LONDON’S BURNING What began as a small fire at a bakery spread into a devastating inferno that engulfed the capital
The date was Sunday 2 September 1666, and Samuel Pepys was enjoying a good night’s rest. The previous day he’d been to the theatre, avoided someone he didn’t like and repaired to Islington. He ate, drank and became “mighty merry”, before singing all the way home, writing some letters and falling into bed. Hardly surprising, then, that when his maid called him at three o’clock in the morning to look at a fire across town, he decided it was far enough away not to worry about and went straight back to sleep.
CITY IN FLAMES Old London Bridge, houses and churches blaze as the fire sweeps along the north bank of the Thames