<Tr> <Td> "</Td> <Td> The conflagration was so universal, and the people so astonished, that from the beginning, I know not by what despondency or fate, they hardly stirred to quench it, so that there was nothing heard or seen but crying out and lamentation, running about like distracted creatures without at all attempting to save even their goods, such a strange consternation there was upon them . </Td> <Td>" </Td> </Tr> <P> Evelyn lived in Deptford, four miles (6 km) outside the City, and so he did not see the early stages of the disaster . He went by coach to Southwark on Monday, joining many other upper - class people, to see the view which Pepys had seen the day before of the burning City across the river . The conflagration was much larger now: "the whole City in dreadful flames near the water - side; all the houses from the Bridge, all Thames - street, and upwards towards Cheapside, down to the Three Cranes, were now consumed". </P> <P> In the evening, Evelyn reported that the river was covered with barges and boats making their escape piled with goods . He observed a great exodus of carts and pedestrians through the bottleneck City gates, making for the open fields to the north and east, "which for many miles were strewed with moveables of all sorts, and tents erecting to shelter both people and what goods they could get away . Oh, the miserable and calamitous spectacle!" </P> <P> Suspicion soon arose in the threatened city that the fire was no accident . The swirling winds carried sparks and burning flakes long distances to lodge on thatched roofs and in wooden gutters, causing seemingly unrelated house fires to break out far from their source and giving rise to rumours that fresh fires were being set on purpose . Foreigners were immediately suspects because of the current Second Anglo - Dutch War . Fear and suspicion hardened into certainty on Monday, as reports circulated of imminent invasion and of foreign undercover agents seen casting "fireballs" into houses, or caught with hand grenades or matches . There was a wave of street violence . William Taswell saw a mob loot the shop of a French painter and level it to the ground, and watched in horror as a blacksmith walked up to a Frenchman in the street and hit him over the head with an iron bar . </P>

Pictures of the great fire of london 1666