By Daniel Defoe
being observations or memorials of
the most remarkable occurrences, as well public
as private, which happened in London during the
last great visitation in 1665. Written by
a Citizen who continued all the while in London.
Never made public before
It was about the beginning of September, 1664, that
I, among the rest of my neighbours, heard in ordinary
discourse that the plague was returned again in Holland;
for it had been very violent there, and particularly
at Amsterdam and Rotterdam, in the year 1663, whither,
they say, it was brought, some said from Italy, others
from the Levant, among some goods which were brought
home by their Turkey fleet; others said it was brought
from Candia; others from Cyprus. It mattered not
from whence it came; but all agreed it was come into
Holland again.
We had no such thing as printed newspapers in those
days to spread rumours and reports of things, and
to improve them by the invention of men, as I have
lived to see practised since. But such things
as these were gathered from the letters of merchants
and others who corresponded abroad, and from them
was handed about by word of mouth only; so that things
did not spread instantly over the whole nation, as
they do now. But it seems that the Government
had a true account of it, and several councils were
held about ways to prevent its coming over; but all
was kept very private. Hence it was that this
rumour died off again, and people began to forget
it as a thing we were very little concerned in, and
that we hoped was not true; till the latter end of
November or the beginning of December 1664 when two
men, said to be Frenchmen, died of the plague in Long
Acre, or rather at the upper end of Drury Lane.
The family they were in endeavoured to conceal it
as much as possible, but as it had gotten some vent
in the discourse of the neighbourhood, the Secretaries
of State got knowledge of it; and concerning themselves
to inquire about it, in order to be certain of the
truth, two physicians and a surgeon were ordered to
go to the house and make inspection. This they
did; and finding evident tokens of the sickness upon
both the bodies that were dead, they gave their opinions
publicly that they died of the plague. Whereupon
it was given in to the parish clerk, and he also returned
them to the Hall; and it was printed in the weekly
bill of mortality in the usual manner, thus—
Plague, 2. Parishes
infected, 1.
The people showed a great concern at this, and began
to be alarmed all over the town, and the more, because
in the last week in December 1664 another man died
in the same house, and of the same distemper.
And then we were easy again for about six weeks, when
none having died with any marks of infection, it was
said the distemper was gone; but after that, I think
it was about the 12th of February, another died in
another house, but in the same parish and in the same
manner.
