Man who raised alarm over Great Fire of London identified

The Museum of London’s new exhibition which focuses on the Great Fire of London, reveals the name of the man who raised the alarm and other ordinary people who were caught up in the blaze.

The Great Fire of London, something we all learn about in primary school raged from 2nd – 6^th September having started in a bakery on Pudding Lane. A monument remembering the blaze can be found at the spot where the fire began and can be found immediately outside of Monument tube station in East London.

Research undertaken by the Museum of London for their new exhibition has revealed the identity of the man who raised the alarm. His name was Thomas Dagger and worked at the bakery where the fire broke out on 2^nd September 1666. He was aged 24 and was likely a servant or apprentice to Thomas Farriner, the baker himself. He was awoken by the smoke and then roused the household, eventually escaping from an upstairs window with Farriner and his young daughter. The fire would go on to destroy most of medieval London.

The exhibition shows how Thomas Dagger, originally from Warminster in Wiltshire had moved to London aged 15 to become a baker’s apprentice. He was married and it is thought that his wife was pregnant at the time of the fire. He would go on to operate as a baker in his own right in the 1690s. According to the researchers, he was an otherwise “unremarkable one man who was swept up in history.” He will feature alongside other ordinary people from the time. Others that will be in the spotlight for the first time will include a young boy who used sign language to warn Samuel Pepys, the diarist who was said to have buried all his cheese to protect it from the fire, of a smaller blaze that had taken hold.

The anniversary of the Great Fire of London is from 2^nd-6^th September. To create your own tour of the area the fire began, head to Monument tube station, where you can find the monument to the fire, Pudding Lane and other artworks and commemorations to the incident. Further along at the opening of the Millennium Bridge near St Paul’s Cathedral, you can also see a statue dedicated to London fire fighters, for their work over the centuries.