The Sun.
London, England, 1861-06-24 00:00:00

evening was bright and clear, the whole of the public
buildings in the city and along the waterside were
tinged by the lurid glare of the conflagration, while
the Pool and eastern part of the metropolis were
darkened by the huge cloud of smoke which rose
from the burning mass. By this period the news
of the magnitude of the fire had spread all over the
metropolis, and the number of people flocking to it
was so great as to render London-bridge and the
Borough quite impassable. The balustrades and
outside coping of London-bridge were fringed with
thousands of spectators, and we heard of one in-
stance where a person in his struggle to obtain a
place had fallen over into the river and was
drowned.

At about 10 o'clock the fire seemed at its worst.
Probably between 8 and 9 there was a greater body
of flame than at any subsequent period, but the
broad light of a summer's evening drowned its
hideous glare. It was not till night fell that the
tremendous terrors of the spectacle could be
appreciated in all their horrid grandeur. Never
since the Fire of 1666 had such a scene been
witnessed. The whole south bank of the river
from London-bridge to below the Custom-
house seemed one stupendous pile of fire,
glowing at its core with an intensity that made
it painful to look at, and casting a ruddy
glare above on everything far and near. At this
time the only hope of the firemen lay in the night
still continuing calm. Their efforts to check the
flames they felt and knew were utterly hopeless. All
the engines of London and all that could be brought
by rail or road from the suburbs were as useless as
children's squirts against these acres of burning
ruins. The efforts of the most powerful engines could
only sprinkle at rare intervals the outskirts of the
buildings, for the heat was so great that none could
approach near and live. All the worst masses of
flame were thus quite out of reach, though, so great
was the bulk of the glowing ruins, that, even had
they been under command, no water-power the fire-
men could procure could have made the slightest
impression. The only chance, therefore, of a cessation
of the calamity rested entirely on the night remaining
still, and allowing the ruins to burn out of themselves.
By the mercy of Providence, happily, no wind arose.
Had it been otherwise, the blasts of heated air coming
through such a mass of fire would have lit every
tEing within half a mile of it. Engines and firemen
would have been alike driven away, and the whole
neighbourhood would have been abandoned to the
flames till a sufficient number of houses on its dread-
ful
line of march could have been either pulled down
or blown up. At one time such an extension of the
catastrophe seemed awfully probable. There was
scarcely a breath of wind, but what little there was
came from the river, gently turning the blinding
mass of smoke and flame across Toeley-street to the
London-bridge Railway Station. On it seemed to
come, nearer and nearer, with a crackling roar that
was terrible, with its millions of burning flakes
filling the air as if the very atmosphere was on fire,
and the great ranks of red flame flapping about
their keen thin points with a dull noise, and leap-
ing up high over the houses with bounds and sputs
like fountains of fire. The heat in the station be-
came very great, and the ground-glass windows at
the side could scarcely be touched. Immediately
between the station and the fire was a large timber
yard, with some houses almost jutting into it. If
these caught, the timber yard and station were cer-
tain to follow, and the flames, thus spreading in two
directions, might travel over all Southwark. Upon
these houses, therefore, the firemen concentrated all
their efforts, and from the tops of eminences and
piles of timber poured streams of water on the walls
and roofs. Gradually, however, in spite of all
checks, the walls began to steam, as if the houses
were boiling, and little ominous curls of smoke
wound through the slate roofs. Then more smoke,
and the water hissed and sputtered on the roofs,
and a dull increasing glow shone from all the win-
dows, as if there were lights inside each room, and
the panes were filled in with red glass. More hoses
were turned on the roofs and walls, but all in vain.
The smoke came thicker from the roofs, the light
shone brighter from the rows of windows, and as
the wind moved in gentle puffs a flicker as of little
gas jets came darting up between the slates, and
ran quivering along like an illumination strug-
gling with a high wind. At last the slates began
to crack and crumble down, and the mass of flames
poured out with a dull whirring noise, mount-
ing high into the air. A few minutes of fierce tre-
mendous blazin,g,during which the remaining slates
crumbled and dropped noiselessly down, and all
chance of saving the buildings was abandoned.
For a time the roofs hold up, but at last, as if melt-
ing they bend slowly, and disappear in an awful
explosion of sparks. At about this time (11 o'clock)
the station seems doomed. None can sec how the
fire is raging, so dense is the mass of smoke and
sparks that sweep towards the railway. The engines
are withdrawn from their useless contest with burn-
ing houses near the timber-yard, and begin to play
upon the stacks of timber themselves. The clouds
of steam that rise from these piles as the water
falls show that the precaution is not taken an in-
stant too soon, even if it then avails. Just at this
most critical period the slight wind gradually
changes, and blows from the station out towards
the fire, rolling hack the mingled clouds of smoke
and sparks and flame again in the direction of the
river. The ruins amid which the fire rages become
then distinctly visible from the entrance to the
Woolwich station, overlooking Tooley-street, and
the sight disclosed is one which it is impossible
either to describe or forget. Spreading far and
wide amid gaunt ruins of walls, cracked and riven
out of shape, lies a perfect sea of fire almost as white
as snow, from which the red flames spring in mas-
sive leaps, and scatter like explosions myriads of
charred embers high into the air. Now a puff of
wind will act on the ruins far and wide, like a blast
through a furnace, and they spring into a whiteness
to which the glare of sunlight is mere darkness.
While these gleams last the spectacle is tremendous.
On every side are only great vistas of rugged walls
and gleaming streets, the very pavements of which
give off a vivid glare that is blinding to look at. The
walls still standing, but white with heat and cracked
in all directions, seem like pillars of fire, against
which, as the breeze drops, the flames rise again, and,
licking up their sides, seem to flap against them and
bring the glowing bricks clown in long streams.
On every side a great mass of flames is struggling.
Nothing can be seen but a town of falling ruins,
with great rafters swaying about in fiery tangles
before they fall headlong down—nothing heard but
the roar of flames and shouts of excited thousands,
which drown even the incessant dull thumpings of
the engines that are working in all directions.
It seemed as if nothing could stop the fire. There
were great warehouses which were called fireproof,
with massive brick walls, iron roofs, and stone floors,
But against such intensity of heat nothing availed.
To the eye they seemed to get redhot, like shells of
furnaces, until their contents poured out through
doors and windows in great streams of flame.
however, the most awful view of the
destruction going on was to be seen from London-
t
brid perhaps,iof Half the inhabitants of the metropolis were
thronging towards this centre on Saturday night,
for from the bridge was to be seen such a spectacle
as we trust will never be beheld again. The
(siligs
onrth,
side of the Thames, with all its massive bt
seemed red hot in the dreadful light, while on the
south the glare and heat from the blazing ruins were
almost blinding. Foul and thick as are the waters
of the Thames at low tide its dingy waves were
nevertheless penetrated by the intense light, and
the river seemed almost turned to blood, but so
bright and lurid in its deep glow that it actually
appeared like a stream of fire. There seemed flame
everywhere, in the air, in the water, even, as we
have said, on the side of the river, where the
Custom-house and great public buildings looked
red hot, and their rows of windows, reflecting
back the sheets of flame, gave them just the appear-
ance of being themselves on fire inside. Never pro-
bably, even when the Great Eastern left the
Thames, has the river been so thronged with small
boats. From far below the Custom-house to above
London-bridge the stream was actually covered
with them. All the roofs of the houses, the pub-
lie buildings, the masts and spars of vessels,
the quays and wharves, the tops of church steeples
—even the gallery of the Monument—were crowded
with thousands ,upon thousands of spectators.'

