'Perspective view of

Perspective view of...the late dreadful fire...in Cornhill...', 1748. 'Perspective view of part of the ruins of the late dreadful fire which happened in Cornhill', 25 March 1748. Engraving by William Henry Toms, published by the engineers Newsham & Ragg, London, showing their hand pumped fire engine deployed in an effort to put out the flames of a large fire that devastated Cornhill in the City of London in 1748. Spectators hold back, a man hauls a sack of possessions from a blazing house, the fire engine directs a jet of water at an upper storey window, and the tower of St Michael Cornhill stands among the rubble and ruins. Christian Newsham and George Ragg were the successors of Richard Newsham (d 1743), widely regarded as the inventor of the first modern fire-engine. ©SSPL/Science Museum