University of North Carolina Press Chapter Title BEN.docx

University of North Carolina Press
Chapter Title: BENEVOLENT EMPIRE
Book Title: Inventing Disaster
Book Subtitle: The Culture of Calamity from the Jamestown
Colony to the Johnstown
Flood
Book Author(s): CYNTHIA A. KIERNER
Published by: University of North Carolina Press. (2019)
Stable URL:
https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.5149/9781469652535_kierner.8
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99
{ 4 }
benevolent
empire
The Lisbon earthquake was more a turning point than a starting
point in
the history of British benevolence. In addition to local
philanthropy to aid
the poor and the sick at home, eighteenth- century Britons
sometimes sent
charitable gifts to the king’s American subjects. The most
impressive case of
British aid to colonists came in response to the Charleston fire
of 1740, when
the relief efforts of colonial governors, London merchants, and
others were
supplemented by a sizable contribution from the king and
Parliament. Gov-
ernment relief for Charleston, which was not widely publicized,
was an act
of statecraft designed primarily to preserve order in a valuable
colony that
seemed vulnerable to slave insurrections and also to Spanish
attacks from
nearby Florida. In 1755, by contrast, disaster relief for Lisbon,

whatever its
other purposes, was presented and perceived as state- sponsored
humani-
tarianism first and foremost.1
Despite the outpouring of support for Charleston in 1740,
colonists’
routine and explicit expectation of relief from Britain in the
aftermath of
disasters was a post- Lisbon development. The king’s gift to
Portugal was a
grand gesture that resonated profoundly among subjects who
cherished the
ideal of a benevolent monarch. Fortified by the lessons of
Lisbon, colonists
sought help from the mother country in the wake of calamity.
More often
than not, Britons assisted colonial disaster victims but—like the
£20,000
dispatched to Charleston, a city that had suffered some
£250,000 in fire-
related losses—the sums provided were less a practical remedy
for a dire
situation than a performance of benevolence. Moreover, in the
decades after
Lisbon, only twice did the king (either on his own or together
with Parlia-
ment) offer direct aid to his suffering colonial subjects. In 1765,
in the midst
of the Stamp Act controversy, which began the imperial crisis
that eventu-
2020 03:05:50 UTC

100 Benevolent Empire
ally led to the American Revolution, George III “was pleased to
give” £500 in
relief to victims of a fire that had ravaged Montreal, an
important commer-
cial center in Britain’s newly acquired Canadian territory. In
1781, during the
American War of Independence, Parliament allocated the
extraordinary sum
of £120,000 to the loyal sugar- producing island colonies of
Jamaica and Bar-
bados for relief in the aftermath of the ruinous hurricanes of
October 1780.2
Focusing primarily on five episodes between 1760 and 1780,
this chapter
examines the rhetoric and realities of imperial disaster relief,
from Canada
to the West Indies, in an increasingly tumultuous era. After
fires, floods, and
hurricanes, colonists invoked sensibility, benevolence, and the
bonds of em-
pire, exploiting dense networks of transatlantic, intercolonial,
and local con-
nections in hopes of obtaining assistance from government
officials, mer-
chants, and others, whose benevolence was tempered by their
own interests
and the shifting circumstances of imperial politics. In the
decades after Lis-
bon, Britons on both sides of the Atlantic commonly construed
disaster re-
lief as benevolence provided to sufferers in a far- flung imperial

community,
though the performance of benevolence was also a tool of
statecraft, a politi-
cal tactic deployed to mitigate colonial discontent, strengthen
the imperial
bond, and solidify a shared sense of British national identity.
§
Among the most significant colonial disasters of the post-
Lisbon de-
cades were the fires in Boston and Montreal—in 1760 and 1765,
respec-
tively—the flooding of Virginia’s James River Basin in 1771,
and the un-
usually severe hurricanes that devastated the British West
Indies in 1772 and
1780. Only in Boston, where the city and its residents suffered
more than
£50,000 sterling in property losses—some estimates were much
higher—
were there no deaths. At the other end of the spectrum, the
hurricanes in
Barbados and Jamaica in 1780 were the deadliest in Caribbean
history, result-
ing in as many as 22,000 fatalities and financial losses in excess
of £2,000,000
sterling. Local newspapers reported these calamities, and
accounts of them
arrived in other colonies in as little as a few days or as much as
six weeks later.
It typically took two months or more for news of colonial
disasters to appear
in London newspapers.3
Although newspapers were critical in spreading disaster stories

and mo-
bilizing donors for post- disaster relief efforts, the most
effective requests for
aid and responses to such appeals flowed through a dense
combination of
governmental, commercial, and personal networks. Colonial
governors, who
were required to report regularly to imperial authorities in
London, could
apply to the home government for assistance, but many also had
closer con-
2020 03:05:50 UTC
Benevolent Empire 101
tacts among officials in other colonies. For their part, colonial
assemblies
employed agents, most of whom were well- connected English
merchants
or lawyers, to represent their interests to the king, Parliament,
and imperial
officials in London. Colonial merchants had long- standing
business and per-
sonal relationships with merchants in other provinces, as well as
in London
and other British ports. Some wealthy colonists forged face- to-
face connec-
tions in Britain by visiting or by sending their sons abroad to be
educated.
Religious and philanthropic groups cultivated transatlantic ties,
as did the

learned men (and a few women) whose correspondence on
science and
other topics created an Enlightenment- inspired transatlantic
intellectual
community. To varying degrees, these official, commercial, and
personal net-
works shaped responses to disasters in the post- Lisbon era.4
The first of these incidents was the conflagration in Boston on
Thurs-
day, 20 March 1760, which local newspapers described as “the
most terrible
fire that has happened to this town or perhaps in any other part
of North-
America.” In truth, no one died as a result of the fire that began
at two o’clock
on that morning and raged for nearly seven hours before being
extinguished
by people from Boston, including some of the city’s “greatest
personages,”
and from neighboring communities. Although the fire destroyed
some 400
buildings—houses, workshops, warehouses—as well as several
ships laden
with valuable cargoes, the estimated financial losses totaled
only slightly
more than one- fifth of those suffered in Charleston in 1740.5
But in March 1760, Bostonians assessed the severity of the fire
in light
of their own experiences. An omnipresent threat in densely
populated areas
crowded with wooden structures, fire was common in colonial
Boston. At
least nine major fires had occurred there previously, making
conflagration

a part the community’s shared history and civic identity.
Founded in 1630,
Boston’s town meeting implemented fire regulations, purchased
its first fire
engine, and became home to the first colonial fire company in
the 1670s. By
1760, Boston had nine fire companies, each made up of twenty
men who
could operate fire engines that pumped water to supplement the
efforts of
local bucket brigades. When the creator of A New Plan of ye
Great Town of
Boston in New England in America sought to embellish his
work with key in-
formation from the city’s history, he chose three categories to
list, with dates,
at the bottom of his map: important buildings erected in the
city, smallpox
epidemics, and “Great Fires.” The fire of 1760 was listed as
Boston’s “Tenth
Terrible Fire,” the added adjective affirming that it displaced
the fire of 1711
as its most ruinous conflagration. Boston newspapers began
their coverage
of the 1760 fire by contrasting it with two lesser fires that had
occurred the
2020 03:05:50 UTC
preceding year, both of which had been readily contained by the

