Fire Service History

We have arrived at our Modern Fire Service following many years of developing and improving. From as early as fire was first discovered man has struggled to tame the fire dragon.

The first organized firefighting is thought to have originated in the UK during the Roman occupation in AD 43.

The Roman fire brigade was a group of slaves who were hired by an aedile Marcus Egnatius Rufus. Augustus took this idea from Rufus and then built on it to form the (Vigiles) in AD 6 to combat fires using bucket brigades and pumps, as well as poles, hooks and even ballistae to tear down buildings in advance of the flames. The Vigiles patrolled the streets of Rome to watch for fires and served as the police force. The later brigades consisted of hundreds of men, all ready for action. When there was a fire, the men would line up to the nearest water source and pass buckets hand in hand to the fire.

Once the Romans left firefighting declined and during the Middle Ages some buildings, towns and villages simply burned to the ground, due to their construction, timber and thatch with an open fires inside.

Breakthrough

The key breakthrough in firefighting arrived in the 17th century with the first fire engines. Manual pumps, rediscovered in Europe after 1500 (allegedly used in Augsburg in 1518 and in Nuremberg in 1657), were only force pumps and had a very short range due to the lack of hoses.

Hans Hautsh

German inventor Hans Hautsh improved the manual pump by creating the first suction and force pump and adding some flexible hoses to the pump.

In 1672, Dutch inventor Jan Van der Heyden invented the fire hose. Constructed of flexible leather and coupled every 50 feet (15 m) with brass fittings, the length remains the standard to this day.

Over the years some parishes organised basic firefighting, but no regulations or standards were in force.

Insurance company formation

After a public outcry following, probably the most famous fire ever, the Great Fire of London, in 1666, which changed things and helped to standardise urban fire fighting.

Nicholas Barbon introduced the first kind of insurance against fire, one year after the Great Fire in 1667. Soon after the formation of this insurance company, and in a bid to help reduce the cost and number of claims, in 1680 his fire office formed the First London fire brigade.

Other private Brigades followed and this is how property was protected until 1800’s. Policy holders were given a fire mark or plate which they affixed to their property. If a fire broke out the fire brigade was called and providing it was the right fire mark it was dealt with. However many buildings were left to burn until the right fire brigade corresponding to the fire mark arrived.

Richard Newsham

The fire engine was further developed by Richard Newsham of London in 1725. Pulled as a cart to the fire, these manual pumps were manned by teams of men and could deliver up to 160 gallons per minute (12 L/s) at up to 120 feet (36 m).

James Braidwood

In 1833 many of the insurance companies merged to form The London Fire Engine Establishment, whose first Fire Chief was James Braidwood. Braidwood arrived in London from Edinburgh after holding the position of the Chief Officer of Edinburgh Fire brigade. Edinburgh's authorities had formed the first properly organised brigade in 1824.

In the mid 1850s a major change in the way fires were fought came into being, when the first reliable steam powered appliances, were adopted by brigades. These appliances replaced the manual engines and allowed a far great quantity of water to be to be directed onto a fire. These Steam powered appliances were short lived however only lasting slightly longer than 50 years due to the introduction of the internal combustion engine in the early 1900s.

James Braidwood died On 22 June 1861 his life was claimed in the Tooley Street fire at Cotton's Wharf near London Bridge Station when a falling wall crushed him to death. It took two days to recover his body and his heroism led to a massive funeral on 29 June, a public spectacle equal almost to the Tooley Street fire itself, which continued to burn for a fortnight and causing £2,000,000 damage. A London fireboat was named in his honour in the 1930s.

Other areas of the UK had either Town Fire Brigades or Volunteer Fire Brigades. It wasn't until 1938 that many of these 1500 small municipal fire brigades run by local councils in the UK were amalgamated.

AFS - NFS

In 1938 the Auxilary Fire Service followed by the National Fire Service were formed. The formation on the NFS would ensure uniformity in much of the basic equipment used by the country's Fire Brigades during what was the busiest time ever in the history of the UKs Fire Service.

Following the ending of the war the N.F.S was taken over by local County Authorities.

Fire Services Act (1947)

The introduction of the Fire Services Act (1947) became effective on the 1st of April 1948. This resulted in 148 County Council and County Borough run Fire Brigades. This act has since been updated as recently as 2004. In 1974 many brigades were amalgamated, following local government re-organisation losing many City and County Borough Fire Brigades.

More changes were carried out in 1986, and saw the formation of some Municipal Boroughs and some County Brigades were renamed. More recently, many of these Brigades being removed from Local Authority control, have become independent Fire Authorities.

Present Day

There are at present 63 brigades in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.