratcliff testified that months before the fire, a Catholic said, "You expect great things in Sixty Six, and think that Rome will be destroyed, but what if it be London?"

Suspicion against Catholics persisted. In 1681, a plaque commemorating the fire read “Here by the permission of Heaven, Hell broke loose upon this Protestant city from the malicious hearts of barbarous Papists."

Coming on the heels of a deadly outbreak of the plague in 1665, Londoners feared the fire represented God's wrath on the city. Some preachers pointed to London's sweet tooth as the cause of the fire. The flames first broke out at a bakery on Pudding Lane and burned the city all the way to Pie Corner. Preachers warned that if London's gluttony didn't end, God would send more fires.

As a reminder, they even erected a statue of a gold boy at Pie Corner, where the fire burned out. Known as the "Fat Boy" in the 17th century, the statue was supposed to remind Londoners to avoid gluttony.

London lacked the necessary procedures and infrastructure to combat such a destructive fire. Before 1666, London's water flowed through wood water pipes, and though it wasn't necessarily inefficient regularly, wooden pipes proved to be detrimental in the case of a large city fire. They were in the entire system for people to access water without stopping the flow, and in the great panic citizens ended up destroying many of the pipes, leaving the city with no water supply. 

The city also created new systems and passed rules to protect the city from future fires. Parishes were required to keep firefighting equipment, a fire brigade was formed, and the 1668 Fire Prevention Regulations ordered, "That plugs be put into the pipes in the most convenient places or every street, whereof all inhabitants may take notice, that breaking of the pipes in disorderly manner maybe avoided."

Along with public systems, new fire insurance policies included a private fire brigade. Policyholders placed a plaque on their house so the brigade would know which homes to protect in case of a fire.