“dexterity”
and “vigilance” of the “People in general of all Ranks.” 6
Telling the story of the fire was the first step in seeking relief
for its vic-
tims, those left homeless and in some cases penniless as a result
of the crisis.
In the days immediately after the fire, three authoritative voices
provided
complementary narratives. Governor, clergy, and the press
agreed that,
though the apparently accidental fire was at least indirectly an
act of God,
aiding its victims—both during and after the conflagration—
would depend
on human agency.
The first newspaper account of the incident, published the day
after the
fire, set the tone by noting the “distressed Condition of those
who inhabited
the buildings which were consumed, scarce knowing where to
take Shelter”
from “the spreading Destruction,” while praising the efforts of
those who
fought the flames and those who took special care to assist
young children,
the sick, and the elderly. A few days later, the Boston Evening-
Post reminded
readers in the afflicted city and beyond that “without the
compassionate as-
sistance of our Christian friends . . . distress and ruin may quite
overwhelm”
the fire’s suffering victims. At the same time, however much
they recognized
the real and potential impact of humans in causing,

extinguishing, or pre-
venting fires, commentators also saw the hand of God in the
unfortunate
event and its consequences. “Notwithstanding the long
Continuance of the
Fire, the Explosion of the South Battery, and the falling of the
Walls and
Chimnies,” intoned the Boston News- Letter, “Divine
Providence appeared
mercifully in that not one Person’s Life was lost: & only a few
wounded.” 7
After the fire, things moved quickly in Boston, a densely
populated,
highly literate, and civic- minded community that was also the
capital of the
Massachusetts colony. Governor Thomas Pownall, a popular
royal appointee
who likely numbered among those esteemed personages who
helped to ex-
tinguish the flames, quickly convened the colonial legislature,
expressing
sympathy for the fire’s victims and urging the province’s
lawmakers to act on
their behalf. Pownall emphasized the devastation caused by the
fire, as a re-
sult of which some 220 families had lost their homes, three-
quarters of whom
were consequently “incapable of subsisting themselves, and . . .
reduced to
extream poverty and require immediate relief.” The governor
urged the legis-
lators to appoint a committee to work with Boston’s local
authorities to im-
plement some “effectual measures,” such as the widening of
streets and new

prohibitions on building with wood, to limit the damage from
future fires.
The legislators, in turn, voted to give £3,000 from the public
treasury to Bos-
ton for humanitarian purposes; a few days later, they ordered
that no taxes
2020 03:05:50 UTC
were to be collected from Bostonians who lost their houses to
the flames, and
they also agreed to work with the town of Boston on new fire
regulations, as
Pownall had suggested. Finally, the assembly also called on the
governor to
embark on a fund- raising effort throughout Massachusetts by
“strongly rec-
ommending the unhappy case of the sufferers to the inhabitants,
and calling
upon them for a general contribution” for their relief.8
Pownall immediately complied with the legislators’ request,
issuing
“a brief ” as a broadside to be circulated throughout the
province. Public
officials had circulated charity briefs to solicit aid for victims
of calamities
in England since at least the sixteenth century; by the
eighteenth century
the practice had made its way to the colonies in America.

Pownall’s brief,
which was also reprinted in the Boston Evening- Post, reiterated
the logic of
early press reports, nodding to divine providence while at the
same time de-
pending on human efforts to relieve the suffering of Bostonians
in crisis. “It
having pleased Almighty goD to permit a Fire to break out in
the Town of
Boston,” the governor began, prefacing his call for the people
of Massachu-
setts to “express their Christian Benevolence on this Occasion,
by contrib-
uting in Proportion to the Means with which goD has blessed
them” to ease
the distress of “these worthy Objects of their Charity.” Pownall
ordered all
Massachusetts clergy to “read or cause to be read” his appeal to
their respec-
tive congregations.9
The Reverend Jonathan Mayhew, a prominent Boston minister,
shared
the governor’s views and even anticipated his call for
benevolence. Mayhew,
who had affirmed the divine origins of earthquakes a few years
earlier, now
reiterated God’s omnipotence as “the author of all those
calamities and suf-
ferings, which at any time befall a city, or community,”
including the recent
fire. In a sermon delivered only three days after the fire,
Mayhew empha-
sized God’s purposeful providence, both in making the fire
more severe than
its predecessors and in preventing fatalities. Declaring that all

humans were
to some degree sinful, Mayhew urged people to repent and
reform, but—
unlike those clergy who prescribed only introspection and Bible
study to
Overleaf A New Plan of ye Great Town of Boston in New
England in America.
William Price made this map during the governorship of
Jonathan Belcher
(acknowledged in the cartouche) in the early 1730s. He later
produced and sold
updated versions, as Bostonians built “Additionall Buildings &
New Streets” in
their growing community. Price’s original map listed eight
“Great Fires,” the earliest
of which was in 1653 and the latest in 1711. This 1769 map, the
last in the series,
includes two more: the “Ninth Fire” in 1759 and the “Tenth
Terrible Fire” in 1760.
Library of Congress Geography and Map Division.
2020 03:05:50 UTC
2020 03:05:50 UTC

2020 03:05:50 UTC
Charity brief. Thomas Pownall, the royal governor of
Massachusetts, solicited
donations to assist Bostonians left homeless by the fire and who
were “incapable of
subsisting themselves.” The governor’s call, issued under the
king’s seal, circulated
as a broadside throughout the province. To maximize its impact,
Pownall wisely
ordered ministers to read his charity brief from their pulpits.
Churches accounted
for more than one- third of all the money collected to relieve
Boston’s “Sufferers.”
Library of Congress Printed Ephemera Collection.
2020 03:05:50 UTC
bolster the faith of sinners—Mayhew deemed benevolence
toward others
the precondition for sinners’ remediation. “Will it not
particularly become
us to shew our gratitude to God for his distinguishing mercy to

us by chear-
fully imparting of our substance for the relief of our indigent
brethren?” he
asked. Indeed, Mayhew argued that God saved people from the
flames pre-
cisely so that they could help those who had suffered from
them. “It is partly
for their sakes, not wholly for our own,” he concluded, “that our
substance
has been preserved.” 10
To be sure, not all Bostonians who inclined toward providential
thinking
interpreted the fire primarily as God’s call to act benevolently
toward one’s
neighbors. Many Bostonians must have also read the sermons
published by
printers Zachariah Fowle and Samuel Draper, whose post- fire
offerings in-
cluded new editions of works by English clergy who railed
against the sin-
fulness of Londoners after their own great fire in 1666. One of
these repub-
lished sermons was the work of James Janeway, the popular
author of pious
shipwreck narratives, who preached the necessity of worshipful
submission
to the “Great & Dreadful God” who could “plague yet seven
times more for
our Sins” if the reprobate did not repent and seek salvation.
Some fire and
brimstone came from closer to home. Andrew Johonnot, a
Boston distiller,
composed a poem that circulated as a broadside bearing a
woodcut illus-
tration of the burning town. Johonnot described the fire as “the

Rebuke of
goD’s Hand” to a people “Who sin without Remorse, and cast
off Shame /
and pay no Reverence to his holy Name.” For him, the lesson of
the fire was
not the need to help one’s neighbors but rather to tend to one’s
own soul to
prepare for divine judgment.11
Notwithstanding such pronouncements, Pownall’s charity brief,
which
circulated in print and was read by clergy from their pulpits,
helped raise
a significant amount of money. Churches in Massachusetts
collected more
than £5,200, with £1,815 coming from Boston’s congregations.
Private dona-
tions arrived, too, the largest from Christopher Kilby, a Boston
merchant
who had made a fortune provisioning British and colonial forces
during the
ongoing French and Indian War. Kilby donated £200 sterling to
the relief
effort, while Charles W. Apthorp, a New York merchant, “upon
hearing of
the Calamity which had befallen this town,” instructed his agent
in Boston
to contribute £100 “for the Relief of the Sufferers.” 12
Kilby’s and Apthorp’s donations stand out because they were
men-
tioned by name in the Boston town records and reported in
several colonial
newspapers. Their public performances of benevolence mirrored
those of
contemporary British merchants who, having attained great

