....................
I tried to focus my sleepy eyes. “PIP!” I screamed and seized the dog who began licking my face again. “PIP! You’re safe! Where have you been? Where did you get to?! I’ve been looking for you for… for… well I don’t know for how long!”
Pip barked excitedly and then licked my face again. I laughed and hugged him close, and we were both so happy that neither of us heard the person approaching. Suddenly someone grabbed my shoulder in a strong grip and spun me round.
I gasped and stared up into the face of… Master Pepys. His eyes bulged and his wig slipped to one side as he glared at me. I just knew I’d been sacked!
Terrified I immediately began to gabble explanations and excuses: “I’m sorry… I didn’t mean to run away… I was looking for Pip… I was afraid he’d die in the fire…”
Master Pepys said nothing but suddenly gathered us both in a huge hug. “Thank God, thank God, my two best boys are safe!” he said and laughed aloud.
I was amazed; I thought we were going to be beaten, and yet here he was laughing and behaving as though he really cared what happened to us. Not only that, but I had no idea he even knew Pip existed. The little dog spent most of his time in the kitchens and cellars where my master rarely went.
For the next few minutes I tried to explain everything that had been happening. I had to pick up Master Pepys’ wig from the dusty ground twice and replace it on his head, while he continued to smile at us, like – as he said himself – “A man who’d lost a crust of bread and found a roast chicken instead.”
But then at last he seemed to remember he should be angry with us and, after a few tries, he managed to make his face look stern and told us that we’d both get a beating later for running away. Pip obviously didn’t believe him and yapped until Master Pepys finally picked him up and had his face washed too.
“Come now, into the house both of you to get clean and fed and ready for the new day ahead,” he said, leading the way to the locked front doors.
“But is there any food left in the house? Hasn’t everything been taken to safety?” I asked, suddenly realizing how very hungry I was.
“You’re right, Tom. There’s not a crumb to be found anywhere inside. But fortunately I brought a basket of goodies with me in case I got peckish during my visit to check on things.”
CHAPTER 8
The fire died at last, though it died slowly, and throughout Thursday reports came in that it had been stopped at several points. I didn’t know it at the time of course, but its defeat began on Wednesday while I was still searching for Pip. High brick walls at Middle Temple and also at Fetter Lane had stopped it moving north and firebreaks at Cripplegate, Smithfield and Holborn Bridge prevented it from destroying any more homes and lives.
It’s been claimed by the government that only six people died, but nobody believes that. Some say that the authorities have only bothered to count those they think important – in other words, the rich, the aristocracy and those with power. But I remember the screams and cries as I walked through the burning streets, and I believe many more died in the flames. When the Great Plague killed thousands of people, their bodies were left as evidence. But the fire burnt its victims to ash and unrecognizable charred cinders that could be ignored and shovelled away with the other debris as the clear-up began.
That morning I stood on my bed and looked out of the window in the roof of the attic bedroom I shared with Pip. I held the little dog in my arms so that we could both see the still-smoking ruins that spread far to the east towards Holborn Hill and south to the Thames in the early morning light.
“Look, Pip, it’s stopped. We’re safe and we still have a place in Master Pepys’ home. We’re lucky, though there are thousands that’ll be sleeping under the skies tonight and for many more nights to come.”
Pip yapped as though he understood, but then he wriggled to be put down and we both headed for the stairs to start our day.
After breakfast Master Pepys decided he wanted to see the ruins “at first hand”. We set out to walk towards the blackened and broken walls of Saint Paul’s Cathedral that towered in the distance over the debris of what had once been a large part of the city. I’d been told that eighty-four churches had been destroyed as well as more than 13,000 houses. But those numbers gave no real idea about the people whose lives had been ruined. Many had lost their businesses – the only way they had of making a living and feeding themselves and their families. Someone in the government had calculated that more than 100,000 were now homeless, with very little hope of getting anywhere else to live.
This made me think of Mother Bellows, the old Puritan lady I’d helped, but at least I thought she’d be safe with her family, unlike some who might have nobody to help them.
In the end all I could do was accept that I could do nothing to help; I was just a twelve-year-old boy who had the good fortune to work for a kind master in a good household and I quietly breathed a sigh of relief. In fact, I was soon back into the routine of being a pageboy and, as Master Pepys and I made our way towards the ruins of the burnt streets, I walked two paces behind him, carrying his finely embroidered gloves.
Everything was deadly quiet where once there’d been the hustle and bustle of a busy city. But even so there were many people about, picking their way through the ruined houses. I thought that perhaps they were looking for where their homes had once stood, but many of them just seemed dazed and wandered about aimlessly.
We walked on for what seemed like hours and, even though the fire was now definitely out, the ruins still smoked and gave off heat and sparks in great billowing clouds.
There were rumours that the fire had been started deliberately by the country’s enemies, but my master didn’t believe it:
“Accident, Tom, pure accident,” he said, when I asked him. “It’s said that a bakery in Pudding Lane didn’t put out its ovens properly and that a spark escaped and set fire to rubbish and from there it spread.” He fell silent for a moment before adding. “There’s a lesson to be learnt from that, my boy… from a tiny spark of mischief can come the greatest of tragedies.”
