On April 30th, 1665 Samuel Pepys wrote 'Great fears of the sickenesse here in the City, it being said that two or three houses are already shut up. God preserve as all ' After these fateful words there ensued the Great Plague of London, followed swiftly by the Great Fire of London. Twenty months later, he concluded 1666 with 'Thus ends this year of publick wonder and mischief to this nation, and, therefore, generally wished by all people to have an end... publick matters in a most sad condition; ... the City less and less likely to be built again, everybody settling elsewhere, and nobody encouraged to trade ... and all sober men there fearful of the ruin of the whole kingdom this next year; from which, good God deliver us ' But his last word is 'One thing I reckon remarkable in my owne condition is, that I am come to abound in good plate, ...'. While perhaps as many as 100,000 perished and the rich fled London in the face of the plague, Pepys sent 'his wife and gold' out of the city