wealth by their
2020 03:05:50 UTC
commercial activities, engaged in philanthropy and other
nonbusiness pur-
suits to enhance their reputations and social status. By the mid-
eighteenth
century, merchants were prominent as donors in London’s
philanthropic
community, and because so many maintained close (and
profitable) ties
to colonial trading partners, they also contributed money to
assist suffer-
ing colonial communities. In 1760, London merchants sent
£1,000 sterling
to Boston even before news of the fire appeared in British
newspapers. Two
merchants from Bristol, England’s second- largest port, also
authorized their
Boston correspondent, Thomas Greene, to donate £100 sterling
in their
names “for the Relief of the Sufferers” in the coming months.
Such dona-
tions attested to both the influence of the benevolent ideal and
the vitality
of personal business networks.13
Other networks derived from imperial political relationships,
some

of which were wholly centered in North America. Colonial
governors and
other officials often knew each other, having shared military or
adminis-
trative backgrounds and common patrons or acquaintances back
in Lon-
don. Governor Thomas Pownall drew on a remarkable network
of acquain-
tances among his fellow governors, many of whom he met
during his years in
America before he received his governorship. Pownall had come
to America
in 1753 as the private secretary of New York’s new royal
governor, Sir Danvers
Osborn. When Osborn committed suicide a few days after his
arrival in New
York, the suddenly jobless Pownall decided to tour the colonies.
He visited
Philadelphia, Alexandria, Annapolis, New Haven, and
Providence, meet-
ing leading men in these communities, including most colonial
governors.
By 1754, he was back in New York, attending the Albany
Congress as the
guest of Lieutenant Governor James Delancey, who became his
friend and
ally. Such intercolonial conferences became routine in wartime,
and Pow-
nall, who received his appointment as governor of
Massachusetts in 1757,
held a conference of his own for New Englanders in Boston the
following
year. He also collaborated with Governor Charles Lawrence of
Nova Sco-
tia to send supplies and troops to Louisbourg, where victorious
British and

colonial forces won a decisive victory that ended French control
of eastern
Canada in June 1758.14
In the spring of 1760, Pownall drew on these connections to
obtain relief
for Boston. Although some of the governor’s friends and
colleagues in other
provinces may have learned about the fire from their local
newspapers, Pow-
nall also directly solicited aid from his fellow governors and
obtained dona-
tions from colonies where he had established personal
relationships. Lieu-
tenant Governor James Delancey sent £1,875 from New York.
Pennsylvania
2020 03:05:50 UTC
governor James Hamilton, whom Pownall first met in
Philadelphia in 1753,
sent £1,212. Governor Horatio Sharpe of Maryland, who had
hosted Pow-
nall at his elegant Annapolis residence, circulated a charity
brief of his own,
which raised £1,120 for Boston. Smaller sums arrived from the
governors of
Connecticut, New Hampshire, Virginia, and Nova Scotia.15
When Boston’s town meeting convened in mid- May, town

officials re-
ported having received donations totaling more than £13,000
sterling from
various donors, a substantial amount that was roughly
equivalent to one-
fourth of the community’s losses in both real and personal
property. Bos-
tonians believed that the next logical step was to solicit help
from the king
and Parliament. To that end, a petition was drafted, describing
the fire and
the suffering it caused and noting the “care and kindness” of
those who had
already given aid but who were now “unable to bear any
considerable addi-
tion to the heavy load of taxes which for many years past has
fallen on them,”
mostly to help fight the long and costly war. The petitioners,
439 in all, made
their case for relief from London by invoking both the
“compassionate con-
sideration” of the home government and Boston’s own
supposedly unique
value as “the chief strength of the English interest [against the
French and
their Indian allies] on the continent of America, without being
in the least
burthensome to the mother country.” Included with the petition
were affida-
vits attesting to property losses ranging from those of the
merchants Jacob
Wendell and Son (who sought compensation for £5,180 in real
and personal
property) to the claims of poor women such as Sarah Ayers (£1
10s.) and
Martha Barnes (16s.). Town officials voted to send the petition

and its sup-
porting documents to the colony’s agents in London “in order to
make Ap-
plication . . . in such a way and manner as they may think
proper for obtaining
Relief for the poor distress’d Sufferers.” 16
The Bostonians’ “humble Petition” was rejected in London not
least be-
cause of their success in obtaining relief from other sources.
Massachusetts’
colonial agents, merchants William Bollan and John
Thomlinson, submit-
ted the petition, which in July 1761 was read by either the
Board of Trade
or the Lords of the Treasury, who deemed it “not proper to
consent” to the
petitioners’ request. Although the men who considered the
petition did not
record their reasons for rejecting it, the back of the document
includes some
telling notations:
£53354 [sterling] Loss
13317 Charity collected
40,037
2020 03:05:50 UTC
The final number represented the funds Bostonians claimed that

they
still needed to recoup in fire- related costs, which amounted to
roughly
three- quarters of their original total losses. These notations
imply, first, that
imperial officials believed that disaster victims should not
expect full com-
pensation for their losses and, second, that because Bostonians
had already
received substantial “Charity” from other sources, their
situation was not
sufficiently dire to warrant imperial largesse. In other words,
officials in Lon-
don concluded that Bostonians and their governor were
primarily respon-
sible for managing the fire and its consequences because they
had, in fact,
fulfilled that function so effectively.17
But the larger imperial context in which officials considered the
Bos-
ton petition was also significant, as was the mounting expense
of a war that
had lasted many years and was being waged on five continents.
Although
the British won decisive victories that effectively ended French
rule in both
North America and India, the war nearly doubled the national
debt and
placed huge financial burdens on residents of the British Isles,
who paid
more than twenty times the taxes levied on colonists in
America. Boston’s
request for aid at a time when the British government was
struggling to meet
its financial obligations was likely to fail, especially given the

New England-
ers’ reputation as smugglers and tax evaders. Ultimately, no
additional aid
was forthcoming from the seat of empire, though the news from
Boston may
have inspired George Whitefield, the famed revivalist, to donate
the pro-
ceeds of one of his sermons to Boston’s relief effort in early
1761.18
Transatlantic sources of imperial relief figured more
prominently in the
aftermath of the Montreal fire of 18 May 1765, which led to
robust debates
over the appropriate uses of philanthropy and the
responsibilities of afflu-
ent Britons toward the king’s new subjects in formerly French
Canada. De-
struction from the Montreal fire was roughly comparable to that
in Boston,
with an estimated £87,580 in property losses and 215 families
left homeless,
though in Montreal “8 or 9 sick Persons in the Grey Sisters
Nunnery were
burnt to death” and another man “was burnt in his own House.”
Montreal,
like Boston, had a history of frequent fires, the most serious of
which oc-
curred in 1695, 1721, and 1734. Otherwise, Boston and
Montreal were very dif-
ferent places. Whereas Bostonians were relatively homogeneous
and civic-
minded, residents of recently conquered Montreal included a
small number
of British newcomers—mostly merchants and soldiers, groups
that were

mutually antagonistic—and the French majority. Montreal also
lacked local
institutions that could mobilize to aid fire victims because after
the British
takeover, local government was in a state of flux and the role of
the Catholic
2020 03:05:50 UTC
Church, so powerful under the French regime, was uncertain.
Montreal had
no fire company, no fire engine, and no printing press. The
province’s first
and only newspaper, the bilingual Quebec Gazette, began
publishing in the
capital, distant Quebec City, less than a year earlier, around the
time that the
entire province, which had been under military rule since 1760,
acquired a
new civilian government that consisted of only a royal governor
and an ap-
pointed council, with no representative assembly.19
The fact that the fire began in the house of merchant John
Livingston
and then spread rapidly “where the …
Create an Annotated Bibliography
Using your research question, working thesis, and outline from
Assignment 1.2, create an annotated bibliography that provides

