Blessed be God, at the end of the last year I was in very good health, without any sense of my old pain, but upon taking of cold.
The opening entry of Pepys’ diary reads like many a diary entry in succeeding centuries, revealing that even one of the most famous diarists of all time did not commence his journal with any sort of plan for making it a transformative document in British history. For all intents and purposes, Pepys starts out perhaps as many as hundreds of thousands blogs with the exception—of course—that he was committing to paper which could be found. Hence, the real diary contains codes that are generally not inclusive in most published versions.
This day I was informed that my Lord Lambert is got out of the Towers and that there is L100 proffered to whoever shall bring him forth to the Council of State.
One of the key elements of the diary that makes it such a valuable document is that it is offers quite literally a day-by-day first-hand account of the singular event which lent its name to an entire era of British history: the Restoration. The escape from the Tower of London by Lord Lambert, for instance, was likely of huge significance on this day in 1660 since Lambert was a hero to the Parliamentarian forces in opposition of restoring Charles II as King and reinstating the rule of monarchy. Historically, however, Lambert’s escape is a mere footnote to history.
This day I first begun to go forth in my coat and sword, as the manner now among gentlemen is.
By this time, Oliver Cromwell was dead and buried, and Charles II was back on the throne. The restoration of monarchy brought with a restoration of certain fashions that had gone severely out of style under the austere socio-political conditions under the rule of Cromwell. The diary in this way becomes really much more blog-like in that in addition to being a commentary on politics, Pepys also regularly expresses his opinion on related subjects like fashion, music, theater, and the arts.
Above 700 died of the plague this week.
Another major historical event which is covered by the time period which elapses over the course of the diary is England getting hit hard again by the Black Plague. Nearly every single daily entry of the diary in this month mentions the plague; sometimes in detail and sometimes in passing. The most chilling aspect of this entry is not the number, but the fact that it is the only line referencing the outbreak on this particular day.
…turned into St. Dunstan’s Church, where I heard an able sermon of the minister of the place; and stood by a pretty, modest maid, whom I did labour to take by the hand and the body; but she would not, but got further and further from me; and, at last, I could perceive her to take pins out of her pocket to prick me if I should touch her again — which seeing I did forbear, and was glad I did spy her design.
In addition to being a first-hand account of a moment in time marked by remarkably powerful events with a legacy which still endures, keep in mind this is a person diary that was not written as history. The diary is every bit as notorious for the author’s infamous sexual appetite as it is for eyewitness accounts of history in the making. This is actually one of the less explicit and—hard though it may be to believe—one of the less chauvinistic and voyeuristic accounts of that grossly out-of-date male sexual behavior.
By and by, they went away, and then we were at rest again; and so, the play being done, we to Islington, and there eat and drank and mighty merry; and so home singing, and, after a letter or two at the office, to bed.
This is the last entry that Pepys would make in the London he had always known. The next day everything changed not just for Pepys, but for everyone in the city, the rest of England and, to a certain extent, most of Europe.
Some of our mayds sitting up late last night to get things ready against our feast to-day, Jane called us up about three in the morning, to tell us of a great fire they saw in the City.
The most famous single event of historical importance which Pepys addresses in his diary has long since been referred to as The Great Fire of London. It has long been estimated that as few as 10,000 of the city’s population managed to escape with their homes fully intact. The fire raged across the London for nearly a week, finally being officially extinguished on September. This was the first entry he would make in what would turn out to be one of the most important written documents related to the Great Fire.
Up by five o’clock; and, blessed be God! find all well
Pepys writes how he woke up on Friday morning and went out into a London that for the first time since the middle of the night of the previous Sunday wasn’t burning. The entries in-between stand alongside those of the even more committed Restoration-era diarist John Evelyn as essential testimony to both the horrors wrought by the conflagration and the remarkable demonstrations of humanity working together toward a single purpose.