Looking down from one of those eminences upon
the bridge, the river, and the surrounding build-
ings, all swarming wiih countless multitudes, but
swathed in the same deep fiery glow, it made one
of the most terrible spectacles ever witnessed in
England. Probably at no time—even during the
Great Fire of London—was there ever seen such a
mass of flame and heat as roared and seethed so
dreadfully on Saturday night along the south side
of the river. All the small boats on the Thames
were, of course, übliged to keep close over to the
Middlesex shore. The intense heat rendered this
necessary, but there were other dangers as well. As
warehouse after warehouse caught, the barrels
of saltpetre and tar with which some were
stored exploded, and came pouring forth in
streams of liquid fire, which floated out upon
the water in great sheets, and broke up at last
into little islands of flame, which went drifting
up the river. All the vigilance and activity of the
Thames Police was necessary to beat and scatter
these out as they floated through the bridge. But
all these exertions would have been in vain to check
the devastation which must have been caused by
these floating masses if the remains of the ships
burnt earlier in the evening had not acted as a kind
of breakwater to their movements. The great mass
therefore of this liquid fire gathered round the frag-
ments of the hulls, and kept their charred ribs
glowing. At a little after 12 o'clock the fire had
burnt quite through to Tooley-street. A huge
granary lower down the river, supposed to be fire-
proof, became apparently red-hot, and the flames
could be seen whirling round and round through
the stories till at last they found a vent through the
roof, and, belching upwards for a few minutes in
one great pyramid of sparks and fire, left only the
hollow glowing walls standing. Still the flames
continued to spread, not only down the river, but
backwards through Tooley-street towards Bermond-
sey and the railway. After 12 o'clock a great many
additional engines came in from distant parts of the
country, but they would have been powerless even
to check the spread of the flames but for the trifling
change we have mentioned in the wind, which kept
the great mass of sparks and heated air out over the
river. But for this half Bermondsey would have
been laid in ashes. Soon after midnight an immense
line of wall, facing the river, the shell of the ware-
house in which the fire began, fell outwards with a
hideous crash. The scene it disclosed was absolutely
appalling, and the sudden glow of heat could be felt
far out upon the river. Moored alongside Chamber-
lain's wharf was a small sloop, which, as soon as
the wooden sheds took fire, was looked upon as
doomed. At first might be perceivsd upon the cor-
dage of the rigging a few small specks of fire, like
little blue blisters,which gradually became largerand
larger, until they ran into one, and the mast began
to blaze. Then on the sides of the vessel, and then
upon its deck, other little blue blisters burst out
where the heat of the burning wharfs had ignited the
tar, and verysoon the sloop was all on fire from stem
to stern. While she was burning, there came a
barge, with flowing sails, borne on the rising tide.
The eddy drew it too near the conflagration ; the
heat—which scorched the faces of people standing
on the landing-stage at Billingsgate—was insup-
portable, the three men on board became alarmed,
they lost all control of themselves, the barge drifted
inland, while they raised their hands and shouted
for help. A boat rowed out and took these three
men off, and in less than two minutes their barge
lay with its broadside to the river of fire next the
shore, and was blazing from one end to the other.
Later in the night a small skiff, rowed by a single
man, was drawn close upon the vortex of fire in the
same way. Another boat ran out, took the man off,
and conveyed him to a place of safety ; but it is said
that a second boat, pulled by a single rower, which
went inshore with the same object, met with a cliff-
ferent fate, being itself drawn in too far. The man
was rendered powerless by the heat, he lifted his
hands for help as the man had done he had thought
to aid in saving ; but he had gone too far to be res-
cued, and it is rumoured that he and his boat were
both burnt together. Then there was a second barge
ignited by the floating, blazing tallow, but that being
further removed from the heat, was scuttled, and so
took no great harm. It should be added that when
the boatmen took the three men off the barge a tre-
mendous cheer burst forth from the spectators, and
almost drowned for a time the roar of the fire. In-
stances like these created an intensity of excite-
ment which can hardly be imagined by those who
were not witnesses of the scene.