a synopsis of your sources and an explanation of how you will
use them.
Below your assignment, include answers to all of the following
reflection questions.
1. Accurately recording bibliographic information is essential
and saves you time, as you can transfer this information to the
References page of your drafted essay. Each source entry should
include a brief summary of the source as well as 3-4 sentences
describing how you intend to use that source to build or support
your argument. Discuss how your annotated bibliography meets
these criteria. (2-3 sentences)
2. Which strategies were most helpful for you when searching
for credible sources? (2-3 sentences)
3. What difficulties did you face while searching for credible
sources? How did you overcome these difficulties? (2-3
sentences)
Guidelines
Refer to the list below throughout the writing process. Do not
submit your Touchstone until it meets these guidelines.
1. Annotated Bibliography
Make sure to:
❒ Alphabetize the entries, according to APA style.
❒ Include the required bibliographic information in APA format
for each entry.
❒ Include 3-4 sentences for each entry that provide a short
summary of the source and how you plan to use it to support
your argument.
❒ Include at least seven entries in your annotated bibliography,
all of which must be credible, academic sources.
❒ Choose your own sources, but use no more than three
websites (there is no limit on the number of online journals
used).
❒ Thoroughly check the formatting requirements for the
different source types.
❒ Indicate the required sources (book, peer-reviewed journal,
newspaper/magazine, and credible website) by including the

source type in parentheses after the relevant entry.
2. Reflection
❒ Have you displayed a clear understanding of the research
activities?
❒ Have you answered all reflection questions thoughtfully and
included insights, observations, and/or examples in all
responses?
❒ Are your answers included on a separate page below the main
assignment?
The "Great Fire" of 1740 and the Politics of Disaster Relief in
Colonial Charleston
Author(s): Matthew Mulcahy
Source: The South Carolina Historical Magazine, Vol. 99, No. 2
(Apr., 1998), pp. 135-157
Published by: South Carolina Historical Society
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/27570297
Accessed: 12-05-2020 03:14 UTC
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2020 03:14:44 UTC
THE "GREAT FIRE" OF 1740
AND THE POLITICS OF DISASTER RELIEF IN
COLONIAL CHARLESTON
Matthew Mulcahy*
FIRES WERE A CONSTANT THREAT TO CITIES IN
COLONIAL
British America. With mostly wooden buildings crowded along
narrow
streets and back alleys, urban places like Boston, New York,
and Charleston
were literally firetraps. Once a fire got started, it could ? and
often did ?
spread quickly beyond the best efforts to control it. Colonial
cities routinely
passed laws regulating the materials used in the construction of
buildings
and mandating frequent chimney cleanings (defective chimneys
were a
common cause of urban conflagrations), but the problem of
fires actually
worsened over the course of the eighteenth century as more and

more
people crowded into the port cities.1
Historians have long recognized the extent to which fires
plagued
colonial urban areas. Large-scale fires were important and
dramatic events
in the histories of individual cities, and few urban histories fail
to describe
major conflagrations and the panic they created among
residents. Likewise,
scholars have documented the tremendous damage caused by
fires and the
various (and often ineffective) measures taken to control their
outbreak.2
Surprisingly, however, few historians have examined what
happened after
the flames were extinguished and, in particular, what relief was
provided
to those who had lost property and personal belongings.
Residents of
colonial cities routinely received food and money in the wake
of fires and
other disasters, but we know relatively little about how much
aid was
distributed, who received it, or how helpful it was in restoring
order to
^Doctoral candidate, Department of History, University of
Minnesota.
:Carl Bridenbaugh, Cities in the Wilderness: The First Century
of Urban Life in
America, 1625-1742 (New York: Ronald Press Co., 1938), pp.
205-209, 364.

2The best and most thorough account of fires (and other
catastrophes) that
struck colonial cities remains Carl Bridenbaugh's two-volume
study: Cities in the
Wilderness and Cities in Revolt: Urban Life in America, 1743-
1776 (New York: Knopf,
1955). Boston and Charleston were particularly hard hit by
fires, and several books
discuss specific conflagrations. For Boston, see G.B. Warden,
Boston, 1625-1776
(Boston: Little, Brown, 1970). For Charleston, see George
Rogers, Jr., Charleston in the
Age of the Pinckneys (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press,
1969) and Walter J.
Fraser, Jr., Charleston! Charleston! The History of a Southern
City (Columbia: University
of South Carolina Press, 1989).
South Carolina Historical Magazine 99, No. 2 (April 1998)
2020 03:14:44 UTC
136 SOUTH CAROLINA HISTORICAL MAGAZINE
people's lives.3
This paper begins to answer some of these questions by
examining
relief efforts following the "great fire" of 1740 in Charleston,
South Carolina.

The fire of 1740 was one of the worst in any city during the
colonial period
and it offers a good opportunity to explore how an individual
city responded
to a major disaster. It also raises questions concerning the
nature of "relief7
broadly defined. Most studies of relief focus on efforts directed
at the poor
in various colonies and cities, and there is considerable debate
among
historians about the nature of this aid in Charleston and other
cities. Some
scholars have argued that relief reflected a genuine concern for
the poor,
while others have seen it as a form of social control. Relief
efforts following
the 1740 fire do not fit neatly into either category. Aid in
Charleston came
initially from local, and mostly private, sources. Individuals
contributed
what they could to assist their neighbors in a spirit of
benevolence. Within
a few months, this assistance was supplemented by money from
the local
government, and later from neighboring colonies. In each case,
the funds
were distributed to the most needy in the city, although the
most needy
were not necessarily the city's poorest residents. Relief was
directed toward
those who were impoverished by the fire rather than those who
were simply
poor.4

The king of England and Parliament eventually supplanted
these local
efforts with a relief grant of ?20,000 sterling. The grant made
Charleston
unique among colonial cities: it appears to be the first and only
time the
English government provided significant disaster relief to any
of its American
3Gary Nash looks briefly at relief following the 1760 fire in
Boston, but does not
offer much detail on how relief was organized or the process by
which it was
distributed. See Nash, The Urban Crucible: Social Change,
Political Consciousness, and
the Origins of the American Revolution (Cambridge, Mass.:
Harvard University Press,
1979), pp. 245-246. Likewise, Warden notes the sources of
relief, but offers no
analysis of who received aid, or how much. See Warden,
Boston, pp. 149-150.
4There has been one previous study of relief in Charleston
following the 1740
fire, but it is essentially a short description of the fire and a list
of those who received
money from the Parliamentary grant. See Kenneth Scott,
"Sufferers in the Charleston
Fire of 1740," South Carolina Historical Magazine 64 (October
1963), pp. 201-211. There
is a large literature on poor relief in colonial America. Two
studies that look at
Charleston in particular are Barbara Bellows, Benevolence
Among Slaveholders: Assisting

the Poor in Charleston, 1670-1860 (Baton Rouge: Louisiana
State University Press,
1993); and Walter Fraser, Jr., 'The City Elite, 'Disorder/ and
the Poor Children of
Revolutionary Charleston," South Carolina Historical Magazine
84 (July 1983), pp.
167-179. Bellows argues that elites were generally
compassionate and attempted to
ease the suffering of their less fortunate neighbors. Fraser sees
a darker side and
argues that elites used poor relief as a means of social control.
2020 03:14:44 UTC
THE GREAT FIRE OF 1740 AND DISASTER RELIEF 137
colonies prior to the Revolution.5 Carolina officials requested
the money for
the "relief of the poor sufferers by fire/' but not all sufferers
benefitted from
the grant. Instead, the majority of the money was distributed
among the
wealthiest and most prominent individuals in the city, which
helps explain
why Charleston was the recipient of Parliament's largesse. The
fire was the
last in a series of crises that struck the colony in the late 1730s,
and, with the
threat of war with Spain looming, the security of the colony
and of the elites'
position atop the social hierarchy appeared in jeopardy.

