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The Great Plague of 1665 was the last major outbreak of bubonic plague in England. It killed an estimated 100,000 people in London alone — roughly a quarter of the city's population. This lesson covers the causes, spread, impact, and responses to the plague, as well as its significance in the context of Restoration England.
Plague was not new to England in 1665. There had been outbreaks in 1603, 1625, and 1636, as well as regular smaller outbreaks. However, the 1665 epidemic was the most devastating since the Black Death of 1348–49.
The plague was caused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis, transmitted by fleas carried on black rats. However, people in 1665 did not understand this. They attributed the plague to various causes:
| Believed Cause | Explanation |
|---|---|
| God's punishment | Many believed the plague was divine retribution for sin |
| Bad air (miasma) | The idea that foul-smelling air caused disease |
| Planetary alignment | Some blamed the conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn |
| Foreigners and the poor | Immigrants and the impoverished were sometimes blamed |
Key Term: Miasma theory — the widespread belief that disease was caused by poisonous vapours or "bad air" rising from rotting material. This theory influenced many of the measures taken against the plague.
The plague first appeared in the parish of St Giles-in-the-Fields, on the western outskirts of London, in the winter of 1664–65. It spread slowly through the spring and then exploded during the hot summer months.
| Date | Development |
|---|---|
| December 1664 | First cases reported in St Giles-in-the-Fields |
| Spring 1665 | Plague spreads through London's poorer outer parishes |
| June 1665 | The King and court leave London for Oxford |
| July 1665 | Deaths rise sharply; Bills of Mortality record alarming numbers |
| August 1665 | Peak month — over 6,000 deaths per week recorded |
| September 1665 | The worst single week: 7,165 deaths recorded (week of 12–19 September) |
| Autumn 1665 | Plague begins to decline as cooler weather arrives |
| February 1666 | Charles II returns to London; plague largely over |
Key Term: Bills of Mortality — weekly printed reports listing deaths in London parishes, categorised by cause. These are our main source of evidence for plague deaths, though they are known to have underestimated the true numbers.
The authorities attempted a range of measures to control the plague, though most were based on flawed understanding of how the disease spread.
| Measure | Detail |
|---|---|
| Quarantine of infected houses | Houses with plague victims were sealed shut with the occupants inside, for 40 days. A red cross and the words "Lord have mercy upon us" were painted on the door. |
| Watchmen | Guards were posted outside quarantined houses to prevent anyone from leaving |
| Pest houses | Temporary hospitals for plague victims were set up outside the city |
| Fires and fumigation | Bonfires were lit in the streets to purify the air; houses were fumigated with sulphur |
| Killing of cats and dogs | Thousands of animals were killed on the assumption they spread the disease (ironically, killing cats may have allowed the rat population to grow) |
| Burial regulations | Bodies were to be buried at night, in deep pits, without public funerals |
Exam Tip: Quarantine was arguably the most controversial measure. While it may have slowed the spread in some cases, it often sentenced entire families to death — one infected person could infect everyone sealed in the house with them. Be prepared to evaluate the effectiveness and ethics of quarantine in exam answers.
| Impact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Flight from London | The wealthy, including the King, court, and many doctors, fled London. This left the poor without leadership or medical care. |
| Trade disruption | London's trade was severely disrupted; shops closed, markets were abandoned |
| Labour shortage | The death of so many workers led to labour shortages and rising wages in some trades |
| Breakdown of social order | Normal life collapsed — churches closed, streets emptied, families were torn apart |
The Great Plague of 1665 was the last major outbreak of bubonic plague in England. Historians debate why plague disappeared after this point. Possible explanations include:
Exam Tip: You may be asked to evaluate the significance of the Great Plague. Consider both its immediate impact (death, disruption, fear) and its longer-term significance (it was the last major plague outbreak; it revealed the limitations of government responses; it contributed to changes in urban planning after the Great Fire).
Question: "The government response was the most important factor in determining the impact of the Great Plague of 1665." How far do you agree?
A Level 4 response would argue that the government response was a significant factor but not the most important, because the underlying epidemiology was not understood and the structural conditions of seventeenth-century London made a major outbreak almost inevitable. The Great Plague 1665 produced estimates of 100,000 London deaths out of a population of approximately 400,000. The government's response included quarantining of infected houses with a red cross and the words "Lord have mercy upon us" painted on the door, the stationing of watchmen, the provision of pest houses, the lighting of bonfires, the slaughter of cats and dogs, and the issuing of the Plague Orders first drafted in 1578 and updated in 1665. These measures reflected the prevailing miasma theory, which held that disease was caused by foul-smelling air, rather than the true cause — the bacterium Yersinia pestis transmitted by fleas on black rats. Quarantine, which on modern analysis might slow transmission, in practice frequently sentenced entire households to death once one member was infected. The killing of cats and dogs probably worsened the outbreak by allowing rat populations to grow. Meanwhile the underlying conditions — overcrowded timber housing, inadequate sanitation, a hot summer, and an economy dependent on ship-borne trade from plague-affected Dutch ports — were the structural causes of the epidemic's severity. The government response therefore shaped how people experienced the plague, but it did not determine its severity; that was determined by structural conditions the authorities neither understood nor could change. A Level 4 answer would conclude that the response was a "proximate amplifier" rather than the "fundamental determinant".
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