The effects of Fires, Plauges, and Cholera on London

Geocashing is a wonderful way of teaching people about significant locations and events in history. Last week our class learned about some horrible things that have happened in London, these things have changed London forever.
One of the first clues that we found was located at the memorial of the Fire of London. The memorial is two hundred feet high and is located in central London. The Great fire of London started from Sunday, 2 September to Wednesday, 5 September 1666. It consumed 13,200 houses, 87 parish churches, St. Paul's Cathedral, and most of the buildings of the City authorities. It is estimated that it destroyed the homes of 70,000 of the City's ca. 80,000 inhabitants. The death toll from the fire is unknown and is traditionally thought to have been small, as only six verified deaths were recorded. This reasoning has recently been challenged on the grounds that the deaths of poor and middle-class people were not recorded anywhere, and that the heat of the fire may have cremated many victims, leaving no recognizable remains.

Another thing that has had a huge impact on London has been plagues. The Great Plague (1665-1666) was a massive outbreak of disease in England that killed an estimated 100,000 people, 20% of London's population. The disease was historically identified as bubonic plague, an infection by the bacterium Yersinia pestis, transmitted through a flea.

One other place that the geocashing took us was to the John Snow Pub, where John Snow discovered the source of cholera, which was killing a lot of people in that particular section on London. Transmission to humans occurs through eating food or drinking water contaminated with cholera vibrios. The major reservoir for cholera was long assumed to be humans themselves, but considerable evidence exists those aquatic environments can serve as reservoirs of the bacteria. Once someone contracts cholera they can get sudden diarrhea where they can die with in three hours, if now medical treatment is rendered.

If I would have not participated in these geocashes I would have not learned as much about theses different things that have had a huge impact on London.