Imagine a city teetering on the edge of disaster, a spark waiting to ignite a catastrophic blaze, yet somehow, the inferno almost never began. It sounds like the setup for a thriller, but this was London in 1666, the very moment before the Great Fire that forever reshaped the city. The irony? The whole thing nearly didn’t happen. If a few chance decisions had swung the other way, London might have dodged one of the most infamous urban catastrophes in history.
Let’s get real for a second: the Great Fire of London isn’t just a dusty tale from history books. It’s a story packed with human error, quirky luck, and a hefty dose of “what if.” Most people remember the fire for its destruction—how it leveled thousands of homes and landmarks—but few pause to consider how close London came to never catching fire in the first place. That tale is just as fascinating, probably more so.
A Flame Is Born — Or Not?
The fire started in a small bakery on Pudding Lane, owned by Thomas Farriner. It was a regular evening, and the bakery’s ovens were stoked to keep the bread coming. This oven, a seemingly innocuous piece of everyday life, became the epicenter of London’s worst disaster. But what’s wild is that the conditions were so precarious that if a single thing had gone differently—a window left open, a bucket of water nearer, a quicker alarm raised—the fire might have been snuffed out before it truly took hold.
Did you know, for instance, that Farriner’s own household nearly escaped the blaze? The baker’s daughter was trapped upstairs, and her rescue by the king’s men became one of the iconic moments of the disaster. But that rescue only happened because the fire was allowed to spread long enough before anyone realized the danger. Had someone acted just a bit faster, the whole event could have vanished into a footnote.
London’s Wooden Tinderbox
Picture London in the 17th century: a maze of narrow streets, wooden houses crammed cheek to jowl, with overhanging jetties that made the air thick and the layout a perfect fuel ladder for fire. It was a disaster waiting to happen. Yet the city had survived fires before without descending into complete chaos. So why did this one nearly not start?
Believe it or not, the city was bracing itself for a different kind of disaster at the time—a potential outbreak of the plague. Many Londoners were preoccupied with quarantines, health precautions, and rumors. People’s attention was elsewhere, and that distraction played a role. The fact that the bakery oven was left smoldering overnight, rather than being properly doused, was a careless but understandable lapse given the circumstances. It wasn’t an act of negligence; it was human frailty under pressure.
The Firebreak That Wasn’t
One of the most maddening “what ifs” surrounds the city’s firefighting methods. London had firebreak policies—basically, they tried to demolish houses around a fire to stop it from spreading. Sounds clever, right? But here’s the catch: those orders were delayed. Why? Local officials hesitated, fearing riots and property loss. They thought maybe the fire wouldn’t get out of control.
Imagine that. The disaster might have been averted if officials had acted decisively and knocked down a handful of homes early on. Instead, their indecision allowed the flames to leap across the city like a predator on a feast. It’s a brutal lesson in the cost of hesitation when it comes to emergencies.
How Close Was the Near-Miss?
To grasp how close London was to escaping the Great Fire, consider the wind. The weather that night was unusually dry and windy, perfect conditions for a blaze to spread. But what if the wind had blown the other way, or if there had been rain? The fire would have been starved of oxygen or extinguished by drizzle. Then again, if it were wetter, maybe the oven wouldn’t have overheated so badly in the first place.
There’s also the human factor: neighbors reportedly noticed the flames early but assumed it was a minor mishap. No one ran for the hills or rang alarm bells immediately. Could the fire have been doused with a bucket or two before it gained momentum? Perhaps. But people underestimate how quickly a fire can grow in such a dense cityscape. It’s a terrifying reminder that sometimes people’s instincts and assumptions fail them at the worst times.
The Aftermath Nobody Wanted
It’s tempting to say that the Great Fire was inevitable, given London’s conditions. But the truth is messier. It was a perfect storm of small mistakes, bad luck, and missed opportunities. The fire’s near-non-existence is a ghost hovering over history, a reminder that disasters aren’t always about grand causes but often about tiny chances someone didn’t take.
What followed was a city almost unrecognizable from what had been there before. The fire destroyed more than 13,000 houses, 87 churches, and iconic landmarks like St. Paul’s Cathedral. Yet, within this destruction lay an opportunity: to rebuild London with wider streets, brick buildings, and better planning. A silver lining if there ever was one, forged from the ashes of near catastrophe.
Why Remember That It Almost Didn’t Happen?
Here’s the thing: history loves to focus on the big moments—fires, wars, revolutions—but the near-misses teach us something equally valuable. They remind us of the fragility of systems we take for granted. Fire safety, urban planning, quick decision-making—these aren’t just boring bureaucratic tasks. They’re the difference between survival and disaster.
The Great Fire of London being almost a false alarm makes it more human. It wasn’t fate or divine wrath that started the fire but a chain of tiny errors and blind spots. Those small moments, easily overlooked at the time, became the tinder for a fire that reshaped a nation.
What If We Didn’t Learn?
Despite the fire’s devastation, it took time for London to enforce stricter building codes and fire regulations. Change was slow, messy, and met with resistance. Human nature tends to forget, especially when the immediate danger passes. This pattern repeats itself in every disaster: near misses, warnings, and then catastrophe.
So, the story of the Great Fire isn’t just about flames. It’s about human nature: how we respond to risk, how we procrastinate, how sometimes, just sometimes, luck steps in to save the day—or condemns us when it doesn’t.
Next time you walk through the streets of London, with its wide avenues and sturdy brick buildings, remember that it almost didn’t exist in this form. That the fire which shaped it was a catastrophe nearly avoided, a disaster that could have been stopped before the first ember caught the wind.
If you think about it, the Great Fire of London isn’t just a story of destruction. It’s a story of near-misses, human error, and resilience. It’s a reminder that sometimes the most profound historical events hang on the thinnest of threads. And isn’t that just a little bit terrifying?
