FIRES AND FIRE-ENGINES.

From the settlement of Philadelphia in 1682 until 1696 no public precautions seem to have been taken against fire. In the latter year the Provincial Legislature passed a law for preventing accidents that might happen by fire in the towns of Philadelphia and New Castle, by which persons were forbidden to fire their chimneys to cleanse them, or suffer them to be so foul as to take fire, under a penalty of 408., and each houseowner was to provide and keep ready a swab twelve or fourteen feet long, and a bucket or pail, under the penalty of 10s. No person should presume to smoke tobacco in the streets, either by day or night, under a penalty of 12d. All which fines were to be used to buy leather buckets and other instruments or engines against fires for the public use.

A similar act was passed in 1700, applying to Bristol, Philadelphia, Germantown, Darby, Chester, New Castle, and Lewes, providing for two leather buckets, and forbidding more than six pounds of powder to be kept in any house or shop, unless forty perches distant from any dwelling-house, under the penalty of £10. A similar law was passed in 1701, and the magistrates were also directed to procure "six or eight good hooks for tearing down houses on fire."

By various acts of Assembly the breaming of vessels with blazing fire, the firing of chimneys and the sweeping of the same, the firing of guns, squibs, and rockets, the building of bakehouses and cooper-shops, and the keeping of hay and fagots, were made the subjects of strict and particular legislation; and by two acts of April 18th, 1795, the corporation of the city was authorized to prevent the erection of wooden buildings east of Tenth street, and to see that every occupier of a house had in repair not exceeding six leather buckets, to be used only in extinguishing fires.

Of course our early ancestors got most of their ideas of public prevention of fires from the home country. After the great fire of 1666, London was divided into four divisions, provided with leather buckets, ladders, brazen hand-squirts, pick-axes, sledges, and shod shovels. Each of the twelve companies were to provide an engine, thirty buckets, three ladders, six sledges, and two hand-squirts; and some inferior companies were to have some small engines and buckets. And the aldermen were to provide themselves with twenty-four buckets and one hand-squirt each. Water was supplied to the engines and squirts by pumps in the wells and fire-plugs in the main pipes belonging to the New River and Thames waterworks. The various corporations of

mechanics each provided thirty hands of different grades, to be ready at all times to attend the mayor and sheriffalty for extinguishing fires, and various workmen, laborers, and porters were also to be always ready. By the act of 6 Anne the churchwardens of each parish were to have introduced into the mains stop-blocks of wood, with a two-inch plug and fire-cocks, so that such plugs or fire-cocks might be quickly opened and let out the water without loss of time in digging down to the pipes; they were to have a large engine and a hand-engine, and one leathern pipe and socket of the same size as the plug or firecock, that the socket might be put into the pipe to convey the water clean and without loss or help of bucket into the engine. Party-walls were also to be of brick or stone, and of a certain thickness.

In 1757 the New River Company had forty-eight main pipes of wood, of seven-inch bore, and the water was supplied to 30,000 houses by leaden pipes of half an inch bore. The Hand-in-Hand Fire Office, a mutual one, was started in 1696 by about 100 persons, to protect each other's houses. employed thirty-five men.

They

Now

Between 1768 and 1774 there were over 300 engines. there is, besides many private engines in large buildings and factories, the London Fire Brigade, established by fire insurance companies in 1833 and 1855, who have some 50 engines drawn by horses, 10 smaller drawn by hand, 2 floating-engines on the Thames worked by steam, and a number of handpumps, one on each engine. From the small size of the mains of the different water companies, the hose is not fixed directly on them, and down to 1860 they had not introduced steam fire-engines.

To return to Philadelphia. From 1701 to 1736 the means of extinguishing fires were principally provided by the corporation of the city. In 1718, Abraham Bickley, a public-spirited merchant, owned an engine, which was probably imported from England, and supposed to be still in existence in Bethlehem, which Councils agreed to buy in Dec., 1718, and agreed in Dec., 1719, to pay him £50 for it. This is the first engine we have distinct reference to. This engine being unable to contend with the great fire of 1730, which destroyed the store near Fishbourne's wharf and Jonathan Dickinson's fine house-a loss of £5000-led to the purchase of three more engines by the city and four hundred leather buckets, twenty ladders, and twentyfive hooks, an assessment of twopence per pound and eight shillings per head being laid to pay for the same. Abraham Bickley was a merchant, Common Councilman, member of the Assembly, and alderman. He died in 1726; another Abraham Bickley, most probably a son, died in 1744.

In July, 1729, George Claypoole agreed to keep the fire-engine

in good repair, and play the same every month, for £3 per annum; but he declined it the next month, and Richard Armitt undertook it instead. James Barrett was paid £6 for twelve fire-buckets taken from him at a fire in Chestnut street. In January, 1731,

two of the engines arrived, with 250 buckets, from England, and the third engine was built here by Anthony Nicholls in 1733, and the other buckets were manufactured here. This was the first fire-engine built in this city. It was operated in January, 1733, and played water higher than the highest in this city had from London." This was the first he made, and he expected to make several others, but the Councils thought the bill was too great; that the engine was very heavy and unwieldy, and required much labor to work it; that some parts were made of wood instead of brass, and they feared it would not last long. In December, 1733, there appeared in Franklin's Pennsylvania Gazette an article on fires and their origin, and on the mode of putting them out. Some months later, in February, 1735, there appeared another article on hints for preventing fires, suggestions that public pumps should be built, a plan for organizing a club or society for putting out fires, after the manner of one in a neighboring city (Boston?), and a suggestion that the roofs should be covered with tiles, and the brick walls be carried up above the eaves for greater safety in walking on them. This latter essay was signed "A. A.," probably Anthony Atwood, a well-known citizen, but was supposed to have been written by Franklin himself, for he says in his Autobiography: "About this time I read a paper [in the Junto] on the different accidents and carelessness by which houses were set on fire, with cautions against them and means proposed for avoiding them. This was much spoken of as a useful piece, and gave rise to a project, which soon followed, of forming a company for the more ready extinguishment of fires and mutual assistance in removing and securing of goods when in danger. Associates in this scheme were presently found amounting to thirty. Our articles of agreement obliged every member to keep always in good order and fit for use a certain number of leather buckets, with strong bags and baskets (for packing and transporting of goods), which were to be brought to every fire; and we agreed to meet once a month and spend a social evening together in discoursing and communicating such ideas as occurred to us upon the subject of fires as might be useful in our conduct on such occasions.