While Chamberlain's Wharf was in full blaze it
was feared by many that St. Olave's Church and
Topping's Wharf would follow; but fortunately, a
vacant piece of ground interposed, which no doubt
saved both. On the other hand, however, Hay's
Wharf, it became evident, had caught in the
roof, through which dense clouds of smoke and
sharp spires of flame were darting. The iron
shutters for a long time kept in the fire here
except at intervals, when it forced its
way upwards; it must have been at least an hour
after the top floor was blazing before the
fire descended to the floor below. After that the
others followed, but the difference in the progress
of the flames here and in the non-fireproof building
was remarkable. So tremendous a degree of heat
rendered the supposed fireproof qualities of the build-
ing of no avail in this instance, when everything
iron became redhot ; hut with anything like an
ordinary emergency tO contend with there cannot
be a question that this great pile of building would
have been perfectly safe. As however it was thought
it might yield, a large body of men had been em-
ployed earlier in the night in removing goods from
the lower floors, and this was done to a considerable
extent, but many casks of oil or tar so removed
upon the turn of the tide were drifted within reach
of the fire, and in turn added to its intensity.

When Hay's wharf was included the river sweep
of the conflagration must have beer. 300 yards,
with a deep foreground of blazing oil and tallow.
The higher the tide rose the wider became the sheet
of flame, as cask after cask of tallow melted and
rolled, iiquidwise, into the Thames.
As the tide rose attention became fixed upon the
dock at the end of Hay's wharf, for the spectators
were anxious upon two points—first, they wished
to see if there was any possibility of escape of the
two vessels lying there, close to the walls of the
fireproof but fire-filled buildings; and, secondly,
they feared that the fire would leap the narrow
chasm of the dock, seize on Beal's wharf, and then,
as must have happened, burn down a great extent
of wharfage property beyond. After midnight,
when the waters had risen sufficiently high, the
screw steamer was towed out amid the cheers of the
onlookers, and 10 minutes later two tugs drew out
an American bark, just as the iron shutters of the
buildings fell out of the side next the dock, and the
conflagration shot forth its fiery tongues, amid
bursts of cheering and hand-clapping such as old
Father Thames has seldom heard. And this rescue
was none too soon. For hours one of the floating
engines had been playing on the external wall of
this building and on the rigging of the bark alter-
nately, but despite this the little blue blisters which
heralded the destruction of the sloop and the barge
had shown themselves on the cordage of the main-
ea
topgallantmast, and once the rigging at that point
was fairly in a blaze. The well-directed hose, how-
ever,
had
extinguishediinks toothis,
to
ad Tandte fireproof
now the
ha
cdantg
er
was a ta
c-
I er of the building and the interposition of the d ,ck,
it now became cleaa that on the river side the fire
had done itc worst. With a gap
) at each end, .it
could do no more in that direction, and in I 'l' oo ey-
street the land engines had shut it in ; so that, be-
sides the buildings comprehended within the
wharves, only two houses, consisting of suites of
offices, had been gutted. Still the fire was raging,
and was likely to rage, furiously. Under the fallen
floors of the warehouses and in the cellars uncle:-
ground was a vast quantity of combustib • le material.
Casks of tallow yet remained to melt, while num-
berless bags of saltpetre and casks of oil and tur-
pentine, with hundreds of tons of cheese, butter,
sugar, and bacon, were yet unconsutned. And still
the people came in fresh thousands to view the sight.
Dawn found London-bridge still thronged with
.
cabs, omnibuses, carts, waggons, and vehicles of
every description. Peripatetic vendors of ginger
beer, fruit, and other cheap refreshments abounded,
and were sold out half a dozen times over. Public-
houses, in defiance of Acts of Parliament, kept open