I nodded, but said nothing as we arrived before the huge broken remains of Saint Paul’s Cathedral. Some of its walls still stood, but they were blackened and there were great holes where the stones had exploded in the heat. It was also completely roofless and the great central tower had fallen in, leaving nothing but a smoking shell.
“Even the houses of God have been destroyed,” I said quietly.
Master Pepys laid his hand on my shoulder. “But they will rise again, my lad. They will rise again. Already the king is calling for plans that will allow a great re-building of all that has been lost. But this time it will be better. It will be built of stone and of brick so that no fire will ever again burn our city…”
....................
That night as I lay in my bed, I told Pip what Master Pepys had said and he yapped as though agreeing with every word. We went to sleep, safe in the knowledge that our city would never burn again.
HISTORICAL NOTE
The Great Fire of London started at one o’clock in the morning on Sunday 2nd September 1666 in a baker’s shop that stood on a street called Pudding Lane. By seven o’clock the same morning, Samuel Pepys was woken by his maid to be told that over three hundred houses had already been burnt down.
Pepys decided that the king must be told about the situation and at ten o’clock he travelled to the Palace of Whitehall. He told Charles II about the terrible fire and recommended that houses should be pulled down to stop it spreading further. The king agreed and sent Pepys to tell the Lord Mayor, Thomas Bloodworth, to demolish all buildings in the path of the flames.
By one o’clock in the morning of Monday 3rd September, the fire had spread and the post office on Cloak Lane was destroyed. The postmaster and his family had to run for their lives, taking as much post with them as they could carry. The king’s brother, the Duke of York, was put in charge of
the efforts to stop the fire and he called in the army to help in the fight against the flames.
But many other people helped too; the headmaster of Westminster School led his schoolboys in a successful battle to save the church of Saint Dunstan-in-the-East. Even so, the fire continued to spread and by nine o’clock a huge area of the city has been destroyed and the flames were less than 300 metres away from the Tower of London. The king then ordered as many fire-engines as could be spared to save it.
By this time hundreds of houses, dozens of churches and even Baynard’s Castle had been destroyed by the flames. Then on 4th September the area of Cheapside – one of the richest streets in the entire city – caught fire. The king’s mother, Henrietta Maria, was forced to leave her home and seek safety in the palace of Hampton Court.
More and more houses, churches and official buildings were burnt to the ground, and then at eight o’clock in the evening, the huge Saint Paul’s Cathedral caught fire and was destroyed.
Early the next morning on September 5th, Samuel Pepys fled from his house in Seething Lane and went to Woolwich. But then, at last, a fire at Holborn Bridge was successfully put out and by seven o’clock that evening all fires in the west of the city were extinguished, apart from one in an area called Cripplegate.
The next day at five o’clock in the morning, Pepys led a group of sailors to fight a blaze in Bishops Gate. This was the last outbreak of the fire and by the next day, September 7th 1666, the Great Fire of London was finally out.
Now began the process of clearing away the debris of all the destroyed buildings, and on September 11th the architect Sir Christopher Wren presented plans to the king for the rebuilding of the city. His crowning achievement would be the new Saint Paul’s Cathedral, which would rise again from the ashes.
By November 20th the streets of London were cleared of all debris and the rebuilding could begin. Even so, many people had lost their homes and their businesses and it would be years before the re-building was completed. How long the process would take can be seen in the fact that the new Saint Paul’s Cathedral wasn’t re-opened for worship until 2nd December 1697, thirty-two years and three months after the Great Fire that had destroyed the earlier building.
But the greatest cost could have been the people who died in the flames. Official figures claimed that only six people were killed in the fire, but some historians believe that the numbers of fatalities must have been far higher. Reports at the time simply didn’t record the deaths of ordinary working class people.
In addition to this, some figures have claimed that as many as 100,000 people were left homeless as thousands of houses were destroyed. Alhough temporary shelters were built, they were of poor quality and it’s believed that large numbers of people would have died of the cold in the harsh winter that followed the fire.
Many shops and other businesses were also destroyed by the flames, which meant countless people lost their jobs and their ability to earn money. This led to extreme poverty at a time when there were very few organised ways to help them.
While this book is based on real characters and actual historical events, some situations and people are fictional, created by the author.
Scholastic Children’s Books,
Euston House, 24 Eversholt Street,
London NW1 1DB, UK
A division of Scholastic Ltd
London ~ New York ~ Toronto ~ Sydney ~ Auckland
Mexico City ~ New Delhi ~ Hong Kong
First published in the UK by Scholastic Ltd, 2016
This electronic edition published 2016
Text © Stuart Hill, 2016
Cover image © Mike Love, 2016
All rights reserved
eISBN 978 1407 17814 1
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this publication may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage or retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic, mechanical or otherwise, now known or hereafter invented, without the express prior written permission of Limited.
The right of Stuart Hill to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.
www.scholastic.co.uk
Stuart Hill, Fire! Fire!
Thank you for reading books on BookFrom.Net Share this book with friends