"The utility of this institution soon appeared, and many more desiring to be admitted than we thought convenient for one company, they were advised to form another, which was accordingly done; and this went on, one company being formed after another, until they became so numerous as to include most of the inhabitants who were men of property; and now at the time of writing this, though upward of fifty years since its establishment, that

which I first formed, called the Union Fire Company, still exists, though the first members are all deceased but myself and one who is older by a year than I am."

It will thus be seen, and by the "Articles of the Union Fire Company of Philadelphia, originally formed December 7, 1736," that Franklin was the founder of the first fire company, and that it was in 1736, and not 1738, as Watson states, Vol. I. 497. The following were also early members: Isaac Paschal, Philip Syme, William Rawle, Samuel Powell. The engine was most probably kept in a house in Grindstone alley, above Market street. Each member at his own cost was to provide six leather buckets and two bags of four yards of good osnaburgs or wider linen. The bags and baskets were for packing and transporting of goods. Upon the alarm of fire being given each member was to repair with half of his buckets and bags to the fire to extinguish it and preserve the goods. Precautions were taken to prevent suspicious persons from carrying away goods by stationing two members at the door, and lights were to be placed in the adjoining houses, so that persons might be recognized. The number of members was restricted to thirty, and this being filled up within a year, the second company was formed, and its institution dated March 1st, 1738, under the name of the Fellowship Fire Company, with thirty-five members. Its engine was located in a house on a lot on Second street near Market belonging to the Friends' Meeting. The ladder was kept under the eaves of the butchers' shambles on the south side, near to the meal-market. There were also seven ladders in various other places. The third company, the Hand-in-Hand, was formed March 1st, 1742, with forty members; the fourth company, the Heart-in-Hand, February 22d, 1743, with forty members; the fifth company, the Friendship, July 30th, 1747, with forty members; the sixth company, the Britannia, about 1750 or 1751; but little is known of this company, and it is probable it was disbanded in preRevolutionary times on account of its name. Of the other companies, a return was made in 1791 of the condition of their engines, buckets, ladders, bags, baskets, and hauses or hose; of the latter the Union had eighty feet, and the Friendship one hundred and twenty feet. Each of the companies had an engine imported from England, and the Friendship had two; the latter had also two hundred and forty buckets, or more than either of the others except the Union. Fortunately, the number of fires was not great; the largest conflagration was of Hamilton's buildings at the Drawbridge, consisting of several stores filled with produce, etc.

In 1768, Richard Mason, "living at the upper end of Second street," made fire-engines. He was the first to introduce levers at the ends instead of at the sides of the engine. He made a fourth-class one for the Northern Liberty Company in October,

and a number of others up to 1801. Philip Mason also built several engines between 1797 and 1801. Samuel Briggs also built two between 1791 and 1796, but they were not successful.

In 1770 the Sun Fire Company applied to the board to permit their engine to stand in one of the new houses at the east end of the stalls to the eastward of the court-house; which was granted. The before-mentioned builders were superseded by the celebrated Patrick Lyon. About 1794 he invented an improved engine, which he claimed would throw more water and with greater force than any other. He does not, however, seem to have accomplished much until 1803, when he made machines for the Philadelphia and Goodwill. After these he built a number as late as 1824, when he built the Reliance. The "Old Diligent," made by him, maintained its usefulness and celebrity until the introduction of steam fire-engines.

In 1809 the Philadelphia Hose Company determined to build a combined engine and hose, which was finally completed after the designs of James Sellers, an ingenious member, in 1814. It carried the hose on two cylinders, but was too heavy. This was superseded in 1817 by the Hydraulion, a style of machine which was adopted by several other companies.

Perkins & Jones built an engine for the Harmony in 1816 on the plan of Joseph M. Trueman. Sellers & Pennock built a few engines between 1820 and 1827, and Joel Bates between 1827 and 1840. Merrick & Agnew, Perkins & Bacon, and John Agnew were also celebrated makers. The latter was the most noted until the introduction of steam fire-engines, of which the first was built in London by Mr. Braithwaite in 1830. In 1841, Mr. Hodges of New York built one for the associated insurance companies, and in 1853, A. B. Latta of Cincinnati built the first one that might be said to be practical and not too heavy.

An act passed by the Assembly in 1731 prohibited coopers and bakers from plying their trades in shops unless built of brick or stone, with a large chimney within them, and various other precautions added. Fines for violation of the precautions were to be devoted to purchasing fire-buckets and engines. Haystacks were not allowed within one hundred feet of any building, nor a larger number of fagots than two hundred.

In 1736 another great fire occurred, in which several houses in "Budd's Long Row," Front street near the Drawbridge, were much injured. This fire gave rise to the Union Fire Company, established Dec. 7, 1736. With this and the other companies that started soon after commenced the volunteer fire system of Philadelphia.

The Hibernia, whose constitution was adopted February 20, 1752, required each member to have two leathern buckets, twc bags, and a large wicker basket with two handles, all marked with his name and that of the company, and kept ready at hand.