Parliament's
unprecedented disaster relief was granted as much to stabilize ?
militarily,
politically, and economically ? a floundering city and colony as
it was to
aid victims of a fire. Thus the money was intended to help
''control" society,
but it did so by supporting elites rather than regulating the
poor.
DURING THE EARLY PART OF THE EIGHTEENTH
CENTURY,
Charleston emerged as "one of the most flourishing towns in
America." As
the hub of the lowcountry trade in naval stores, deerskins,
slaves, and, later,
rice, and buoyed by the rising Carolina economy in the first
decades of the
eighteenth century, Charleston grew rapidly. Its population
expanded
from 1,200 persons in 1700 to more than 6,300 by 1740, and
the city itself was
transformed from a struggling outpost into a major American
port. Several
public buildings were constructed, most notably St. Philip's
Church. Eight
wharves served ships calling from Bristol, Bridgetown, and
Boston, and
warehouses sprung up along the Ashley River to store the trade
goods that
brought prosperity to Charleston and the surrounding
Lowcountry. Along
the city's main thoroughfares, wealthy merchants and planters
built
increasingly large private homes, more and more of which were
constructed

of brick rather than wood, testaments to the power and
privilege of their
owners.6
The rise of Charleston, however, was not a tale of linear
development.
5Boston received a good deal of aid from England following
the 1760 fire, but
it came from private sources, mostly London merchants who
had trading connections
to the city. See Warden, Boston, pp. 149-150. The next
important English relief effort
after the fire that I have been able to locate was the money
granted to Barbados and
Jamaica following the devastating hurricanes in 1780. See
Richard B. Sheridan, "The
Crisis of Slave Subsistence in the British West Indies during
and after the American
Revolution" William and Mary Quarterly 33 Third Series
(October 1976), pp. 615-641.
6Quotation in "Letter from Charleston," Gentleman's Magazine
(January 1741),
p. 55. Much of the above is drawn from Peter Coclanis,
particularly the introductory
essay "The Sociology of Architecture in Colonial Charleston"
in The Shadow of a
Dream: Economic Life and Death in the South Carolina
Lowcountry, 1670-1920 (New
York: Oxford University Press, 1989), pp. 3-11. See also
Rogers, Charleston in the Age
of the Pinckneys; John McCusker and Russell Menard, The
Economy of British America,
1607-1789 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press,
1985), especially Chapter

8, "The Lower South."
2020 03:14:44 UTC
It would be more accurate to speak of the repeated rises of
Charleston, since
the city was destroyed by various disasters and rebuilt on
several occasions,
beginning with the hurricane of 1690. Hurricanes struck again
in 1700,1713,
and 1728, each "overthrowing many houses and overflowing
the town."
Hurricanes were a seasonal fear, but fires were a constant
threat. In 1698 a
small fire consumed part of the city, and two days later a
terrible earthquake
shook Charleston. Roughly fifty buildings in the town were
damaged or
destroyed between the two misfortunes. Fire struck again in
1699, destroying
more than ?30,000 of goods and property, and just as residents
recovered
from this blaze, another one hit in 1700. This series of disasters
gave English
colonists and their London backers good reason to wonder
about the
stability and future prospects of the settlement.7 After an
interlude of
relative calm, major fires broke out in the 1730s, once again
bringing

damage and distress to the city and its inhabitants.
As destructive as these calamities were, none compared to what
residents
came to call the "Great Fire" of 1740. Charleston's most
devastating disaster
of the colonial period began in the afternoon of November 18.
An accident
in a hatter's shop ignited the blaze, and from that small
beginning, flames
spread rapidly across the city. It had been hot and dry along the
southern
coast for several weeks, and the fire found ready fuel among
Charleston's
wooden buildings, leaping from one to another with an
"astonishing
violence and fierceness." Strong winds fanned the flames
throughout the
day, and as the blaze intensified, panic in the city increased.
The streets were
filled with terror-stricken individuals and families, some
rushing to escape
burning homes, a few vainly attempting to stop the blaze from
spreading,
and still others running in and out of fiery buildings
desperately trying to
save what personal belongings they could before their homes
were engulfed.8
The South-Carolina Gazette reported that "inhabitants of all
ranks"
worked together "with Care and Diligence" to fight the fire, but
other
accounts paint a more chaotic picture. While some other cities,
most notably
Philadelphia, had formed fire brigades, Charleston had no

organized
7John Bartram, quoted in David Ludlum, Early American
Hurricanes (Boston:
American Meteorological Society, 1963), pp. 41-42. See also
Jeanne A. Calhoun, The
Scouring Wrath of God: Early Hurricanes in Charleston, 17 00-
1804 (Charleston, S.C: The
Charleston Museum, 1983; Leaflet No. 29); Bridenbaugh,
Cities in the Wilderness, p.
212.
8The claim that the fires started in a hatter's shop appears in an
account printed
in the Pennsylvania Gazette, Jan. 29, 1741; South-Carolina
Gazette, Nov. 20, 1740
(quotation). Other accounts of the fire appear in "Letter from
Charles-Town," p. 55;
Robert Pringle to Andrew Pringle, Nov. 22,1740, in Walter
Edgar, ed., The Letterbook
of Robert Pringle (Columbia: University of South Carolina
Press, 1972), Vol. 1, pp. 271
273 (hereafter Letterbook); and in Alexander Hewatt, An
Historical Account of the Rise
and Progress of the Colonies of South Carolina and Georgia
(London: Alexander Donaldson,
1779), Vol. 2, pp. 83-84.
2020 03:14:44 UTC

means of dealing with fires. There were fire wardens in the
city, and
individuals were expected to have leather buckets and hooks at
the ready
if a blaze broke out, but such efforts were rarely coordinated,
and even less
often effective. The fire-fighting efforts in 1740 provided clear
evidence of
the penalties for such disorganization. In the early hours of the
blaze,
individual residents tried to rescue personal belongings rather
than control
the flames, and there was no coordinated effort by officials to
form a fire
fighting force. It was only with the arrival of disciplined
British troops from
ships stationed in the harbor that enough houses were torn
down to halt the
spread of flames. If residents could have been prevailed upon
to work
collectively, perhaps there would have been less damage.
Instead, the fire
burned a wide swath across Charleston, destroying more than
300 homes
and businesses in the central part of the city, which was,
according to the
merchant Robert Pringle, "the most valuable part of the town
on account of
the Buildings and Trade." Warehouses along the docks filled
with that
year's rice crop went up in flames, and one anonymous writer,
in a letter to
London, estimated that "7 or 8,000 deerskins, above 200 tons
of Braziletto
wood," and numerous other goods were also lost. The streets of

Charleston
in the wake of the fire presented a "dismal schene which much
surpassed
anything I ever saw," wrote Pringle. He and others estimated
the total
damages in the city at ?250,000 sterling. "From one of the most
flourishing
towns in America," commented one observer, "Charleston is at
once
reduced to ashes."9
The fire left hundreds in the city homeless. Reports indicate
that two
and sometimes three families crowded into the surviving
houses. Even
wealthy merchants like Pringle were forced into cramped
accommodations.
Two months after the fire, Pringle informed one correspondent
that he was
"still in part of the House near the Custom House at a small
Charge, but not
Convienent for Business. However as there is no Help for it
must be Content
till I can provide myself Better."10 Others without the means to
pay rent
relied on the generosity of neighbors until they could find
money or did
9South-Carolina Gazette, Nov. 20,1740 (first quotation). Hooks
were used to help
pull down houses in hopes of stopping the spread of fires. The
fire wardens of the
city made an inspection of inhabitants just six months prior to
the blaze to insure that
all homes were equipped with buckets and hooks, but it made
little difference in

