The Express.
London, England, 1863-12-22 00:00:00

THE GREAT 'IRS IN THE CITY.

A closer examination yesterday of the track of
the recent fire in Wood-street shows in • striking mairaer
how much it was confined to a class of buildings the interior
arrangements and means of communication of which tippetr
to have been made in defiance or in ignorance of the prima-
plea which now regulate such matters, under the operatics
of the Metropolitan Building Act. The warehouses and
aloes which have perished seem to have bees sop,.
mid from each other by thin lath and plaster pants
tioos for the most part, and only in one instance wee there
an iron door between oce part of the interior of the same
building and another, such as is now commonly used and
made imperative, iudeetl, in the construction of warehouses
ae an invaluable means of shutting off communication in
cases of fire. That iron door, too, which remains uninjured,
would have been completely effectual in arresting the
flames in that direction had they not penetrated by
• vulnerable point into the part of the building which
it protected. The ties of iron for safety against fire
was most conclusively proved by a very remarkable circum-
stance. The large and haodarrne warehouse of Messrs. J.
and B. Morley, Moeda at the corner of Gresham and Wood
streste, overlooked by a large window on the ground floor at
the back the little court in which the fire originated, and
to which it was at first confined. This large window
was protected on the outside by • folding iron
shutter, and that more again-t robbery than fire.
On this occasion, for some time, the flames played fiercely
but harmlessly about the outside of the window so guarded
by the iron shutter. Had they ones entered Mime. Mors
ley 's premises at that point, the stock stored inside, sad
estimated at from 210.0001. to 300.0001., would inevitably
have been destroyed, If, indeed, the devastation would have
ended in that oes vast pile of buildings. Upon such a
cinder condition of safety did property almost fabulous
in value, and belonging to a single firm, depend in this case.
The ruins, consisting for the most part of large muses
of charred timber, show how largely wood rather than
brick had 'peen used in the construction of the booms
' which have perished. The fire. isdeed, has literally
followed in the track of the combustible material, and
oo each side of the gap which it has left iragepbles of brick,
some of them supposed to be 300 years old and which the
flames were powerless to harm, remain staking. It is the
opinion of Mr. Woodthorpe, the district surveyor for the
northern division of London, who visited the spot yesterday,
that but for those formidable old walla the whole man
of warehouses forming the east side of Wood-street sod the
west of Milk-street, right up to Cheapside, and including
with their contents some of the moat valuable in the
city of London, would have bees destroyed. Captain
Shaw, too, the chief of the London Fire Brigade, who
was out for the first time after his recent dangerous
illness, and could not resist the temptation to go and see
the place expressed his amazement that in • neighbour.
hood so &mill packed the conflagration had been confined
to so oomparatively small an area. The truth is that the
promptitude with which the 'testi fire-engines, six or
seven in number, were brought into action, and the resist-
less vigour with which they played on the firs, materially
checked its program from the first, nod that in spite of
difficulties experienced in bodieg access to it only through
a few blind court+ and alleys. The firemen had at immi-
nent risk to conduct their hose over the tops of lofty
pies of houses both is Wood-street arid Milk-street, and
through little by-ways, before the engines (thirteen in n 11)
could be brought to bear on the burning mass. Fortunately,
the trade books of Messrs. Grant, who are the largest W
irers, were preserved intact in an iron sale on their pre-
mises ; but about 300 people to whom they gave employ-
ment have boss suddenly thrown out of work. The firm
is understood to be insured to the amount of 37,0001., that
sum being spread over eight different insurance offices. Their
stock consisted mostly of underclothing of all kinds, shirts,
neckties, umbrellas, and parasols, of all of which they were
manufacturers on • large Kale. In ore room alone on the
third floor they bad 1,200 dozen of Ise flannel shirts
stored, all of which have bees burnt. They occupied four
large warehouses four stories high, two of which have
been completely, destroyed, with their valuable contents.
Messrs. Morley, notwithstanding the risk they ran, did not
suffer to an extent at all commensurate with the loss sus-
tained by Meant Grant. It ir true their shirt factory oritli
many valuable machines, has been buret, but it was not a
place in which they kept any very considerable quantity of
stock, and they only estimate their loss, which is covered
by insurance, at about 4,0304 or 5,000/. An underground
communication existed between the @hit factory which has
been destroyed and another part of their very extensive
premises, and there, too, the laity afforded by au iron
door, which shut off one place from the other in the sub-
terraneau passage, was established by the result. A con-
siderable amount of salvage was being collected from among
the ruins of Messrs. Grant's warehouses yesterday ; but of
Messrs. Morley's factory and its content+, or of the stocks
of Mr. Bunting. Messrs. Henry, and Mr. Gibson, the other
sufferers, not a vestige remains.— Times.

FZDZILAL PROWL= MAP.—Notary. Bacon and
Co., of Faterooster•rw, have published what they style a
Federal Progreso Map of America—that is to say, a polit:cal
and military map, ooloored so as to show the territory le-
covered by the Federal armies since the war commenced.
The extent of territory claimed by the Confederates in
of that which they then held, of that from which they h►ve
been expelled, and of that which they now hold, is thus
stated :
Territory claimed by the
Confederates in 18G1 (all

Ares.

Yortlatioa.

the Sieve Sham swept
Delaware)
Territory in the military pee-
session of the Cootederatee
in 1861
Territcey from which the

1.2=,383

Frew 8.396,436
Slave, 3,949,620

814,422 i

Fres, 6,473.414
Slav*, 3,592,432

Coofeaerate forces have
bees expelled :102,000
Itemaioies under Coated*
rate rule, December, 1863 1 512,4'a

Frye, 3401,294
Slave, 1.510 282
Free, 3,265.120
Nome, 2,439,275

A GXXXXOCS Acr or Six R. PEEL—During
his late visit to the southern part of this county. Sir
Robert Peel happened to drive on • wet arid told Sunday
morning, in the latter end of November, through the village
of Shrew. The poor villagers and other inhabitants of the
parish were hoarier mass, which the pariah priest was cele-
brating in • small shed in the street. Ac there is actually
no chapel, all were kneeling on the wet soil miry road, the
heavy rain potuise down on their bare heads. Immediately
on his return to Dublin Sir Robert forwarded 501. to the
bishop, exprweing at the same time a hope that *then toe-
nested with the locality might assist is getting up a chapel
in which the prof people might be sheltered during Divine
service from the inclemency of the weather. As the noble
Earl of Duaraven had already contracted for the erection of
a new arid beautiful catholic church ie Semen, the gift of
our Chief Sernetary could not. of course, be accepted ; bat
the genuine good nature which prompted the offering is
not lees appreciated by the catholics of this county.— Teske
Chromic*.