The Great Fire of 1892
At about 5:00pm in the afternoon, July 8, 1892, a dropped pipe in Timothy Brine’s
stable at Freshwater Road ,the top of Carter’s Hill began what became the
worst fire in St. John’s history. Initially the fire did not cause any widespread panic,
however a series of bad coincidences caused the fire to spread and destroy
virtually all of the east end of the city, including much of its major commercial area
before being extinguished.
Rev Moses Harvey witnessed the stages of the fire and remarked to his friend that it
“was a bad day for a fire. A high wind from the north-west was blowing, hurling the
sparks far and wide on the roofs of the clusters of wooden houses. For a month we
had hardly any rain, and the shingled roofs were like tinder.” The situation was
worse because of work completed earlier in the day on the water mains.
Although water flow was re-established by 3 p.m., two hours before the fire began,
water pressure was insufficient to force water up into the higher sections of the city
where the fire began. W. J Kent remarked that the “flames therefore made headway
before water was procurable, and as a very high westerly wind was furiously fanning
the fire it began to spread rapidly.”
The Essay on Fire Water Find Signal
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An hour into the blaze, people of St. John’s realised that the fire could not be
contained in the area of Brine’s farm. Because locals believed stone walls would
withstand the flames, residents moved valuables into numerous stone buildings in
the city. One of the most common refuge areas was the Anglican Cathedral of St.
John the Baptist. The nave and transepts of the church were filled with valuable
property belonging to numerous families including that of the Anglican bishop of the
day, Lleweyn Jones. Unfortunately the cathedral also fell victim to the ravenous fire.
The fire was far from finished; the wind caused offshoots of the main fire to consume
new sections of the city while the main fire continued its destructive trek towards
the city’s commercial centre, Water Street. The businesses that lined Water Street
and Duckworth Street were destroyed as the fire spread throughout the downtown
area. Rev. Harvey stated; “The beautiful shops, full of valuable goods; the stores
behind, containing thousands of barrels of flour and provisions of all kinds; the fish
stores; the wharves, which it had cost immense sums to erect, — disappeared one by
one into the maw of the destroyer… the whole of Water Street, on both sides, was
`swept with the besom of destruction.”
The fire continued to burn into the night and the early hours of the next morning.
Rev. Harvey’s description of the restless night stated that “the terror-stricken
inhabitants flying before the destroyer,… the cries of weeping women hurrying with
their children to places of safety — all constituted a scene which not even the pen of
Dante could describe.”
Daybreak on the morning of July 9, 1892 revealed the full extent of the fire’s
devastation. When morning broke the thick clouds of smoke still ascended from the
burning ruins, and it was hours before it had cleared sufficiently to admit a view of
The Essay on Chicago Fire City People One
The Great Chicago Fire of 1871 The Great Chicago Fire of 1871 was one of the largest disasters in American history. Practically overnight the great city of Chicago was destroyed. Before the fire there was a large drought causing everything to be dry and flammable, then a fire broke out in the O'Leary's barn and spread throughout the city. Many attempts were made to put out the fire but there were ...
the track of the desolating scourge. A walk through the deserted streets
demonstrated that the ruin was even more complete than seemed possible at first.
Of the whole easterly section, scarcely a building remained… of the costly and
imposing structures and public buildings which were the pride and glory of the
people, scarcely a vestige remained; and St. John’s lay in the morning as a city
despoiled of her beauty, her choicest ornaments, presenting a picture of utter
desolation and woe.
Less than $5,000,000 of the total estimated losses of $13,000,000 were covered by
insurance. A large influx of financial aid from Great Britain, Canada and the United
States helped the city recover from its devastating losses.
It is from this reconstruction era that many of the present day registered heritage
structures were either built or re-built. The most prominent architect of the
reconstruction era in St. John’s was John Thomas Southcott. He designed numerous
Second Empire styled buildings that had distinctive mansard roofs with bonnet-
topped dormers protruding from the concave-curved roof surface. Southcott’s
prolific works were evidenced by the development of the term the “Southcott style”
which became associated with the architecture in the re-built city. Each year in
Southcott’s honour the Newfoundland Historic Trust presents the Southcott Award
for excellence in the restoration of heritage structures.