November. South-Carolina Gazette, May 10, 1740. For a
discussion of early fire
fighting techniques, see Bridenbaugh, Cities in the Wilderness,
pp. 212, 364-372.
Robert Pringle to Andrew Pringle, Nov. 22,1740, in Letterbook,
Vol. 1, p. 272 (second
quotation). The writer in the Gentleman s Magazine estimated
that the loss in
buildings alone was ?100,000 sterling. "Letter from Charles-
Town," p. 55 (third
quotation). For accounts of disorder in the streets, see South-
Carolina Gazette, Nov.
20,1740; Robert Pringle to Andrew Pringle, Nov. 22,1740, in
Letterbook, Vol. 1, pp.
271-273.
10Robert Pringle to Andrew Pringle, Dec. 29,1740, in
Letterbook, Vol. 1, p. 283.
2020 03:14:44 UTC
The 1740 fire, according to the November 13, 1740 South-
Carolina Gazette,
"consumed the Houses from Broad-Street and Church-Street
down to
Granville's Bastion.... The Fire likewise consumed all the
Houses on the West
side of Church-Street, from Broad-Street to Tradd-Street,
opposite to Coll.
Brewton's." Above, Broad Street is on the right (H marks the

Exchange
Building), Church Street the horizontal street through the
middle of this map.
Granville's Bastion is marked Q. "The Ichnography of Charles-
Town at High
Water" (1739) from the collections of the South Carolina
Historical Society.
2020 03:14:44 UTC
without shelter.
People burnt out by the fire began to seek aid as soon as the
flames were
extinguished. Those most destitute turned to St. Philip's Church
for relief.
Unlike other colonial cities, Charleston had no formal city
government until
1783. Instead, city services such as poor relief were
administered through
church parishes, which in Charleston meant St. Philip's. The
vestry of the
parish met regularly to distribute aid or review cases of persons
seeking
admission to the almshouse. But the extent of damage caused
by the fire
called for special measures. Dozens of residents were lined up
outside the
door in need of immediate aid. The vestry met two days after
the fire, on

November 20, and decided to "meet daily at 10 of the clock in
the morning
to distribute [money] amongst the most nesessitious [sic]."11
The most pressing issue for the vestry was raising money to
distribute
to the "sufferers." Regular poor relief was collected through a
yearly tax; on
occasions when tax revenues fell short of demand, the vestry
petitioned the
General Assembly for additional funds. The 1740 fire
overwhelmed the
available moneys, however, and vestry leaders hoped that
government
funds would be allocated quickly. The Assembly was aware of
the
suffering, and it passed an immediate bill allocating ?188
(?1,500 currency)
to St. Philip's for relief efforts.12 Although the bill worked its
way through
government channels with relative speed, the money did not
appear in the
vestry account books or, more importantly, in the hands of
victims, until the
following February.
Immediate relief money came instead from private citizens.
William
Bull, the lieutenant governor of the colony, was the first to
help, donating
?13 (?100 currency) "for the present Relief of such poor People
who have
been ruined by the late dreadful fire" and others soon followed.
The vestry
appointed two or three members to review individual requests
for aid, and

they decided to distribute what money they had "until a further
supply can
be Collected." The initial grants were small. On the first day, a
total of only
?7 (?55 currency) was distributed, and no single grant was
more than ?3 (?20
currency). Over the next several days, money continued to
trickle in, and
"For a general history of poor relief, see Bellows, Benevolence
Among Slaveholders,
pp. 1 -20. Minutes of the Vestry of St. Philip's Parish, Nov.
20,1740 (quotation), South
Caroliniana Library, University of South Carolina, Columbia,
S.C.
12J.H. Easterby, ed., Journal of the Commons House of
Assembly, 1739-1741 (Columbia:
University of South Carolina Press, 1951), pp. 407, 412, 415.
The money was
approved by both the Council and Assembly by November 21,
but the vestry records
indicate that the money was not distributed until February
2,1741. All money is
listed as pounds sterling unless otherwise noted. The 1740
exchange rate to sterling
was roughly 8 to 1, while the 1742 rate (when Parliament's
grant was distributed)
was roughly 7 to 1. See John McCusker, Money and Exchange
in Europe and America,
1600-1775: A Handbook (Chapel Hill: University of North
Carolina Press, 1978), p.
223.

2020 03:14:44 UTC
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People burnt out by the fire began to seek aid as soon as the
flames were
extinguished. Those most destitute turned to St. Philip's Church
for relief.
Unlike other colonial cities, Charleston had no formal city
government until
1783. Instead, city services such as poor relief were
administered through
church parishes, which in Charleston meant St. Philip's.
Engraving of St.
Philip's from The Gentleman's Magazine, June 1753, from the
collections of
the South Carolina Historical Society.
2020 03:14:44 UTC

relief was redistributed to those in need, but grants remained
limited by
donations. No grant was larger than ?6, and the average grant
over the first
two weeks was about ?3.13 The size of the grants indicates the
money was
intended for immediate relief, particularly to allow sufferers to
purchase
food and other essentials, or to pay for small rented rooms
while they
awaited more permanent shelter.
Private donations continued to be the only source of relief in
the city for
the next several weeks, but as time passed, more and larger
donations
arrived to aid victims of the blaze. Indeed, private efforts
provided
surprisingly large amounts of money and supplies. St. Philip's
Parish
turned over money collected at a Fast Day service totaling
more than ?85 on
November 28, and contributed a regular Sunday collection of
?8 on December
1. An additional ?18 was collected from donations to the vestry
after the
Sunday service. Parish officials likewise sought out their
counterparts in
neighboring parishes for help, and the response was heartening.
St.
Andrew's Parish collected more than ?45 and other parishes
forwarded
smaller, but still significant, amounts of money and/or food.
Individual
citizens also continued to give directly to St. Philip's in

amounts ranging
from a ?4 gold piece donated by "a person who desired his
Name might be
conceiled [sic]" to the ?6 gift of the local Free Mason Lodge to
the ?188
(?1,500 currency) donated by the wealthy planter and merchant
Gabriel
Manigault. All told, almost ?471 (?3,766 currency) was donated
to St.
Philip's between November 20, 1740, and February 18, 1741,
by private,
local sources.14 This money dwarfed regular poor relief
expenditures in the
city, which averaged roughly ?175 a year from 1734 to 1740
(see Table 1).
WHO RECEIVED THIS AID? THOUGH ALL RESIDENTS OF
Charleston ? rich and poor, black and white, male and female ?
were
affected by the blaze, not all of them received assistance from
St. Philip's.
Unfortunately, we cannot tell a great deal about those who
came to the
church for help, but we can draw at least a few generalizations
from the
existing data. First, recipients were not among Charleston's
elite. No one
asking for money from St. Philip's was serving or would serve
as a member
13Vestry Minutes (SCL), Nov. 20, 1740 (first and second
quotations). The
average grant was ?20.8 currency. A total of ?135 (?1,080
currency) was given out
to fifty-two individuals or heads of households from November

20 through December
4,1740. Vestry Minutes (SCL).
14Christ Church and Goose Creek parishes contributed ?2 (?14
currency) and
?18 (?142 currency) respectively. Vestry Minutes (SCL), Dec.
2,1740; Jan. 21,1741;
Nov. 25 (quotation) and 29,1740, and Feb. 18,1741. The?471
figure does not include
the ?188 from the Assembly. With that money included, the
total is ?659 (roughly
?5,266 currency). The last donations appear in February
records, but "fire money"
continued to be distributed in small amounts through January
1742. Vestry Minutes
(SCL), Nov. 20,1740; Feb. 18,1741; Jan. 25,1742.
2020 03:14:44 UTC
TABLE 1:
PUBLIC RELIEF EXPENDITURES IN
CHARLESTON, 1734-1740, BY GRANT TYPE AND YEAR
Type Year Amount (in Currency) Amount (in Sterling)
Poor 1734 ?1,000 ?125
1735 ?1,500 ?188
1736 ?1,600 ?200

