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confessed to being part of a grand Catholic conspiracy. Hubert claimed that he, along with a group of co-conspirators, had intentionally started the fire at the Pudding Lane bakery by pushing a fireball through a window on the end of a long pole. To anyone looking at the facts with a cool, rational mind, Hubert's confession was absolute nonsense. For starters, Thomas Farriner's bakery did not even have a window in the location Hubert described. Furthermore, the captain of the ship that had brought Hubert to England testified under oath that the young Frenchman had not even landed in the country until two days after the fire had already started. But the court, pressured by a vengeful public and a government desperate to deflect blame from its own incompetence, chose to ignore these inconvenient truths. Even the judge openly admitted that he did not believe Hubert was guilty, describing him as "disorganized in mind." Yet, the legal machinery of the era, much like the rigid bureaucracy that had prevented the Lord Mayor from acting on Sunday morning, demanded a resolution. Robert Hubert was found guilty of arson and sentenced to death. On October 27, 1666, he was hanged at Tyburn. It was only after his death that the city officially accepted that he had been completely innocent, a tragic sacrifice to the gods of public hysteria and political convenience. As for Thomas Farriner, the man who had actually left the oven embers burning, he escaped almost entirely unscathed by the blame. He gave evidence at the inquiry, vehemently denying that his oven could have been the source of the fire. He insisted that he had personally checked the oven and that it was cold when he went to bed. The committee, perhaps eager to focus on the foreign conspiracy angle, chose to believe him. Farriner went back to his trade, rebuilt his bakery on the very same spot in Pudding Lane, and continued to bake bread for the rest of his days, proving that in Britain, sometimes the best way to survive a disaster of your own making is to simply carry on as if nothing had happened. Resilience and the Ruined City By Wednesday, September 5, the wind finally died down. The firebreaks created by the navy's gunpowder began to hold, and the great fire was finally brought under control. The scene that greeted the survivors was one of absolute desolation. Approximately four-fifths of the city inside the ancient Roman walls had been completely destroyed. Over 13,200 houses, 87 parish churches, The Royal Exchange, Guildhall, and St. Paul's Cathedral were gone. The heart of the nation's economy lay in ashes. Yet, amid the ruins, the resilient character of the common Londoners began to shine through. Tens of thousands of people were now living in makeshift tents and wooden shacks in Moorfields, a large open area north of the city. They had lost everything, yet there was a remarkable absence of rioting or despair. Instead, a strange, festive atmosphere began to develop in the refugee camps. Enterprising merchants set up temporary stalls to sell food and beer. The printing presses, which had survived by being moved out of the city, began to churn out pamphlets and broadsides filled with that unique brand of British humor that uses irony to cope with catastrophe. Ballads were written about the fire, mocking the Lord Mayor's cowardice and celebrating the survival of the city's famous taverns. The King, recognizing the danger of having eighty thousand homeless, frustrated citizens gathered in one place, took practical steps to prevent famine. He ordered that bread be brought