Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1891-01-02
London's Fire Perils.

On Wednesday, when the bulletins of the aft
ernoon papers contained the alarming, though
rather vague. news of the big fire in London, a
man asked me If 1 thought the entire city was
likely to be consumed. 1t did not seem very
probable to me that the immense collection of
cities. towns and villages, covering perhaps l50
square miles, that is called London, could meet
the fate of Chicago. The fact that the Thames
river divides London roughly into two parts
makes such fiery doom for the whole metrop-
oils well nigh impossible. But there are other
reasons, of course, in plenty. The absence of
frame houses. and of fimsy structures of brick
that are little better than wood in the face Of
confagration, is great obstacle to the spread
of fire in London. When the London of Charles
lis time was burned, in 1866, frame houses
predominated. and the single bridge that
spanned the Than es, London Bridge, with its
street of wooden houses. was train to carry
the fire to the south side Of the river, although
in those days Southwark was but little more
than village. 1t was singular how the Car
penters' Company kept control of the building
trade until the Great Fire set people to think
ing about the infiammabiliry of wood. Even
as late as 1850, but ten years before the Great
Fire, we find the Carpenters Company-which
may be compared in its genial influence and
control of the trade to one of our trade unions
-memorializing Parliament to prohibit the use
of stone and brick for buildings because, as
they humorouslv put it 1.-THE tymber buildings
are more commodious for this city than brick"
But after the fire Parliament made short work
OF frame buildings, and the act which was
passed then forbiddlng the use of wood except
for floors, windows, doors and shop fronts, has
been practically in existence ever since. The
result has been that in spite Of narrow streets
and notoriously insufficient fire service LoD-
don has escaped widespread fires; although tn e
fire losses have been far heavier than ought to
be in city of London's wealth and civilization.
A feature of the fire in Victoria street the
other day, which the American correspondent
noted derisively, was the number of hand en-
gines which still cucumber the London fire
Srigade. see by o report of the London Fire
Department. published in 1887, that it owned
then As steam fire engines and 7S six-inch man
ual fire engines and 81 hand engines under six
inch. There have been some improvements
made in the department since Captain Shaw,
its chief, visited America in 1887. but the hanc
engines are still in the majority no doubt
Pittsburg has about twenty-five steam fire en-
gines, or half as many as London, with, sup
pose less than tenth of the area to protect.
1t is singular that the London fire insurance
companies and the merchants do not force the
authorities to remodel the fire service on the
American plan. The only particular to which
the Londoners can point with pride is the per
sonel of the brigade. They are a very fine set
of men physically; picked men Invariably from
the English nayy-it being the rule of the Lon
don department to recruit their force with
sailors solely.