1737 ?1,000 ?125
1738 ?1,500 ?188
1739 ?1,528 ?191
1740 ?1,825 ?228
average ?1,422 ?178
Fire 1740-1741 ?3,766* ?471
* Does not include ?1,500 grant (currency) from Assembly.
Source: Minutes of the Vestry of St. Philips Parish, Vol.1,
South Caroliniana
Library, University of South Carolina, Columbia, S.C.
of the Assembly, which, as we shall see, was clearly not the
case with those
who received money from the Parliamentary grant. Moreover,
few of the
names appearing in the vestry records appear on the Parliament
list: only
eighteen of the 171 people filing petitions received any aid
from St. Philip's.
The absence of elites was mirrored by an absence of the truly
destitute.
It is difficult to determine the occupation or status of many of
the names
listed, and while some recipients were surely in impoverished
circumstances
prior to the blaze, it seems most were not drawn from
Charleston's "lower
sort." The population of poor people was growing in Charleston
at the end
of the 1730s. Official reports noted an increase in "idle" and
"vagrant"
people, and the general economic distress in the city following

the blaze no
doubt had an impact on the poor. Why they don't appear in the
vestry
records is unclear. It is likely the poor were not considered
worthy of
assistance because the fire was not the cause of their condition.
The vestry
records often included language such as "burnt out," and
"suffer'd by fire"
after names, indicating both that the individual had some
property destroyed
by the blaze and that officials were careful to distribute aid
only to victims
of the fire. It is also conceivable that at the time of the
conflagration, some
of the poor already were receiving aid in the recently erected
poorhouse in
the city, and did not seek additional aid from the vestry.
Finally, it is
possible that the poor were granted money, but that vestry
officials did not
note the names of individuals who were given less than ?5
currency (the
2020 03:14:44 UTC
smallest grant noted) or who received non-monetary aid. The
latter was
clearly the case on two occasions when the records indicate
that one barrel

of rice was distributed to "sundry poor people."15 Regardless,
few recipients
overall were identified as being "poor" prior to the blaze.
Instead, most recipients appear to have come from more
middling
ranks of society, although perhaps from the lower end of those
ranks. Most
seem to have had some livelihood or means of support prior to
the blaze;
many were small artisans or shopkeepers who lost everything in
the fire and
were reduced to poverty or near-poverty. John Scott, for
example, was a
gunsmith in the city who sought aid from the vestry twice for a
total of ?4
(?30 currency) and one barrel of rice. Other artisans, including
a carpenter,
a hatter, and a goldsmith, likewise received aid on more than
one occasion.
It must have been difficult for these men to come to the door of
St. Philip's.
Poor relief in the eighteenth century was associated with
failure and
dependence, and skilled artisans were likely in dire
circumstances if they
sought aid. Many struggled to maintain …
■ 1755: The Lisbon earthquake
Earthquake
Date: November 1, 1755
Place: Lisbon, Portugal

Magnitude: In the 8.0 range on the Richter scale (estimated), X
for
the central city and IX for the outskirts on the Modified
Mercalli
scale (estimated)
Result: 5,000-50,000 or more dead
During the eighteenth century Portugal enjoyed one ofits
greatest periods of wealth and prosperity. Gold had
been discovered in its colony of Brazil, which held the largest
depos-
its then known of this precious metal. Moreover, extensive
diamond
fields were also found there. The greater part of this wealth
flowed to
the mother country and concentrated principally in the capital,
Lis-
bon.
The population of Portugal was almost 3 million, with about 10
percent residing in Lisbon. This city, on the north bank of the
Tagus
River, was situated where the river, flowing from the northeast,
bent
gradually to the west and entered the Atlantic. The city was
shaped
like an amphitheater. It was flat in its central area, where the
ports, to-
gether with the major commercial and royal government
buildings,
were located. In the low hills rising and arching around the
center
were houses, shops, churches, monasteries, and convents. A
magnet

of world trade, the city housed a cosmopolitan population. In
addi-
tion, an exceptionally large proportion of its populace were
mem-
bers of the Catholic clergy and religious orders.
Quake, Fire, Flood. The serenity and assurance of this city were
irrevocably shaken on November 1, 1755, the holy day of All
Saints.
An earthquake of unprecedented strength and consequences
struck
the city, leaving it by dusk a broken ruin of its former self. For
about
ten minutes during midmorning the earth shook, rolled, and col-
lapsed underneath the city three times. The shaking was so
severe
that the damage extended throughout southern Portugal and
Spain
and across the Strait of Gibraltar into Morocco.
380
Co
py
ri
gh
t
©
2
00
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EBSCO Publishing : eBook High School Collection
(EBSCOhost) - printed on 5/13/2020 8:25 PM via SAM
HOUSTON STATE UNIV
AN: 201907 ; Carmichael, Robert S., Bradford, Marlene.;
Notable Natural Disasters
Account: s3268531
Near the port area, the quake leveled numerous major buildings
and destroyed the royal palace. The king was not, however, in
resi-
dence. Many of the city’s over 100 religious buildings were
damaged
or leveled. Because it was a holy day and Lisbon was known for
its reli-
gious fervor, most churches were filled with morning
worshipers.
They were crushed under the crashing walls and roofs.
Aftershocks at
almost hourly intervals caused further damage. Indeed,
aftershocks
of less frequent intervals but great violence would continue well
into

the next year.
Fires began to appear in the city, progressively becoming a
general
381
1755: The Lisbon earthquake
Tangier
La Coruna
Braga
Coimbra
Covilha
Bilbao
Malaga
Salamanca
Cordoba
Sevilla
Valladolid
Porto
Madrid
Lisbon

SPAIN
PORTUGAL
MOROCCO
Rio Douro
R
i
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d
o
aGu
ana
Tagus River
Atlantic
Ocean
Strait of Gibraltar
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Account: s3268531
conflagration fed by a northeast wind. Lasting for almost a
week,
these fires charred part of the outskirts and the entire central
part of
the city. Their damage was the costliest because they destroyed
the
contents of opulent churches and palaces, consuming paintings,
manuscripts, books, and tapestries.
In a final assault, three seismic waves from the sea struck the
cen-
tral harbor and coastal area just before midday. Some of these

tsuna-
mis towered at over 20 feet. What the quake had not shaken nor
fires
destroyed, water in crashing cascades now leveled. Thus, within
a few
morning hours, quake, fire, and flood had destroyed one of the
ma-
jor ports of Europe.
Deaths from this destruction were, in the days immediately
follow-
ing the events, estimated to be as high as 50,000 or more. A
systematic,
contemporary attempt through parish surveys to account for the
dead
was unsuccessful due to its uneven application. Modern
estimates now
go as low as 5,000 or 15,000 for the fatalities from this disaster.
However, not only death but also fear, hunger, and disease fol-
lowed the destruction. To flee the conflagration and repeated
trem-
ors, thousands tried to escape the city for the countryside,
struggling
over blocked roads and passages. Prisoners escaped from jails
and as-
saulted the living and the dead. Food could not be brought into
the
city. The thousands who had been injured but not killed
languished
without care, hospitals having been destroyed and caregivers
having
fled or been killed. Infectious diseases began to spread.
Rebuilding. The king’s principal minister, Sebastião de Car-
valho, later known as the Marquis of Pombal, energetically took

con-
trol of recovery and rebuilding. Public health needed immediate
at-
tention. Bodies that had not burned in the fires were collected
onto
boats that were sunk in the Tagus. The army was called in to put
out
fires and clear streets and passages of debris. Anyone caught
stealing
was immediately executed. Prices for food and building
materials
were fixed. Field tents for shelter and feeding were erected.
The reconstructors of the city gave priority to replanning its
lay-
out. The new plan eliminated the old twisting, narrow streets.
The
flat central part of the city was redesigned to have straight
streets that
crossed at right angles in a grid pattern. These streets were 60
to 40
feet wide. Near the harbor area a spacious plaza was built,
called
Commerce Square.
382
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Account: s3268531
To expedite construction, buildings were prefabricated. The
sizes
of doors, windows, and walls were standardized. To protect
these build-
ings against future earthquakes, their inner frames were made of
wood
that could sway but not break under pressure. The style of
building for

these structures was a kind of simple or plain baroque and came
to be
known as “pombaline.” These buildings were made according to
the
most advanced standards of hygiene so that there was adequate
circu-
lation of air and measures for sanitation. Because of the great
wealth
that Portugal commanded from its colonies, principally Brazil,
Lisbon
and other Portuguese cities recovered relatively quickly.
Consequences. One consequence of the Lisbon earthquake was
that as the result of the extensive rebuilding, the city’s port and
cen-
tral area came to be among the best planned and constructed in
eigh-
teenth century Europe. Another consequence affected economic
nationalism. Great Britain dominated Portuguese imports of
manu-
factured goods. Indeed, much of the wealth that Portugal
received
from Brazil passed to English hands due to these purchases of
British
goods. To pay for the rebuilding, a tax was placed on the import
of
certain British products. This measure sought not only to raise
reve-
383
A 1755 engraving titled The Ruins of Lisbon shows a tent city
outside the quake-
ravaged port, criminal activity, and wrongdoers being hanged.

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Account: s3268531

nue for reconstruction but also to make British goods more
expen-
sive and thereby encourage the production of native Portuguese
products at a relatively lower price.
The consequences of the earthquake were felt not only in terms
of
engineering and economics but also in theology and philosophy.
In
fact, it was in these areas that the quake had its most resonant
social
significance. No sooner had the quake struck than the clergy of
Lis-
bon began preaching that the disaster represented the wrath of
God
striking against the city’s sinful inhabitants. So strong was the
fervor
of these preachers that they aroused parts of the populace into
par-
oxysms of hysterical fear. This hysteria made dealing with the
crisis in
an organized, rational manner difficult. The civil authorities
begged
the clergy not to preach such fear, but their admonitions were
only
somewhat successful.
Western Europe as a whole was in the midst of a period known
as
the Enlightenment, or Age of Reason. Pombal, with his rational,
utili-
tarian views of government, was representative of this
movement.
Confronting the religious hysteria, reasonable men argued that
the
Lisbon earthquake needed to be studied not as a supernatural

event
but as a natural one. They demonstrated that thunder and
lightning
were known to be natural events, so an earthquake should also
be
considered as such. The Lisbon earthquake thus prompted a
great
debate between the emerging rational forces of the modern age
and
the declining religious emotions of the medieval.
A further philosophical debate also occurred among those who
were followers of the Enlightenment. Many of them believed
that in a
reasoned, organized world everything happened for the best.
Thus,
they explained that while the earthquake in Lisbon was a
horrible di-
saster, it nonetheless resulted in a rebuilt and modernized city.
Others argued that one could not be so sanguine and optimistic
about the world. Among the leading voices of this point of view
was
the French philosopher and poet Voltaire. In a long poem
written im-
mediately after the earthquake and in a later, famous novel,
Candide
(1759; English translation, 1759), he argued that the Lisbon
tragedy
proved the existence of irrational, totally unbeneficial evil in
the
world.
Voltaire’s hero, Candide, voyages the world, traveling
throughout
Europe, America, and Asia, encountering perils and dangers at

b
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HOUSTON STATE UNIV

Account: s3268531
corner. He is in Lisbon during the earthquake. Numerous times
he
or his friends are tortured or almost killed. People around them
lead
miserable lives. He pursues a girl for a love that is ultimately
futile. Ac-
companying Candide is a teacher, the philosopher Pangloss,
who be-
lieves that everything that happens in the world happens for the
best.
Pangloss adheres to this belief to the end of the novel, despite
all the
horrors he witnesses. Ultimately, therefore, the reader of
Candide
learns that the superficiality and rigidity of the thought of
Pangloss
and people like him betray the inherent error of their position.
Voltaire maintained that it was naïve and self-serving to say
that
evil was always balanced by good. There were people
everywhere who
suffered for no reason and who would never be compensated for
their suffering. He argued that those who believed that
everything
that happened was for the best were those who wanted to keep
things
as they were, who wanted acceptance of the status quo. Such an
atti-
tude ignored those who suffered under the conditions of the
present

and failed to respond effectively to alleviate their suffering. If
ig-
nored over a long period, such suffering could prove unbearable
and
violent. In relation to these arguments it should be noted that
less
than half a century after the Lisbon earthquake, the suffering
and
outrage of these masses burst forth against the Old Regime in
the
French Revolution.
The Lisbon earthquake resounded in Europe not only as a physi-
cal event but also as a cultural one. Its force shook not only the
earth
but also men’s minds, in terms of old and new ideas.
Edward A. Riedinger
For Further Information:
Braun, Theodore E. D., and John B. Radner, eds. The Lisbon
Earth-
quake of 1755: Representations and Reactions. Oxford,
England: Vol-
taire Foundation, 2005.
Brooks, Charles B. Disaster at Lisbon: The Great Earthquake of
1755.
Long Beach, Calif.: Shangton Longley Press, 1994.
Davison, Charles. Great Earthquakes, with 122 Illustrations.
London:
Thomas Murby, 1936.
Dynes, Russell Rowe. The Lisbon Earthquake in 1755:

Contested Mean-
ings of the First Modern Disaster. Newark: Disaster Research
Center,
University of Delaware, 1997.
385
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M

ay
n
ot
b
e
re
pr
od
uc
ed
i
n
an
y
fo
rm
w
it
ho
ut
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er
mi
ss
io
n
fr
om
t
he
p
ub
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sh
er
,

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ce
pt
f
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us
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HOUSTON STATE UNIV
Account: s3268531
Kendrick, T. D. The Lisbon Earthquake. London: Methuen,
1956.
Laidlar, John, comp. Lisbon. Vol. 199 in World Bibliographical
Series. Ox-
ford: ABC-Clio Press, 1997.
Mullin, John K. “The Reconstruction of Lisbon Following the
Earth-
quake of 1755: A Study in Despotic Planning.” Planning
Perspec-
tives 7 (1992): 157-179.
386
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Account: s3268531
Global Disaster Politics
Reflection Brief 02
Objective:
This exercise provides students the opportunity to submit a
deliverable based upon their
thoughtful reflection on the assigned readings covered in class
since the start of the semester.

Deadline:
This deliverable must be submitted to Blackboard by Sunday,
June 14, 2020, at 11:59 pm. In the
interest of fairness, late submissions will not be accepted.
Format Requirements:
Style:
Spacing:
Justification:
Headers:
Word Count:
Font:
Margins:
In-Text Citations:
References:
External Sources:
File Format:
File Name:
Essay Header:
Written Essay (includes introduction, main section, and
conclusion)
Double-Spaced
Full Justification
Essay must make use of section and sub-section headers, as
appropriate
Minimum of 800 words, excluding reference list; Maximum
1000 words
Times New Roman, 12-point font
1-inch margins, with page numbers
All sources must be cited in-text, choice of style up to author
All essays must include reference page, not included in
minimum word count
Do not use materials other than those assigned in class
Submit as a Microsoft Word document

Save as: “Last Name, First Name - Reflection Brief 02”
Last Name, First Name
Global Disaster Politics
Reflection Brief 02
Submission Date
Prompt:
Using the assigned course materials, answer the following
writing prompt:
1. Argue the necessity of teaching the concept of “focusing
events” to future emergency
management practitioners. Provide a rational for your argument
with close and careful
readings of the works we have covered since your last
Reflection Brief. Remember, a well-
written essay will not only clearly identify the author’s thesis,
the content that is written
in the main section of a well-written essay will be organized
into a series of sections
and/or sub-sections that logically support the essay’s
overarching thesis.
Assessment:
Additional information on the expectation for this deliverable
can be found in the Reflection Brief
Rubric, which has been posted on our Blackboard course page.
Questions:
If you have any questions or concerns, do not hesitate to contact
me at [email protected] Of

course, my ability to answer your questions or address your
concerns will depend on when you
sent me your email request for assistance. The early bird gets
the worm.
mailto:[email protected]

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